dusty handprint
of smacking wave
haults
lingering stars.
the ocean,
the master,
in black night.
-------------------
I feel it was a past life, or perhaps merely a fragmented dream lost in drunken sleep that i lay in solemn thought, comfortably buried in a sea of blankets accenting pillowed mountain atop ragged mattress on cracked wooden floor. Familiar tapestries, my little black shelf before me. Incense burning, slowly intoxicating, and the smell of which still lingers on the canvas bag riding next to me, my only companion. Now those walls are bare, another memory latched to the back of the eyes, the mind, and the soul. A vision like the corn rolling by, a pale blur of greens and yellows out the window beside me. The smell of shit is faint, but there. I've smelled worse. I keep finding tiny sand grains clinging to my skin and clothes and I hope that they stay, smiling back on that last pleasant dip in the atlantic this morning, sand hot as hellfire. I'm alone now, as I was then and am most times. Out the the window the sun is setting. Corn has turned to trees. Right now my little bag the only companion I desire of the passengers on this bus. A wanderer at last and for the next two months I'm free to see all the lands I want through these windows. It's becoming too dark to write and my train of thought is fleeing. I feel happy and home out here on the road.
The impending darkness of night that surrounds and provides sanctuary on a packed greyhound bus is on hiatus, replaced by the familiar tinge of florescent light bouncing off loud marble floors and wire benches, always lacking the appropriate number of armrests. Two hour layover. I'm thinking back on the beauty of bus stop number one of this long journey ahead. A wooden shack attached to KK's Foodmart in Elizabeth City but really nowhere, North Carolina. Flies buzzing all around, crunch of foodstamp chips from waiting mouths in all directions, one hour from the shore i've been playing on for the past few days. Now I realize the perfection (the imperfect perfection for nothing is perfect I suppose) in it all, starting on that eastern shore, feet in the water, back to the ominous sea and every sweet possibility of the adventure to come sprawled out before me.
A few minutes left to step out for a cigarette before the bus departs and I may enjoy the darkness once again, perhaps sleep, but probably not. The mind is running rampant with thought, the body still not used to sleeping alone, and Jersey awaits with the rising sun.
-------------------
The bus was too cold for comfortable rest in cut-off shorts, I remained awake for most of the ride eventually dozing off to bukowski's drunken drawl emananating from my headphones. Shortly after, I was stirred awake by the driver's voice and fumbling of bags and feet. More resting of eyes on a lone bench in the Penn Station Newark until swept off to sleepy dreamworld on comfy leather couch in Hillside, New Jersey. Awake to drinks, talks, food, drinks, talks. Radiohead helped guide the tour while Steve showed me each tiny corner of his childhood and beyond. Gothic churches lurking in shadows where cigarettes were once secretively smoked, school bell chiming for the changing of classes somewhere not far in the distance. Buildings long since burnt, streets corrupt, the strange beauty of industrial wasteland illuminated by the setting sun. An abundance of Hispanics, nail salons, skeevy fried chicken joints, and chinese takeout. Scenes of former car crashes, deaths of friends, past jobs (and ten years later old John still pushing carts), parking spots in dark parks once shared with summer lovers, now awaiting the nights drunks and dealers. Out for more drinks, new people, more talks, drinks, drinks. Everyone looks frozen going nowhere here, the bartender's nylons two shades too pale and I think the bouncer to be a vampire after last call. Well, hello, Jersey, your history is rugged sweet to the ear and the eye and the mind and sleep must be indulged before the boozy haze fades into nowhere, as it tends to do. Philadelphia awaits, dreams of fireworks and cheesesteaks and city smells like grease flying from a street vendor entwined with bus exhaust and pretzel salt. It is July fourth, sometime after four a.m. It's been a year now since smoke poured from my car in a heap of twisted metal and broken glass and everything hazy but soon the blue lights flashing and the feel of the cold jail cell cement awaiting powdered egg and mushy bread and drunken empty months to come. try to think thoughts of cheese and steak and little travels in the new day, my eyes are closing and I don't wish to dream of that past life tonight.
--------------------
Steve is still sleeping, his apartment is freezing. I'm excited for my morning coffee and the day's little excursion to Philly. The Roots are playing a free show before the fireworks and no driving, this year. Life has evolved into something much too glorious for written word. I hear the buzz of an electric razor, the tell-tale sign of a man awake.
---------------------
Hillside is filled with little roadside diners, the kind of joint your grandpa takes you to for sunday brunch during the youthful years. Twenty later, late night, chain-smoking, sharing laughs over little hilarities enhanced by the drink and long talks of life and the great philosophy or perhaps conspiracy behind it all. Forty later, lurking over eggs and toast, coffee in shakey drunken hand. No more cigarette in here, the law has spoken. Early morning, late night, all the same, never did leave town like you said, remained to waste away as the coffee pot dispenses it's last drop. step outside for a smoke, cold ripping away at your bare hands while the next pot brews inside and your eggs grow cold...
Well, I'm only passing through and find great joy in this place, the Mark Twain, the best french toast my tongue's ever tasted. Eggs overflow from their perch atop giant fluffy hotcakes, bacon sprawled over top, sausage links on the sides like little syrup catchers, not so little.
Bellies full, off to Philly at last. The Roots were great, people everywhere. God Bless America actually means something tonight, (sans God) as I've set out to travel it far and wide. Scurry off for drinks until last call comes too early. Late night ride back to Jersey munching sandwiches, great music, cigs in hand, wind in hair, dozing off every other song till we arrive at last and sound sleep awaits.
-------------------
on the train to New York City now. Step out of Penn Station and found myself at home, love at first sight. Steam from first vendor finds it's way to my nose. I love to let myself get carried along by the hustle and bustle in a big new city, so easy to join the flow, squinting eyes and squishing nose, plowing forward like i've somewhere to be, someone to meet, a ride to catch. Really I'm just a wanderer, nowhere to be except anywhere and everywhere I want. I break this face, giggle and light a smoke as I pass a suited man, shoulders forward and eyes focused with forehead wrinkled in hurried stress, matching the precise face of my imitation. A family full of I Love NewYork tees being dragged by father's hand, child crying, so lost and uneasy and rushed, what a vacation. One can only be so lost on numbered streets, my friend.
Dug the city, return alone tomorrow after I part with Steve in the morning.
------------------
Took the first shower I've had since Thursday morning (its Sunday, now, July 5th, 2009). Bathing is overrated and I never do it in excess. I let the water drip from my body, still deep tan from the north carolina shore of a week ago, and allow sleepiness to seep in. Everything has been beautiful so far and tomorrow I return to the big city.
-----------------
its early now, seven a.m., been awake since six. Steve is in the shower, Im all packed up, my one little bag, and fixing a few peanut butter sandwiches with honey for the road.
---------------------------
Back in the Penn Station Newark, now, waiting on the 9:05 to New York. It is 8:24 and I want an apple juice. I'm sitting on the same bench I arrived at on Friday morning, and one of the same characters sits across from me. Purple stretch pants, silly hat, crazed face. A man drops a dollar just now, dressed in a nice suit headed to the nine to five. A second man goes out of his way to ensure the dollar returns to hand of its owner. I love every little moment of kindness still existing in this world. I'm thirsty as hell, must locate apple juice before the bus whisks me away from a fine Jersey weekend. My feet are tapping anxiously, I notice, they crave those big city Monday streets, themselves being far removed from 'the routine'. Just a day of play ahead until darkness falls and the road carries me along, every day closer to that Western shore I've so anticipated, but no rush, there's so much to dig along the way. And I am, and I will.
I'm beginning to grow a fondness towards the chucka'chucka'chucka of the train schedule board as it shuffles every few moments.
--------------------
Washington Square Park, 2:00 p.m. on a Monday
Just laying here is all, really, the sun is beating down and a variety of lovely skins all around, different shades and exposures and firmnesses. thoughts everywhere, wish I could read them all. A giant thought bubble envisioned overtop this grassy knoll. As your cigarette burns down to the filter, what brings on that look of dismay? Like that filter is your time run out. Innocent baby sucking bottle that has grown empty in woman's arms who notices not as a reminiscent stare remains fixated on that fountain beyond the benches. This is a beautiful gathering of souls. Searching for a song, uplifting a thought to the clouds hoping for an answer with the rain to come, catching eyes or maybe thought waves. Sweat is dripping from my brow and soaking through my shirt but I don't want to abandon this scene, not yet. Seven or so hours till the bus carries me on my way.
The flies here are mutants.
Among all these cigarette smokers so intense, a small girl picking nose, just picking, not a care.
----------------------------------
8:00 p.m New York City Greyhound Station
dried sweat sits on my skin, I'm exhausted and ready for sleep or at least a dark, quiet ride. I'll be home in the morning. Looking forward to familiar faces. One hour till departure. Still have two sandwiches. Hoping for a seat alone and glad for the second bus with no layover. Little sideways glances always makes me wonder what they're wondering.
