March 25,
March 26,
March 28,
March 29,
March 31
It’s maddening. Searching through everything, looking for what a majority might see, trying to think about what a majority might think about. Trying to determine who owns what, who is trying to persuade who about what and why. Bottom line—thousands of questions, not too many answers. But the final question is one of action—what do I do about what I’ve determined?
To a degree, I take things on a daily level. I buy as little as possible; I ask the question—where is the compromise between what I need to survive – literally – and how much would purchasing something add to my life experience, and perhaps more importantly, will it detract from others’ life experiences (i.e. would I buy a precious stone mined through the efforts of known forced slave labor?)
I ask myself – who made this, where did they make it, did they want to make it, is it naturally responsible for it to be made? Many times I don’t know the answers, and sometimes when the answers aren’t good I buy things anyway, but I figure it’s a start in the right direction if I pay attention to what I’m doing. Every day I wonder, what would things be like if people paid more attention to the things they bought? So many different sources state that money is the root of all evil and pain. That’s a pretty tough statement to qualify, but why not test it by not buying things? Why not test the theory and try having a good time without consuming stuff? I feel really good about myself when I go through a day without gaining any new physical material, when I go through a day without operating under the pretense that I can “own” anything at all. I figure I’m just borrowing it until I die, anyway—no real need to get upset I think …
So what else can I do? There’s that whole rough pyramid scheme, that life is divided between the physical world, emotional/social world, and the spiritual world. For my situation, my basic actions regarding buying things deal with the physical world. The others are a little trickier.
Emotionally/socially, I guess that means I just have to buck up. Nuff said.
Spiritually, I wonder. With all the religions out there, it seems to matter that one of them is probably right, or at least that some are more correct than others, being that there are several that are at odds with each other. And you can’t really go on practicality. I don’t even think I can breach that subject. Seems like we all just need to get along and respect what we don’t know, hoping that we don’t end up in the pop-culture version of hell. But who picks pop-culture, anyway … The advertisers, right? Right.
So anyway, what to do. See how easy it is to get distracted? I’d be a vegan, but as of yet I haven’t been able to figure out how to get enough calories. I get skinnier, get sick, and feel tired all of the time. Still working on that one.
I’d wear a robe, a single piece of clothing, warm enough to stay alive, cool enough to avoid heat stroke. But how’s that go down for a city-dwelling unemployed white American blue-collar male? I’d rather call myself a “person,” like the next human on the block, but that also doesn’t follow with pop-culture. Let’s figure out all the ways we’re different, right? Right.
But what about coffee? Don’t really need coffee to survive. Fu-fu berry flavors, $3.70 worth of heaven. It’s a symbol of corporate greed, a symbol of 8-year-old Nicaraguan girls running through bean fields, making three cents an hour. But that’s all hearsay, or heresy, whichever way you take it. I think about this while I’m drinking a tall vanilla latte, and it doesn’t taste as good anymore.
It seems so dreamy to say that I get lost in the music. It seems so unrealistic to say that I can follow the notes and the melodies to some place in my head where everything else slips away. It sounds so melodramatic; maybe even contrived. It seems so plastic of a statement to make; so hum-drum; so cliché. And yet it can be so true.
It seems that the silliest things, the most ordinary occurrences, sometimes bring me the most hope. What I know of tonal theories lets me float like a mist through dissonances—everything from the dishwasher to the sounds of traffic. And if I appreciate noise that much, how much do I appreciate the synthesis of sound?! The modulation, gradation, and exposition of form and melody—these things are truly beings of self-evident truth and beauty … they are the pieces that make up the best parts of humanity, unable to be captured or altered … (can you hear my sighs, upward out from the horizon in the distance ? ... … … )
But enough of that nonsense; it’s time to get down to serious business. Business of jobs and finances, of families and friends, furiously we fight and fuck our way to fruition … ! Oh! but bitter words retain their value when communicated, don’t they? I forget sometimes. Sometimes, sometimes the stream of consciousness slips silently into semantic soliloquy, soothing some but surrounding some others, shrouding their souls with shiny, silvery, suspenseful secrets … … … (mmmm, who let the reptiles loo-sss-e … … )
And one day becomes the next, but the music remains the same. Every time I set the record needle down, it plays the same tones. Every time I push down the button to make the recordings play, the same songs play. What wonderful, wonderful comfort. And if some day, all recordings break, if all music disappears in a mist much like myself—on that day I shall learn how to sing.
Bought a shirt today; hot pink, light blue, and white. It's a little small, as in, the cuffs fall just short of my wrist bones. Unbuttoned cuffs, that is-part of the whole motif, right.
Motif?
Genderless, raceless, with no country of origin, remember? We have decided we are to be indistinguishable as people; as in, we are all people, and that is all we are. And what, eh-hem, does a hot pink flannel shirt have to do with this disastrous theory?
Everything.
It was half-price, at a Goodwill in Seattle. I mean, it was $4 originally, but today they had a special on items with blue tags. Just my luck, right. It's heavy cotton; it's a Van Heusen, made in China. Did I mention it was pink?
So I had a good idea the other day. Instead of saying that I was born in such-and-such a country and/or live in such-and-such other country, I should learn latitudes and longitudes. Then I'd be swift and say something like, "I was born at 10 degrees east, 15.5 minues north by northwest of line #77," or something equally vague. Then nobody'd have shit to say about what "country" I was born in, and they'd have to look on a map to figure out what the fuck I was talking about. Talk about getting rid of preliminary prejudices without much effort. That'd show 'em.