----------------------------------------
awoken in pittsburgh, 4 a.m. to the unsure closure of tabs, empty cigarette pack, step outside to smoke the last one.
5:17 a.m. a car starting and one's morning already beginning.
belly still full of beer. eat a bit but no revival of memory.
--------------------------------------
reading over wierd drunken ramblings from the morning, sitting on a shady bench off of 31st and East Carson Street. I feel like nothing will make this hangover go away. Spent too much money here as I expected. Anticipating the ride ten hours from now, one more catch up to to later on, probably over drinks, fuck. I get sick of being around people and can't wait to rest my eyes and open them to somewhere new and sleep away that day-after-drunk tinge that lingers on my skin. It was good to spend a day at home but I"m ready to travel on. My face is breaking out. I have no urge to get up from this bench for the next ten hours.
------------------------------
transferred to the tenth street benches. I remember a day a year and a half ago maybe, I was smoking a bowl by the river after a long day at work. I waited in line at the burger king on 18th for half an hour for a vanilla milkshake but the machine was broken. i walked to dairy queen on 10th (which i'm looking at now and striked this memory), and walked the entire way home, sipping slowly, enjoying all taste and cool, slipping feelingfully. It was one of those perfect days after a long winter, not quite hot yet but you know the cold has gone for good. my ipod was on shuffle and every song was beautiful, a rarity. I exalted in great thoughts and simple pleasures enjoyed for three miles. it was one of the most pleasant highs of my life.
----------------------------------
12:30 p.m. Thursday. Chicago. Lake Michigan.
The sun feels nice on this bed of hot concrete. I keep seeing little ducks out of the corner of my eye. Boats clinking together on Lake Michigan create a soothing rhythm in perfect tone with teh gentle slosh of the water against the harbor. Spent the morning lost downtown after an uncomfortable night's sleep on the bus from Pittsburgh. Pure business mania, suits and ties and the clicking of heels. Was pleased to come upon Millenium Park, children screaming with joy in giant fountains, many unexpected visual stimulations, and then I reached the lake i'd searched for all morning long and have been laying here exhausted, taking photos and enjying the day. I was here two summers ago, passing through after a week of drunken and exhilerating adventures to the badlands, south dakota. Well,I spent that day vomiting in the parking garage down the road from where I now sit. This is a much better day. I"m unsure how to reach kuma's corner but my tummy is rumbling so i'll carry on and figure it out somehow.Last good meal before tonight's bus leaves and the two and a half day ride to Portland begins.
First I think i'll enjoy a smoke and exalt in the tranquil separation of this scene.
Wanderer, at last, everything feels right.
A mallard lingers by me, velveteen head of rich jungle green. Gave one quack and drifted on. Goodbye little one.
-----------------------------------
worst food pain ever, kuma's corner. but nonetheless i had to do it and it was fucking amazing to my taste buds. and naturally the india pale ale was too tasty for just one also filling up space in my belly. money is bullshit therefore i chose to spend what i normally would have in half a month in one sitting. oh well, it was beautiful. a few hours till departure, hopefully this feeling will cease a bit by then. i long to be back on lake michigan, hungry lying down in hot sun.
-------------------------------
exquisitly strange are the words I would choose to describe the last twenty hours on the bus. thirty to go until portland. Crazed one in front of me picking away at scabs on head, stale drool encrusted on face, picking away at those scabs like your brain has inevitably picked at. terrible but shared great laughs over this with kind old candy giving lady in adjacent seat and my partner in three day bus ride crime, william, more on that later. sat by adam last night, cool dreadie hippie with warm sleeping bag to save us on a cool overnight ride from chicago to minneapolis. great conversation shared, silly laughs all throughout the night. felt like a childhood sleepover giggling under the little children's sleeping bag he acquired from someone along the road. flat land ha sbeen rolling by all day and it is four p.m. now. the redundance is beginning to lull me to sleep. the miles to rapid city are not decreasing rapidly and signs pop up just enough to remind one that they are nowhere close, like watching minutes drag by on an old rolling time clock, (like that one february 2006 after kwesi's funeral waiting in line for fried chicken our little group passing clock just as it rolled from 4:19 to 4:20. i hope life after life here is treating you well, man.) or your money points dwindling close to zero and payday not quite just around the corner. like waiting for your number called on a busy day at the meat market.
tired, just wanted to jot down vague thoughts and memories.
-------------------------------
except for unsure spurts of sleep affected heavily by lack of space and the bobblehead syndrome, I would say I've been awake for the past fifty-five hours. The final stretch of the ride has come at last, carrying us through what i believe still to be rolling Idaho hills, soon to arrive on the west coast. This last bus is finally quiet with a seat of my own to stretch my legs and gather my thoughts. It's saturday, around one in the afternoon, western time now. It has been one non-stop wild ride since boarding in Chicago on Thursday. Trail mix and whole grain crackers with cheddar cheese have tided me well, taking care those days to only spend money on coffee, milk, juice, and smokes. I know I will spend most of my dollars on good foods throughout the journey however otherwise and overall simplicity and minimalism are things Ive come to seek and embrace more each day over the past few years.
there's been an eclectic mix over the days, for sure. You must always open your eyes and mind and heart wide as you can, fear no conversation, no other, and no expanse of solitude. You'll miss the beauty in so many people and things and in yourself. We became a little family over the past three days on our overcrowded bus late for every destination and so glad we could make light of it all. Slightly peeved and annoyed I no doubt was as my big seat to myself on first day was overtaken by "muscles" who as i suspected became annoying at times but for the most part was a most unexpectedly joyous and memorable compadre of the open roads. Brought me to tears with laughter every day and became somewhat the ringleader of our little bunch. A veteran of the hounded roads, appreciating unexpecedly and fully how 'beautiful the ride has been" and always is, in whatever way. Turns out the nazi from the back of the bus wasn't after all. Merely a botched ink job we all thought to be a swastika until South Dakota and the truth was settled over joints behind desolate truck stop with fluffy bleached white clouds popping from radiant blue sky, bales of hay and golden stalks of corn, surreal and raising memory of years past. As the sun set I let my mind drift back to that roadtrip back in sumer of 2007 to the badlands, south dakota. that life changing sky. I knew one day I would find it again.
Montana is the most gorgeous mountain painting I"ve ever seen and long to stop but we must carry on to teh coast, no time for rest only snapping unjust photos through bug-splattered bus window. joints talks, laughs, joints, pizza, unexpected closing of eyes. Hours away from a girl i've never met in Portland, Oregon and all I crave right now is a shower and a couch to rest for hours on end for the first time in a week. Two days to see my baby after three weeks and I smile because its great to have someone to miss this much. Its been a monumental ride, these three days, ineed and I don't want it to end. How people loathe the bus days and nights (all the same on the road) i'l never know. I delight in every second seeing the country fly by. Luck with crowds and smells and understanding amongst souls so different but the same somehow and ending just right in quiet, empty, reflective bus. phone dead, ipod dead, no distraction. Justice can't be done to this ride. priceless.
pretty little waterfall barely spotted in the distance just now. this is the life for me.
eliminate fear from your being and all that you touch with your hand and your vision beam and your eager tongue and tender nose and mountain popping ears and your most genuine soul will fill you with gladness and knowledge and beauty in every form. do every little thing your heart desires without hesitation. you will find answers you never knew you were seeking.
I just closed my eyes and lost sense of weight and time and place and of existing in a body, in this vessel of skin and bones and internal fascinations.
I think I just experienced my first true moment of enlightenment.
------------------------------------
17.8.09
split-second satori beneath a virginian wave, crashed june 25th 2009.
approach tenderly
her majesty.
toes sink into
the divine,
sway
with the essence,
life's fierce and delicate bath,
rushing towards
toes removed
to sink again,
closer,
the beauty in becoming one.
consumed.
the world above skips
no beat.
hide forever
in this second,
split.
rolling,
body surrendered,
senses dulled.
but the touch,
regal.
toes sinking.
emerging from this sanctuary
the senses quiver,
see the circus
unaffected.
the show must go on.
in latter moment,
(release of the body to vast mother)
broken idea of time
escaped.
yonder realm reached
by eager child,
eyes open wide
into the sun.
21.4.09
olds.
from sometime in november 2008
Oh, reclusive night. Or is this morning?
Vanilla aura inhaled, my mind seems to speak so loud and clear in the silence.
The meager stash of nag champa that traveled with me during the move to Virginia has been just enough to suit. Before fleeing the burgh I made sure to stock up at nick's imports and after three years of my faithful business I feel almost guilty going elsewhere to replenish my supply. His genuine greetings on the street each day just one more thing I miss about the steel city.
My supply has dwindled and for quite some time now I have been clinging to my final stick not wanting to burn it down on any moment that wasn't fitting or meant to be paired with that soothing earthy aroma.
My mind and soul have been writhing since July and lately for the first time I have sensed that I was lingering on the brink of enlightenment. The reason, the only one thing I’ve been waiting for, so long in fact I’d begun to doubt its existence. Although, silly me, I have always believed there is a reason for everything, and self doubt paves only a road of self destruction. But I have to be ready to receive the reasons I suppose. Close my mind even a smidge and freedom is not able to set me free,
"before you can see the light you must learn to deal with the darkness"
since right after the accident that fortune has been sitting on my dresser. Every day if not more than once I have looked at it. Maybe today will be the day but have I not BEEN dealing? So much darkness maybe everything I have ever believed is nothing. No darling you weren't dealing with anything you were putting it off and closing your mind. Through trial and error and sleepless nights and bouts of depression and neglecting company and doubting all that you are, and you just wanted to know WHY. But you had to learn. And you were learning the entire time and now that light is finally there and everything makes sense and the hands of understanding are working the knots from your back and its relief like you have never known.
I feared that this had all been for nothing, even all along, my whole existence so far.
I have been draining myself continually but it was as though I was just draining right back into myself and suffering this miserable standstill and only to drain and redrain again and again and again and now in this ordinary of nights and the final stick burning and my senses feeling different I realize it has finally come and why so long is a mystery of sorts and I’m finally draining OUT instead of recycling that filth.
all these months depraved, up so high and down so low, snorting mental and emotional rails of doubt and negativity and letting that pride the fucking monster cut itself into the drug. I became the unlikely addict of this meaningless world that will suck you in so hard and so fast you don't realize you have let it because it waits patiently to sting until you are at your most vulnerable and then the venom is oozing in your veins and you didn't even realize you had become so weak to let this happen.
oh god the denial all this time and I knew it had to stop but I kept snorting it all in only to fall back down and this happened over and over until months later it smacks me in the fucking head like a shit-ton of bricks. And now the venom starts to drain and I’m not feeling that drip anymore, it had become comfortable, welcome, with it I knew would come escape from what is real. And now it is gone and they all still love it, but baby you know you never liked it anyhow, that god awful drip that all addicts seem to adore, and did I actually convince myself that I did too?
the last nag champic ember releases its red glow and the ash falls into my little ceramic thrift store bowl and the smell permeates the room and I realize that last stick is now gone. But its three a.m. and the dancing flame on the wick of the vanilla candle beside it is sticking it out with me and now that the drain has begun I can smell it for the first time. and be aware, it is plentiful and has burned for hours so many times since the move and tonight I mean I can really fucking smell it and I swear to god every other time I have thought it to be the worst candle because it had no smell but it was kind of pretty and burned so long so I kept on. and I’m feeling so free from all these burdens that I can finally smell that smell and I can feel that smell and I can see that smell and my relief right now is so great I think I may even hear that smell.
And it is all so good.
My heart races randomly. I sensed the healing properties of the night tonight upon the arrival, start, and completion, of lonesome traveler and have been working on a pot of coffee I brewed around midnight. I’ve had too much I’m getting anxious and writing feverishly and my heart is beating way too fast. But I need the night sometimes. I am able to feel so alone (and good alone, mind you) in a house full of heavy sleepers with my bed and my books and my little flame and the silence playing in the darkness out there. And I can't even feel that alone when physically, in an empty house in the day, I am really alone, if you get what I’m saying...
I was a creature of the night even at nine years old. Sitting in front of the shrink and not knowing how to explain to her why I, this poor scrawny little child, was not sleeping at all for so many years. Up all night until dawn the mind so alive and when that dawn is about to break I guess I dozed off most times around then until the Winnie the Pooh alarm clock is wailing for school. , the daily grind. the conformist force-fed societal regime that I can't escape and I’m only in third grade and I have so, so long to go it seemed and that night is all I have but when I am hitting the snooze button I never know what to think. for the journey to sleep was so long and so exhausting for me and I was unsure whether I had ever really been sleeping at all...
well now that I have babbled myself completely off track... all I have wanted is the reason for the accident and all the trouble that has followed. Why I had to fall and get back up only to fall right back down again. Blessings disguised as curses perhaps is what they all have been. And the gift had to keep on giving until I recognized it has such.
Minimalism. Get back to what you need. I became over-indulgent somewhere. I lost track. Worrying myself to misery over all this debt and it doesn't matter and it never did because I had all I needed. And it was so much at once (and I was never used to being so on top of things) I wasted it and I let it eat away at me like every other drooling hyena of this world. At any given point and time in your life (and if you do this wrong you won't realize it until you look back and retrace your steps and now I know this) you have everything you need. There is enough. Or there is the resource to acquire enough. And don't worry about the future if you are being resourceful and wise with what you have and not materialistic, not blind, as I became. Don’t worry about the future because in the future if you aren't worrying yourself with all the shiny objects then at that time you will also have what you need. So live in the now and do it right. If I had only been more humble and not so over indulgent when deep down I knew it was wrong and not myself, I would have had every penny I needed to pay this debt before it became so. I would have had just the amount I needed each time another expense arose. but I took for granted the helping hand and the line of credit and I threw it all away on nothing tangible because I don't even remember what and now I see why this all happened and its ok. And now the money has been coming in the smallest of spurts and each time it comes another little expense or trouble arrives at my door. and I huff and puff and then I stop because why am I doing so when I have everything that I NEED and I will pay with this small trickle of money that is just enough with just enough left over to sustain and I will STILL have just what I NEED.
Jesus fucking christ am I even making sense because sometimes these thoughts come at me so fast and I start writing so fast I can't even read it then I start typing but it is coming out so fast my thoughts run over themselves then its a big heaping plate of everything but the kitchen sink and does it make sense like it makes sense in my head?
I drank way too much fucking coffee. I feel like I’m going to die.
Last night. Hours at the dive and its last call and we carry on the drink at home and
"you just described yourself and everything you hate and its all the same"
a very, very late night conversation on the meaning of life, a debacle of sorts, the mind coaxed open by just the right dose of the drink, and finally! My conversee catches my bluff. And in one sentence pulled from my own mouth and shown back to myself in its falsehood due to the way I had been living. And I was exposed to myself and the faults of late. Finally. and this is why I didn't understand all this time.
some days later and I’m not at home and I have to awake in an hour and I shouldn't fall asleep because I’ll be late for my appointment. My appointment which I am having to attend each month because of the accident because I was an irresponsible drunk behind the wheel all those years. And it is so much fucking money for nothing and if I’m late it is that much more. I’m complaining even though it is all a result of my own carelessness and my own faults and my own over indulgence.and now the alarm has been blasting for an hour and I’m late and I’m angry because I just received this small amount of money after I have had none for weeks and now that I’m late even more is going to be gone and why am I angry when I still have enough and will still have just enough left over and its all I need and knowing good and well I would do nothing but drink the late fee I’m now paying in the nights to come anyhow...
my god this is it, my bluff called not only a day or maybe two prior. And here it is in my sober face bright and early and head throbbing. So I go and I’m late and I fork it over and it is all so strange and beautiful to me at last, this life of mine.
Solitary night following (which is still now in progress) and it cost me nothing more than I already did not have before and I realize that I have alas LEARNED to DEAL with the darkness. I was simply EXISTING in the darkness before and I thought my misery was somehow "dealing with". There are unavoidable things and one cannot complain or you will miss out on all life is offering and I have been missing out but now I understand it all. I was a hypocrite and now the boozy haze gone and the reflection of the statement of another and the test that followed settles in. and now all the pieces of the past four months fit and I had started to think they never would.
I lost my trust in sustaining simply through lust for life. I guess this is the reason why everything since the move has occurred not just the accident. because now I understand the who and the what the how and the when and the where and the WHY of all these things that have happened to me and why these people have come and gone and why they happened and came and went when they did.
One always has just what one needs and from there life is in your hands and no one else's.
Oh, reclusive night. Or is this morning?
Vanilla aura inhaled, my mind seems to speak so loud and clear in the silence.
The meager stash of nag champa that traveled with me during the move to Virginia has been just enough to suit. Before fleeing the burgh I made sure to stock up at nick's imports and after three years of my faithful business I feel almost guilty going elsewhere to replenish my supply. His genuine greetings on the street each day just one more thing I miss about the steel city.
My supply has dwindled and for quite some time now I have been clinging to my final stick not wanting to burn it down on any moment that wasn't fitting or meant to be paired with that soothing earthy aroma.
My mind and soul have been writhing since July and lately for the first time I have sensed that I was lingering on the brink of enlightenment. The reason, the only one thing I’ve been waiting for, so long in fact I’d begun to doubt its existence. Although, silly me, I have always believed there is a reason for everything, and self doubt paves only a road of self destruction. But I have to be ready to receive the reasons I suppose. Close my mind even a smidge and freedom is not able to set me free,
"before you can see the light you must learn to deal with the darkness"
since right after the accident that fortune has been sitting on my dresser. Every day if not more than once I have looked at it. Maybe today will be the day but have I not BEEN dealing? So much darkness maybe everything I have ever believed is nothing. No darling you weren't dealing with anything you were putting it off and closing your mind. Through trial and error and sleepless nights and bouts of depression and neglecting company and doubting all that you are, and you just wanted to know WHY. But you had to learn. And you were learning the entire time and now that light is finally there and everything makes sense and the hands of understanding are working the knots from your back and its relief like you have never known.
I feared that this had all been for nothing, even all along, my whole existence so far.
I have been draining myself continually but it was as though I was just draining right back into myself and suffering this miserable standstill and only to drain and redrain again and again and again and now in this ordinary of nights and the final stick burning and my senses feeling different I realize it has finally come and why so long is a mystery of sorts and I’m finally draining OUT instead of recycling that filth.
all these months depraved, up so high and down so low, snorting mental and emotional rails of doubt and negativity and letting that pride the fucking monster cut itself into the drug. I became the unlikely addict of this meaningless world that will suck you in so hard and so fast you don't realize you have let it because it waits patiently to sting until you are at your most vulnerable and then the venom is oozing in your veins and you didn't even realize you had become so weak to let this happen.
oh god the denial all this time and I knew it had to stop but I kept snorting it all in only to fall back down and this happened over and over until months later it smacks me in the fucking head like a shit-ton of bricks. And now the venom starts to drain and I’m not feeling that drip anymore, it had become comfortable, welcome, with it I knew would come escape from what is real. And now it is gone and they all still love it, but baby you know you never liked it anyhow, that god awful drip that all addicts seem to adore, and did I actually convince myself that I did too?
the last nag champic ember releases its red glow and the ash falls into my little ceramic thrift store bowl and the smell permeates the room and I realize that last stick is now gone. But its three a.m. and the dancing flame on the wick of the vanilla candle beside it is sticking it out with me and now that the drain has begun I can smell it for the first time. and be aware, it is plentiful and has burned for hours so many times since the move and tonight I mean I can really fucking smell it and I swear to god every other time I have thought it to be the worst candle because it had no smell but it was kind of pretty and burned so long so I kept on. and I’m feeling so free from all these burdens that I can finally smell that smell and I can feel that smell and I can see that smell and my relief right now is so great I think I may even hear that smell.
And it is all so good.
My heart races randomly. I sensed the healing properties of the night tonight upon the arrival, start, and completion, of lonesome traveler and have been working on a pot of coffee I brewed around midnight. I’ve had too much I’m getting anxious and writing feverishly and my heart is beating way too fast. But I need the night sometimes. I am able to feel so alone (and good alone, mind you) in a house full of heavy sleepers with my bed and my books and my little flame and the silence playing in the darkness out there. And I can't even feel that alone when physically, in an empty house in the day, I am really alone, if you get what I’m saying...
I was a creature of the night even at nine years old. Sitting in front of the shrink and not knowing how to explain to her why I, this poor scrawny little child, was not sleeping at all for so many years. Up all night until dawn the mind so alive and when that dawn is about to break I guess I dozed off most times around then until the Winnie the Pooh alarm clock is wailing for school. , the daily grind. the conformist force-fed societal regime that I can't escape and I’m only in third grade and I have so, so long to go it seemed and that night is all I have but when I am hitting the snooze button I never know what to think. for the journey to sleep was so long and so exhausting for me and I was unsure whether I had ever really been sleeping at all...
well now that I have babbled myself completely off track... all I have wanted is the reason for the accident and all the trouble that has followed. Why I had to fall and get back up only to fall right back down again. Blessings disguised as curses perhaps is what they all have been. And the gift had to keep on giving until I recognized it has such.
Minimalism. Get back to what you need. I became over-indulgent somewhere. I lost track. Worrying myself to misery over all this debt and it doesn't matter and it never did because I had all I needed. And it was so much at once (and I was never used to being so on top of things) I wasted it and I let it eat away at me like every other drooling hyena of this world. At any given point and time in your life (and if you do this wrong you won't realize it until you look back and retrace your steps and now I know this) you have everything you need. There is enough. Or there is the resource to acquire enough. And don't worry about the future if you are being resourceful and wise with what you have and not materialistic, not blind, as I became. Don’t worry about the future because in the future if you aren't worrying yourself with all the shiny objects then at that time you will also have what you need. So live in the now and do it right. If I had only been more humble and not so over indulgent when deep down I knew it was wrong and not myself, I would have had every penny I needed to pay this debt before it became so. I would have had just the amount I needed each time another expense arose. but I took for granted the helping hand and the line of credit and I threw it all away on nothing tangible because I don't even remember what and now I see why this all happened and its ok. And now the money has been coming in the smallest of spurts and each time it comes another little expense or trouble arrives at my door. and I huff and puff and then I stop because why am I doing so when I have everything that I NEED and I will pay with this small trickle of money that is just enough with just enough left over to sustain and I will STILL have just what I NEED.
Jesus fucking christ am I even making sense because sometimes these thoughts come at me so fast and I start writing so fast I can't even read it then I start typing but it is coming out so fast my thoughts run over themselves then its a big heaping plate of everything but the kitchen sink and does it make sense like it makes sense in my head?
I drank way too much fucking coffee. I feel like I’m going to die.
Last night. Hours at the dive and its last call and we carry on the drink at home and
"you just described yourself and everything you hate and its all the same"
a very, very late night conversation on the meaning of life, a debacle of sorts, the mind coaxed open by just the right dose of the drink, and finally! My conversee catches my bluff. And in one sentence pulled from my own mouth and shown back to myself in its falsehood due to the way I had been living. And I was exposed to myself and the faults of late. Finally. and this is why I didn't understand all this time.
some days later and I’m not at home and I have to awake in an hour and I shouldn't fall asleep because I’ll be late for my appointment. My appointment which I am having to attend each month because of the accident because I was an irresponsible drunk behind the wheel all those years. And it is so much fucking money for nothing and if I’m late it is that much more. I’m complaining even though it is all a result of my own carelessness and my own faults and my own over indulgence.and now the alarm has been blasting for an hour and I’m late and I’m angry because I just received this small amount of money after I have had none for weeks and now that I’m late even more is going to be gone and why am I angry when I still have enough and will still have just enough left over and its all I need and knowing good and well I would do nothing but drink the late fee I’m now paying in the nights to come anyhow...
my god this is it, my bluff called not only a day or maybe two prior. And here it is in my sober face bright and early and head throbbing. So I go and I’m late and I fork it over and it is all so strange and beautiful to me at last, this life of mine.
Solitary night following (which is still now in progress) and it cost me nothing more than I already did not have before and I realize that I have alas LEARNED to DEAL with the darkness. I was simply EXISTING in the darkness before and I thought my misery was somehow "dealing with". There are unavoidable things and one cannot complain or you will miss out on all life is offering and I have been missing out but now I understand it all. I was a hypocrite and now the boozy haze gone and the reflection of the statement of another and the test that followed settles in. and now all the pieces of the past four months fit and I had started to think they never would.
I lost my trust in sustaining simply through lust for life. I guess this is the reason why everything since the move has occurred not just the accident. because now I understand the who and the what the how and the when and the where and the WHY of all these things that have happened to me and why these people have come and gone and why they happened and came and went when they did.
One always has just what one needs and from there life is in your hands and no one else's.
My world feels whole again, for now. It is 4:08 a.m. and there is no more space in this notebook at all. I'm already scribbling in the very last margin. goodnight.
7.4.09
its the little things, like smiling at my keys in the ignition because i don't take any guff from these fucking swine.
APRIL 7, 2009 @ 12:10 AM
gonna ramble on, sing my song...
zepp was singing to me in the car late last night.
the wind finally blowing warm, even in the darkness now, independent of the sun.
that was the first i'd noticed that little love of mine this year.
mmm, little things.
like the truest of chills down the spine from nothing more than closeness in the absence of spoken word as it meets the feeling of skin on skin.
like noticing the warmth in the wind and opening every window,
and accelerating slightly to really feel it now.
and to toy with the tiny dangers and laugh at the joy of freedom
turning the volume louder while rob's a'searchin for his baby...
i like being awake while the world sleeps and sometimes sit on benches at lonely rest stops in the middle of the night because i like the way they feel. i might scrounge up a few quarters for a vending machine coffee. and i think. exist. feel the air. wonder at the lives of those who soar by, stop in, and sleep in trucks and backs of cars.
i wonder what they wonder about me...
i wonder at life being the most divine of all things. and i wonder why i'm here and i wonder when i'll leave again and where i'll go and what i'll do and who i'll know. i wonder about this little home i have now and how i always feel more home in my beat up eighties toyota with my skulls and my books and these strangers in this roadside refuge by myself and the promise that there are no guarantees but there is a path to follow and everything is beautiful along its way and you can drive and drive and drive and drive and a bench waits to welcome you at this same place hundreds and thousands of miles away in each and every direction where the 'rules' and the 'law' and such other silly things are no matter. like they have ever really been to me anyhow. oh, sweet anarchy.
and recently i wonder about what you are all wondering about and what you really think of all these crazy thoughts in my head...
gonna ramble on, sing my song...
zepp was singing to me in the car late last night.
the wind finally blowing warm, even in the darkness now, independent of the sun.
that was the first i'd noticed that little love of mine this year.
mmm, little things.
like the truest of chills down the spine from nothing more than closeness in the absence of spoken word as it meets the feeling of skin on skin.
like noticing the warmth in the wind and opening every window,
and accelerating slightly to really feel it now.
and to toy with the tiny dangers and laugh at the joy of freedom
turning the volume louder while rob's a'searchin for his baby...
i like being awake while the world sleeps and sometimes sit on benches at lonely rest stops in the middle of the night because i like the way they feel. i might scrounge up a few quarters for a vending machine coffee. and i think. exist. feel the air. wonder at the lives of those who soar by, stop in, and sleep in trucks and backs of cars.
i wonder what they wonder about me...
i wonder at life being the most divine of all things. and i wonder why i'm here and i wonder when i'll leave again and where i'll go and what i'll do and who i'll know. i wonder about this little home i have now and how i always feel more home in my beat up eighties toyota with my skulls and my books and these strangers in this roadside refuge by myself and the promise that there are no guarantees but there is a path to follow and everything is beautiful along its way and you can drive and drive and drive and drive and a bench waits to welcome you at this same place hundreds and thousands of miles away in each and every direction where the 'rules' and the 'law' and such other silly things are no matter. like they have ever really been to me anyhow. oh, sweet anarchy.
and recently i wonder about what you are all wondering about and what you really think of all these crazy thoughts in my head...
6.4.09
its been a few years...
january 2007
the night is bitter, the city long since abandoned by this hour. the impermanent warmth of the drink had evaporated after last call and those with lighter minds and fuller pockets now enjoy the sweet release of drunken sleep. it is sometime after 4 a.m. the wind is ripping away at my face and hands, numbing and biting the flesh i failed to cover.
(i don't remember minding the cold that night.)
substance means sleep, as of late, and my mouth has been dry for days.
i reach the overlook and collapse my body, exhausted,into the snow. i light a cigarette, painstakingly, for i can not feel my hands. a bit of black fingernail falls to the snow and rapidly drowns, the flesh it once protected becomes raw by the time i manage the first drag.
a slow exhale.
smoke joins the falling snow in a spiraling upward dance. the wind heightens and it swirls around me like a two liter tornado. as any beauty you experience alone in nature, it is surreal. i could step out of my body and see everything happening.
laying above this sparkling city as it sleeps, i wish that i could.
closing my eyes i bring myself back to a similar scene only 2 weeks prior:
{i had walked down the beach that night for over two miles, not a soul to be seen. it was a week before christmas. tis the season to wonder how the hell i'm going to explain myself this time. the air was warm but soothing and goosebumps raised up on my knees as it breezed through all the tattered holes in my jeans. i love the calm of an ocean at night. i wonder why none of the locals are ever around, its so beautiful. but i appreciate the solitude. i wonder whats going on in that deep black sea. is the moon's stream of light the disco ball to a party of fish, indulging their gills in the spilt posessions of a drunken sailor? seahorses in circles smoking grass? sharks fucking dolphins behind abandoned coral reefs?
i lay in the sand and begin to bury myself as i have a conversation with an old friend, long since gone. my phone dies but i heard what i needed. i try to soak in the warmth, the soft crash of the gentle night waves meeting the shore and rolling back, the cool sand between my toes...
i want to get a bottle of wine or two before the store closes. i regret walking out this far as i bury my cigarette in the sand, for the walk back is long and all that awaits is drunken rage and a long, cold, winter seven hours north...
i don't want to start over again...}
i'm starting over, again.
i deserve it... i accept it... i don't mind.
i enjoy the look of the smoke as it slips from my mouth and explodes against the frigid air.
the frozen brown river lurks, motionless, below my mountain-top perch. it is ugly as shit. and holds no possibility of an orgy of drunken fish. i laugh for thinking this and wonder how the ocean would be tonight. well, the city skyline is what you have now. and you are stuck here for awhile.
i realize that the snow has started to pile up around my body and my cigarette has burned down to the filter. back up the mountain.
i awkardly step into an unfamiliar home and curl up on the hard floor. i wish i had a pillow. or a few gulps of bourbon to take the cold away.
even inside i can see my breath before me.
someone upstairs is turning on the shower, i still don't know their names...
the sun is coming up. fatigue consumes me. i give up.
a few miles away the beehive is opening and i think i have enough for a hot cup of coffee.
i'm only nineteen. its going to be a long year.
the night is bitter, the city long since abandoned by this hour. the impermanent warmth of the drink had evaporated after last call and those with lighter minds and fuller pockets now enjoy the sweet release of drunken sleep. it is sometime after 4 a.m. the wind is ripping away at my face and hands, numbing and biting the flesh i failed to cover.
(i don't remember minding the cold that night.)
substance means sleep, as of late, and my mouth has been dry for days.
i reach the overlook and collapse my body, exhausted,into the snow. i light a cigarette, painstakingly, for i can not feel my hands. a bit of black fingernail falls to the snow and rapidly drowns, the flesh it once protected becomes raw by the time i manage the first drag.
a slow exhale.
smoke joins the falling snow in a spiraling upward dance. the wind heightens and it swirls around me like a two liter tornado. as any beauty you experience alone in nature, it is surreal. i could step out of my body and see everything happening.
laying above this sparkling city as it sleeps, i wish that i could.
closing my eyes i bring myself back to a similar scene only 2 weeks prior:
{i had walked down the beach that night for over two miles, not a soul to be seen. it was a week before christmas. tis the season to wonder how the hell i'm going to explain myself this time. the air was warm but soothing and goosebumps raised up on my knees as it breezed through all the tattered holes in my jeans. i love the calm of an ocean at night. i wonder why none of the locals are ever around, its so beautiful. but i appreciate the solitude. i wonder whats going on in that deep black sea. is the moon's stream of light the disco ball to a party of fish, indulging their gills in the spilt posessions of a drunken sailor? seahorses in circles smoking grass? sharks fucking dolphins behind abandoned coral reefs?
i lay in the sand and begin to bury myself as i have a conversation with an old friend, long since gone. my phone dies but i heard what i needed. i try to soak in the warmth, the soft crash of the gentle night waves meeting the shore and rolling back, the cool sand between my toes...
i want to get a bottle of wine or two before the store closes. i regret walking out this far as i bury my cigarette in the sand, for the walk back is long and all that awaits is drunken rage and a long, cold, winter seven hours north...
i don't want to start over again...}
i'm starting over, again.
i deserve it... i accept it... i don't mind.
i enjoy the look of the smoke as it slips from my mouth and explodes against the frigid air.
the frozen brown river lurks, motionless, below my mountain-top perch. it is ugly as shit. and holds no possibility of an orgy of drunken fish. i laugh for thinking this and wonder how the ocean would be tonight. well, the city skyline is what you have now. and you are stuck here for awhile.
i realize that the snow has started to pile up around my body and my cigarette has burned down to the filter. back up the mountain.
i awkardly step into an unfamiliar home and curl up on the hard floor. i wish i had a pillow. or a few gulps of bourbon to take the cold away.
even inside i can see my breath before me.
someone upstairs is turning on the shower, i still don't know their names...
the sun is coming up. fatigue consumes me. i give up.
a few miles away the beehive is opening and i think i have enough for a hot cup of coffee.
i'm only nineteen. its going to be a long year.
31.3.09
thoughts in observance of a drowning pen.
"dig the change in a man...my hero has become so strange."
that line has struck me so hard several times over the past few years that it has actually brought tears to my eyes.
my hero taught me everything i need to know about life through understanding in a coffee shop window and secrets on smokey balconies late at night, never forgotten over the years. thousands of miles interchanged between ever since, the hero's eyes grown more strange to me with each distant crossing of our paths. but have i not said it myself that strange is a wonder of the world? and it is. the rope may wear thin at spots but will never split entirely when tethered to the greatest soul i've ever known.
i am sitting cross-legged on a rock in the middle of the rapids, attempting to remain as still as one can in contrast to the frenzied river waters rushing around on all sides.
although, there seems to be a rhythm in this liquid frenzy...
well, maybe in every frenzy lies a rhythm if you simply remain still in the pit of madness. clench your eyes shut tight as though you might go insane or even die if it overtakes you.
and then moments pass and you realize that you're still breathing...
chaos swirls around you in every direction and here you are sitting in as perfect a stillness as one can achieve and the chaos never slows, as it never will. that's ok for we are then allowed all the rest of eternity to liberate our souls to a rock in the rapids and find the hidden glory in every bit of this never-ending lunacy.
(please don't ever let yourselves be controlled by the uncontrollable.)
a homeless man once told me that we could all learn to live in peace if we would just stop and watch the birds.
well i'm sitting here on this massive stone in the middle of this raging river and as i'm listening to the delicate chirping of the birds in the trees over there it seems quite clear to me that the rage is really rather gentle in itself and even those tiny chirps withhold a sense of urgency...
there is madness in everything.
that is what my hero taught me and ultimately that is all i needed to know about life. and i say this for i then took that and ran and i havn't stopped since and its been so glorious and so tragic and so wonderful and mind you what is really important here is that this entire time i have not been running FROM anything at all but only FOR.
for anything and everything...
of course i can't sit on this rock forever...
(my lunch break is only so long, but no matter about that, really.)
but i can stand to go.
i can dip my toes in.
dance with insanity.
change the rhythm.
occasionally come ashore to touch dry land.
(those rapids can be the world i will forever cease to be a part of)
(derangement swirling round and round)
perch on as many rocks as possible,
in my own little madness.
and be free..
25.3.09
and then there was one.
i found my last journal entry from the mexico adventure. i don't know how i left it out of that massive blog from a few days ago. anyways. here it is:
march 18th 2009. fuck time:00 p.m.
cruising along a louisiana highway. its a beautiful day for driving.
well, every day is beautiful for driving in its own aspect i suppose.
red cheeks and tip of nose. a gift from the hot texas sun as i floated down the freeway in a universe of my own, lost in the pages of a book.
the seasons are changing. and right on time.
i miss you, mexico.
i was sad to leave when i crossed back onto american soil via foot as the dawn broke this morning.
although, i do welcome the return to the road.
constant motion. dig the journey.
another piece of what i've been searching for all along has fallen into place.
my awakening has been slow...and now i see it:
that one could never handle such a strong dose of true life all at once.
letting every fix consume me completely.
bathing in satisfaction,
i feel as though i must be fully immersed.
but as the soothing waters of being truly alive continue to rise,
i realize i am barely even submerged ankle deep.
comfort in silence.
patience with words.
acceptance of unrecorded thought.
the sun sets peacefully before me after graciously providing another day.
barefaced at last. and the wind is feeling different.
every gentle breath of nature moves straight to my soul.
what is happening in this moment and what lies ahead are a mystery.
the moon will soon rise to tell me this is alright.
that everything is in its right place.
(as the sun fades faster i feel it melt beyond my now unmasked eyes, become one with the raw complexity of my soul...)
i realize that i have begun to know this already.
i can still feel mexico city though it creeps further into the distance with every letter that i write.
well, really i just feel the earth.
we are all one.
i wish the soft tingle of my breath on your neck to carry this song in the breeze and stir in you a subtle transformation.
my words can only go so far, but i will carry this with me.
to whom it may concern:
i will be here when you wake...
march 18th 2009. fuck time:00 p.m.
cruising along a louisiana highway. its a beautiful day for driving.
well, every day is beautiful for driving in its own aspect i suppose.
red cheeks and tip of nose. a gift from the hot texas sun as i floated down the freeway in a universe of my own, lost in the pages of a book.
the seasons are changing. and right on time.
i miss you, mexico.
i was sad to leave when i crossed back onto american soil via foot as the dawn broke this morning.
although, i do welcome the return to the road.
constant motion. dig the journey.
another piece of what i've been searching for all along has fallen into place.
my awakening has been slow...and now i see it:
that one could never handle such a strong dose of true life all at once.
letting every fix consume me completely.
bathing in satisfaction,
i feel as though i must be fully immersed.
but as the soothing waters of being truly alive continue to rise,
i realize i am barely even submerged ankle deep.
comfort in silence.
patience with words.
acceptance of unrecorded thought.
the sun sets peacefully before me after graciously providing another day.
barefaced at last. and the wind is feeling different.
every gentle breath of nature moves straight to my soul.
what is happening in this moment and what lies ahead are a mystery.
the moon will soon rise to tell me this is alright.
that everything is in its right place.
(as the sun fades faster i feel it melt beyond my now unmasked eyes, become one with the raw complexity of my soul...)
i realize that i have begun to know this already.
i can still feel mexico city though it creeps further into the distance with every letter that i write.
well, really i just feel the earth.
we are all one.
i wish the soft tingle of my breath on your neck to carry this song in the breeze and stir in you a subtle transformation.
my words can only go so far, but i will carry this with me.
to whom it may concern:
i will be here when you wake...
22.3.09
fear and loathing to the border and beyond...excerpts from a random mexican escapade.
3-12-2009
bertha is a writhing cunt.
she speaks when not spoken to and lies compulsively.
fucking gps, you bastardized technological spawn.
i woke up this morning, sort of, outside atlanta. i say sort of because i am unsure whether i ever fell asleep at all. my feet were freezing and its hard to rest in peace with a harsh street light hovering above the rear window, exposing every flaw in the frosted breath of late, late night, or very early morning.
(bondage cats and sparta)
nothing really noteworthy has occured thus far, just trying to haul this fucker to texas as fast as humanly possible in order to catch the bus.
good tunes. good waffles. good convo.
frank, bertha, me and the steve.
straight cruisin. barefoot and barefaced.
life seems clear.
3-12-2009 10:54 p.m.
i feel as though i'm stuck in a past i was never even a part of. decades before i was even so much as a fertilzed egg.
revelations are coming.
this was all a part of the plan. the un-plan, i suppose.
the real plan, the concert, was really all a part of something bigger, i feel. something unspoken. unknown. the plan that was a plan i did not plan. and is, in fact, always my plan.
an industrial wasteland is smoking before me. it is playful in the night and seducing to the eye. when the sun rises its true filth and destruction will become exposed...
well, back to enjoyng the darkness.
friday. march the 13th. 6:36 p.m.
drifting along the mexican plains in the back of an auto-americanos bus, mariachi music from somewhere up front. i guess they don't believe in common public transport courtesy. i don't mind though, it adds to the atmosphere.
the ease of crossing the border amazed me.
i feel free, happy, in my right place.
the land is flat and plain.
mountains soaking in the fog have begun to arise outside my window as the curtain swings playfully by my propped up foot. why would i close it?
the dangers and warnings of this place seem far, non-existent.
god the mountains are unreal in that fog, the cigarette smoke of the gods.
run down buildings here and there.
a few moments ago as i picked up my journal and began to position myself comfortably, i noticed two cows existing in the grass. i say existing because there they stood, under no apparent ownership. not a building or body or restraint in sight.
i guess even cows can simply just 'be'.
i can't help but think of my beat heroes' mexican escapades. i could hop from this bus and go off into the night. perch atop those mountains in the exhale of the unknown, as the smoke curls...
i want to grasp the hands of the masses and show them this beautiful earth. i want everyone, no man left behind, to desire and understand that peace is possible. that strangers and strange concepts and places and thoughts are beautiful. and that strange, in itself, is one of the natural wonders of the world. strange is relative of course and in this lies part of its wonder.
writing is difficult on these rickety roads.
i had a thought upon beginning. however it left me as my eyes grew transfixed on the softness of the oncoming night...
well, i guess i just see this fire and this lust for true life burning in so many people and its the same fire that rages within me and i just want them to fuel this. and to realize that nothing is stopping them.
you must plunge head first into even darkness unknown for your eyes long to meet the light and this is the way. the way to live. nothing is there to stop you except your own fear.
sunday march the 15th. 6:17 p.m.
laying on my bed in the hostel, watching from barred windows this world i am currently existing in as it exists on a lazy sunday afternoon, waiting for the taco shits to come.
real mexican food is not what i'd expected it to be. it is good, cheap, and plentiful, with orgasmic salsas and corn tortillas out the ass. however i am slightly repulsed so far by the undercooked meat with excessive fatty deposits. pork failed. beef failed, and i am not allowing myself to attempt the chicken. no fucking pollo for this senorita. a crying shame.
my first thought upon waking up this morning:
"tequila, you are a sick fuck"
never again. but hey, when in mexico...
i had to face my hatred. however, free tequila night at the hostel last night was quite the good local time. my last true memory was of wandering the warm streets of mexico city late at night on the prowl for more cerveza, not a care in the world.
they deliver pizza here on mopeds and it always comes with hot sauce on the side. and they deliver twenty-four hours a day?
this discovery immediately brightened my mood upon waking up this morning when i discovered that i had not merely dreamed of screaming 'bacon! steve! bacon!' last night but that we had, in fact, actually ordered pizzas.
well, i passed out from tequila overdose before they arrived, but it made for a pleasant breakfast.
it was such a surreal feeling waking up in the deep south of another country (supposedly ridden with danger and war but one would never know as a welcoming vibe of peace and calm radiates from every passing face). so far from everyday life. no commitments. no need for the flashing of a fake smile another day for another dollar. i feel indescribably amazing here. everyone and everything is so open and relaxed. it saddens me to realize the potency of our poison.
here, smut is peddled openly on the streets, loud music blasts from within sex shops (openly labeled as such). thank god for cultures embracing the glory of sexuality. an average looking woman stops in for a dildo before hitting the coffee shop next door. business men flip casually through stacks of porn at a street vendor. a gay couple rub one another's shoulders lovingly as they scan the back of an electro-bondage dvd in the marketplace as a child purchases an ice cream cone several yards to the right.
all on a lazy sunday afternoon.
i love how this crazy plan all came about not even a month ago.
i love that i am here.
i love a simple life.
i love seeing the world up close and personal. and as it rapidly fades into the distance through the glass of a passenger side window as i drift on.
forever embedded in my mind, an image. those shacks in the depths of night with a single dim light welcoming the chance that even one customer may roll along with a flat tire, a hunger pain, a sick liver...and smoke, lonely smoke, puffing solemnly, but in the most wonderful way, from a rusted roadside grill, as a man sits and waits...
i am in love with this earth. i am in love with not just being alive, but feeling alive.
i don't want this to end and i can't help entertaining the idea, well, the fact...that it does not have to.
march 17th 2009.
sometime after 4 a.m.
fear and loathing in mexico. day six.
money is getting tighter than a virgin's snatch. steve and i just ate pizza that has been sitting in the room, unrefrigerated, since saturday around three in the morning. i'm pretty sure that isn't healthy.
there is a raging fiesta of some sort going on across the street that i would very much like to invite myself to.
seriously, it is after four a.m. on a monday night and the street is filled with hooting hollering mexicans downing cervezas and blaring shitty rap music from a car stereo with no signs of turning in in the near future. and no sign of policio.
how fabulous. i love mexico.
although i have to admit, the two things i was most looking forward to about this trip i have determined that i actually prefer american-style: mexican food and radiohead.
as thom yorke bitterly told mexico city to 'have a nice life' and immediately followed into fucking 'creep' as the finale encore i felt a slightly unpleasant mixture of pissed off and disappointed.
damn you crazy mexican jumping beans and your fanny mc-top-hits-loving antics! damn you thom for your cruel and heartless ending!
buti immediately corrected my thoughts.
this is not my country. these fans loved that ending. they, for the vast majority, did not understand thom's exasperated sarcastic statement. they dug on creep in all its wonder-less wonder, went out thoses gates and got three fake t-shirts, a poster, and some shoelaces, and basked in the glory of a great show.
and i'm glad. this is their fucking country, not mine. they can dig on radiohead in the way they desire. and its not thom yorke's fault for being aggravated at the shitty soundsystem mishaps that managed to mangle not one, but three amazing songs.
i said it myself an entry or two or three ago, that this concert that started it all was the plan that was really a part of a bigger plan that was not, in fact, planned. i have been craving this sort of wayward adventure for years. to leave the country on a whim with a soul full enough to compensate the emptiness of my wallet.
there is so much i want to learn about this world. and about myself. and about everyone. and about life.
this is the way.
forget hesitation. erase fear. open your eyes. ask questions. question everything. condemn nothing as out of your reach. society does not always lie, but does not provide truth. find this for yourself.
"buy the ticket, take the ride."
think more. and do more. learn to separate these concepts. think for the sake of thought. do without always feeling the need to think first.
i don't know how to really begin to describe this journey to anyone. i'm starting to see life, and i mean really fucking see it, the way i have been wanting to all along.
separating thinking and doing and really delving into the infinite possibilities and saving graces of each of these individually.
the mind possesses treasures that words are not worthy of. i am getting more comfortable with accepting this. i am growing more in love with recognizing eyes that require no words for understanding.
i let a young girl sip my beer upon her eager request at the show and i have never seen a more pure and beautiful smile of freedom and chance and glorified rebellion mixed with innocence and awe...i then dumped my beer on the ground in the madness a moment later. however i did not mind surrendering the drink and the seventy pesos that went with it because i will remember the story in that smile for as long as i live.
that's what life is about.
bertha is a writhing cunt.
she speaks when not spoken to and lies compulsively.
fucking gps, you bastardized technological spawn.
i woke up this morning, sort of, outside atlanta. i say sort of because i am unsure whether i ever fell asleep at all. my feet were freezing and its hard to rest in peace with a harsh street light hovering above the rear window, exposing every flaw in the frosted breath of late, late night, or very early morning.
(bondage cats and sparta)
nothing really noteworthy has occured thus far, just trying to haul this fucker to texas as fast as humanly possible in order to catch the bus.
good tunes. good waffles. good convo.
frank, bertha, me and the steve.
straight cruisin. barefoot and barefaced.
life seems clear.
3-12-2009 10:54 p.m.
i feel as though i'm stuck in a past i was never even a part of. decades before i was even so much as a fertilzed egg.
revelations are coming.
this was all a part of the plan. the un-plan, i suppose.
the real plan, the concert, was really all a part of something bigger, i feel. something unspoken. unknown. the plan that was a plan i did not plan. and is, in fact, always my plan.
an industrial wasteland is smoking before me. it is playful in the night and seducing to the eye. when the sun rises its true filth and destruction will become exposed...
well, back to enjoyng the darkness.
friday. march the 13th. 6:36 p.m.
drifting along the mexican plains in the back of an auto-americanos bus, mariachi music from somewhere up front. i guess they don't believe in common public transport courtesy. i don't mind though, it adds to the atmosphere.
the ease of crossing the border amazed me.
i feel free, happy, in my right place.
the land is flat and plain.
mountains soaking in the fog have begun to arise outside my window as the curtain swings playfully by my propped up foot. why would i close it?
the dangers and warnings of this place seem far, non-existent.
god the mountains are unreal in that fog, the cigarette smoke of the gods.
run down buildings here and there.
a few moments ago as i picked up my journal and began to position myself comfortably, i noticed two cows existing in the grass. i say existing because there they stood, under no apparent ownership. not a building or body or restraint in sight.
i guess even cows can simply just 'be'.
i can't help but think of my beat heroes' mexican escapades. i could hop from this bus and go off into the night. perch atop those mountains in the exhale of the unknown, as the smoke curls...
i want to grasp the hands of the masses and show them this beautiful earth. i want everyone, no man left behind, to desire and understand that peace is possible. that strangers and strange concepts and places and thoughts are beautiful. and that strange, in itself, is one of the natural wonders of the world. strange is relative of course and in this lies part of its wonder.
writing is difficult on these rickety roads.
i had a thought upon beginning. however it left me as my eyes grew transfixed on the softness of the oncoming night...
well, i guess i just see this fire and this lust for true life burning in so many people and its the same fire that rages within me and i just want them to fuel this. and to realize that nothing is stopping them.
you must plunge head first into even darkness unknown for your eyes long to meet the light and this is the way. the way to live. nothing is there to stop you except your own fear.
sunday march the 15th. 6:17 p.m.
laying on my bed in the hostel, watching from barred windows this world i am currently existing in as it exists on a lazy sunday afternoon, waiting for the taco shits to come.
real mexican food is not what i'd expected it to be. it is good, cheap, and plentiful, with orgasmic salsas and corn tortillas out the ass. however i am slightly repulsed so far by the undercooked meat with excessive fatty deposits. pork failed. beef failed, and i am not allowing myself to attempt the chicken. no fucking pollo for this senorita. a crying shame.
my first thought upon waking up this morning:
"tequila, you are a sick fuck"
never again. but hey, when in mexico...
i had to face my hatred. however, free tequila night at the hostel last night was quite the good local time. my last true memory was of wandering the warm streets of mexico city late at night on the prowl for more cerveza, not a care in the world.
they deliver pizza here on mopeds and it always comes with hot sauce on the side. and they deliver twenty-four hours a day?
this discovery immediately brightened my mood upon waking up this morning when i discovered that i had not merely dreamed of screaming 'bacon! steve! bacon!' last night but that we had, in fact, actually ordered pizzas.
well, i passed out from tequila overdose before they arrived, but it made for a pleasant breakfast.
it was such a surreal feeling waking up in the deep south of another country (supposedly ridden with danger and war but one would never know as a welcoming vibe of peace and calm radiates from every passing face). so far from everyday life. no commitments. no need for the flashing of a fake smile another day for another dollar. i feel indescribably amazing here. everyone and everything is so open and relaxed. it saddens me to realize the potency of our poison.
here, smut is peddled openly on the streets, loud music blasts from within sex shops (openly labeled as such). thank god for cultures embracing the glory of sexuality. an average looking woman stops in for a dildo before hitting the coffee shop next door. business men flip casually through stacks of porn at a street vendor. a gay couple rub one another's shoulders lovingly as they scan the back of an electro-bondage dvd in the marketplace as a child purchases an ice cream cone several yards to the right.
all on a lazy sunday afternoon.
i love how this crazy plan all came about not even a month ago.
i love that i am here.
i love a simple life.
i love seeing the world up close and personal. and as it rapidly fades into the distance through the glass of a passenger side window as i drift on.
forever embedded in my mind, an image. those shacks in the depths of night with a single dim light welcoming the chance that even one customer may roll along with a flat tire, a hunger pain, a sick liver...and smoke, lonely smoke, puffing solemnly, but in the most wonderful way, from a rusted roadside grill, as a man sits and waits...
i am in love with this earth. i am in love with not just being alive, but feeling alive.
i don't want this to end and i can't help entertaining the idea, well, the fact...that it does not have to.
march 17th 2009.
sometime after 4 a.m.
fear and loathing in mexico. day six.
money is getting tighter than a virgin's snatch. steve and i just ate pizza that has been sitting in the room, unrefrigerated, since saturday around three in the morning. i'm pretty sure that isn't healthy.
there is a raging fiesta of some sort going on across the street that i would very much like to invite myself to.
seriously, it is after four a.m. on a monday night and the street is filled with hooting hollering mexicans downing cervezas and blaring shitty rap music from a car stereo with no signs of turning in in the near future. and no sign of policio.
how fabulous. i love mexico.
although i have to admit, the two things i was most looking forward to about this trip i have determined that i actually prefer american-style: mexican food and radiohead.
as thom yorke bitterly told mexico city to 'have a nice life' and immediately followed into fucking 'creep' as the finale encore i felt a slightly unpleasant mixture of pissed off and disappointed.
damn you crazy mexican jumping beans and your fanny mc-top-hits-loving antics! damn you thom for your cruel and heartless ending!
buti immediately corrected my thoughts.
this is not my country. these fans loved that ending. they, for the vast majority, did not understand thom's exasperated sarcastic statement. they dug on creep in all its wonder-less wonder, went out thoses gates and got three fake t-shirts, a poster, and some shoelaces, and basked in the glory of a great show.
and i'm glad. this is their fucking country, not mine. they can dig on radiohead in the way they desire. and its not thom yorke's fault for being aggravated at the shitty soundsystem mishaps that managed to mangle not one, but three amazing songs.
i said it myself an entry or two or three ago, that this concert that started it all was the plan that was really a part of a bigger plan that was not, in fact, planned. i have been craving this sort of wayward adventure for years. to leave the country on a whim with a soul full enough to compensate the emptiness of my wallet.
there is so much i want to learn about this world. and about myself. and about everyone. and about life.
this is the way.
forget hesitation. erase fear. open your eyes. ask questions. question everything. condemn nothing as out of your reach. society does not always lie, but does not provide truth. find this for yourself.
"buy the ticket, take the ride."
think more. and do more. learn to separate these concepts. think for the sake of thought. do without always feeling the need to think first.
i don't know how to really begin to describe this journey to anyone. i'm starting to see life, and i mean really fucking see it, the way i have been wanting to all along.
separating thinking and doing and really delving into the infinite possibilities and saving graces of each of these individually.
the mind possesses treasures that words are not worthy of. i am getting more comfortable with accepting this. i am growing more in love with recognizing eyes that require no words for understanding.
i let a young girl sip my beer upon her eager request at the show and i have never seen a more pure and beautiful smile of freedom and chance and glorified rebellion mixed with innocence and awe...i then dumped my beer on the ground in the madness a moment later. however i did not mind surrendering the drink and the seventy pesos that went with it because i will remember the story in that smile for as long as i live.
that's what life is about.
10.3.09
stream of consciousness.
i guess i'm basically a fucking hobo.
i'm leaving for mexico with extremely minimal funds.
but what i have naturally can be made "enough".
my insurance dropped me because they are corpsefucking bastards.
i recieved many offers to buy my camera
which would solve not all, but alot of my current financial issues.
well i decided not to sell it.
i realize its the only thing i have of "worth" anymore.
of course i no longer have a savings account or anything of that nature.
all of that peaced out years ago
when i first started making spontaneous life changing decisions while on a boozing rampage
or under the influence of other mind altering drugs.
now that i am fucked up less often than not, i am still doing the same "crazy" and "irrational" decision making.
(apparently thats what the kids are calling it these days)
so, i guess thats a good sign.
a good sign of what, i don't know.
i'm moving into a house in the middle of nowhere upon my return.
with no food. no furniture. no money. and a part time job.
but thank god.
i now carry a bottle of sriracha in my purse.
along with a mostly empty wallet.
a book of matches.
a pack of smokes.
and a vanilla flavored chapstick.
i consider being broke a clean slate.
that way they are always plentiful.
the clean slates, that is.
i keep telling myself that i will get back "on my feet"
but i don't.
i should probably care about that.
but i don't.
i enjoy the liberation of floating with the consolation of firmly planted feet.
i don't know how this happens, but it does, and i am glad
otherwise i guess i would be a miserable fuck.
i watch msnbc news at work on closed captioning when there is no actual work to be done.
i see news about tent cities popping up on the west coast due to job loss and the "failing economy".
this is supposed to instill fear, worry, sorrow?
well, i found it comforting. resourceful. hopeful. beautiful, in a way.
i have been drinking a lot of hot tea and feel it is improving my mental clarity.
i'm ready to get this fucking show on the road.
change is happening alot and for the better.
but that doesn't make it any less overwhelming.
i just want to close my eyes and feel the sun and know that i'm drifting along,
separated from everyday life.
its always good. i leave alot these days.
but i just want more more more.
an extended fix.
the cure is near.
for a while, at least.
are you addicted?
this is alot of strange bullshit that i typed for some unknown reason and will replace tomorrow before i say goodbye to this stagnant town forever.
beginning with a path unwinding to the mexican border and nothing more to lose.
mountains hovering in the distance...
it has become a calming sight these days. pleasing to both the eye and mind.
however, i want to climb them.
at this point in life i'm not so much interested in the view from the top,
but more so in the climb in itself.
i should probably pack something other than nicotine and hot sauce soon.
just a thought.
i suppose that statement was a slight spritz of redundance
because after all,
isn't that what these all are?
just thoughts.
i'm leaving for mexico with extremely minimal funds.
but what i have naturally can be made "enough".
my insurance dropped me because they are corpsefucking bastards.
i recieved many offers to buy my camera
which would solve not all, but alot of my current financial issues.
well i decided not to sell it.
i realize its the only thing i have of "worth" anymore.
of course i no longer have a savings account or anything of that nature.
all of that peaced out years ago
when i first started making spontaneous life changing decisions while on a boozing rampage
or under the influence of other mind altering drugs.
now that i am fucked up less often than not, i am still doing the same "crazy" and "irrational" decision making.
(apparently thats what the kids are calling it these days)
so, i guess thats a good sign.
a good sign of what, i don't know.
i'm moving into a house in the middle of nowhere upon my return.
with no food. no furniture. no money. and a part time job.
but thank god.
i now carry a bottle of sriracha in my purse.
along with a mostly empty wallet.
a book of matches.
a pack of smokes.
and a vanilla flavored chapstick.
i consider being broke a clean slate.
that way they are always plentiful.
the clean slates, that is.
i keep telling myself that i will get back "on my feet"
but i don't.
i should probably care about that.
but i don't.
i enjoy the liberation of floating with the consolation of firmly planted feet.
i don't know how this happens, but it does, and i am glad
otherwise i guess i would be a miserable fuck.
i watch msnbc news at work on closed captioning when there is no actual work to be done.
i see news about tent cities popping up on the west coast due to job loss and the "failing economy".
this is supposed to instill fear, worry, sorrow?
well, i found it comforting. resourceful. hopeful. beautiful, in a way.
i have been drinking a lot of hot tea and feel it is improving my mental clarity.
i'm ready to get this fucking show on the road.
change is happening alot and for the better.
but that doesn't make it any less overwhelming.
i just want to close my eyes and feel the sun and know that i'm drifting along,
separated from everyday life.
its always good. i leave alot these days.
but i just want more more more.
an extended fix.
the cure is near.
for a while, at least.
are you addicted?
this is alot of strange bullshit that i typed for some unknown reason and will replace tomorrow before i say goodbye to this stagnant town forever.
beginning with a path unwinding to the mexican border and nothing more to lose.
mountains hovering in the distance...
it has become a calming sight these days. pleasing to both the eye and mind.
however, i want to climb them.
at this point in life i'm not so much interested in the view from the top,
but more so in the climb in itself.
i should probably pack something other than nicotine and hot sauce soon.
just a thought.
i suppose that statement was a slight spritz of redundance
because after all,
isn't that what these all are?
just thoughts.
9.3.09
to remedy a constant craving for madness: indulge without question.
from early september 2008
cool morning. dim light. the air is crisp. green leaves brush my face. the weather hints that they are longing for change with the season and so am i. i hope it returns soon, but for the day fall has sneaken into this city.
it's smell mixes with the smoke in my car and stirs up memories and a feeling i miss.
i havn't felt like myself in awhile.
my impatient sense of adventure is almost choking me.
i realize i'm driving faster.
one week from today, legality will finally release me from the burdens of the past few months, i hope.
stop sign. i close my eyes. i breathe in deeply the smell of fall, car smoke, and freedom. i watch the sparks play on the pavement after i toss my cigarette from the window.
i pull away. i contemplate life. i'm glad to be alive.
thank god i'm thinking irrationally again.
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