So it was really random that I ended up at Goodwill at all today. I was on a mission to figure out what this crazy building was up on top of this hill. It had red bricks, and I could see it from any highway in the damn city. After some searching, I discovered it was a medical campus, and, you'd never believe it, the damn Amazon.com building. A handsome young security guard waved at us from underneath the parking garage as we rolled out the exit. Mystery solved, right. At least it wasn't a prison like we expected.
So I feel like it's time for something completely different. I'd take the symbol of the Jolly Roger, pirates and all that, but I can't swim too well-I sink-so that'd not be a great karmic idea. I'd take the ankh, but I'm white, and who'd believe Death was a honky. More likely'd be one of the minorities, right?
So I was looking at this orange shirt to buy, sort of pumpkin colored, but dingy-dirty-pumpkin colored?-but left it behind for the next hoo-hah punk kid to snatch it up, maybe strap a patch on it above the left-breast pocket, like a name-tag that said "Bob." Then I'd be cool.
So the homeless are organizing. I see them holding standardized slabs of cardboard, scrawled with the same block handwriting, each working street corners busy with cars, each standing listlessly, listlessly, listlessly ... I wonder at the humility, not as in, embarrassment, but as in, humility before god, in such instances. People think of themselves as home-"owners," but I still don't dig the concept of "owning" anything anyway. But, if you don't have a home, it has harder to get a job in order to have a home you need in order to get a job with. The semantics of it drives me crazy. Does it all really come down to language in the end; silly little words? Try to qualify your language and it comes out sounding like-"In my understanding of my immediate environment, I believe it would suit a greater whole to their own enjoyment of life if tolerance were given a higher priority than the bartering of paper money for items which, in the long run, reduce the quality of life for all involved in the processing, manufacturing, or distribution of said items." Like the pink shirt I'm wearing-except that it doesn't count anymore, because it's second-hand.
Right?
Sometimes when the sun shines, there is an appreciation of living that accompanies it. Sometimes, when the sky is clear, with faint brush-strokes of white-chocolate clouds drifting by; sometimes, the outer world becomes a shade more manageable. Sometimes the cool breeze feels a little cooler-when the heat of an afternoon lets your body relax into its warmth.
Today, with the sun shining, I've decided that I'm okay with where I'm at. I've decided that my decisions were exactly that-my decisions-and that they've landed me on this moon of mine with no purpose but to skip around the carpeted front room of my house; white-chocolate carpet, with streaks of sky blue brushed into the fabric, nothing more than a dream within a dream. In that cliche, all things become clearer.
Sometimes I get caught talking about the ethereal. Getting lost in nameless depression; my words tell me senseless lullabies. If I could sleep forever this next time, get caught in the next daydream-the one about the sunny day-I think then maybe I'd find value in the expectation of it. But rainy weather comes-it always comes.
There's an acceleration in the air today. A cyclone of particles. A fusion of energy, an explosion of matter! With it comes neon colors; electric purple, viperous green, cerulean, construction-zone orange. They fly in pairs and in threes, congregating in bunches underneath trees, tip-toeing upside down underneath the leaves, exploring chlorophyll. Helping respiration. They jump with wide, ballet leaps, spinning, charging forward with hope and resuscitation!
The poor fools! They come back old and graying. They come back draped in old black cloth, carrying canes, nursing crutches. Ah, the povertyless youths-they become impoverished, believing adults. From the sunshine, their bodies become tan and golden. From the weight of communication, they become wrinkled and bitter. They marry themselves to weighted chains, carry broken hopes like junk mail-self-addressed junk mail. The audacity!
But today; today is a different story. Today is Rip Van Winkle. Today is Brer Rabbit. Today is the ferns that grow beside the stony path; they unfold themselves, beginning as hooks, little eyelets, and unravel to become majesties. How I envy plant-life. To be green!
I'd played my last game sometime during my senior year, '98-'99. I started sometime around six years old, ended sometime when I was 16 or 17. After that-I took a hiatus. I knew I wasn't good enough to play in college. I accepted that. But there I was, at 23, back in the game, running around on a dirt field, the youngest player out there by at least four years. Amused, I wondered what I'd gotten myself into.
I heard somewhere that sports were the essence or war, or something to that effect. That the athlete was the soldier. That the captain of a team was the general of a platoon. So much horseshit, I think-just my opinion, though.
Out there on that dirt field, I did what I thought I was supposed to-be in to talk, be it to run, be it to show my presence to the enemy. The purpose is thrice over-once to win, once to maintain health, once to gain skill in gaming. What is my deign to any of those ends?! Shit, who knows.
But I know, jumping in the air, falling shortly thereafter from a bump to the side, hitting the dirt and getting some excess dust in my eyes; but I know, why the fuck not? The winner; the loser. Those who score goals; those who assist. Those who perform special maneuvers; those who maintain stability and morale. Fuck the whole lot of it. It comes down to the team (the team!) driving to a bar afterward and intaking alcohol to cool the nerves and numb the sore muscles.
For at least ten years, I spent a significant amount of timing honing my skills at this pretend war, competing against teams (teams!) who wanted to win something, wanted to prove something, wanted to take home the plastic trophy to put up on a shelf, as evidence that they were something greater than earthborn parasites.
My high school coach never quite understood me-"what do you mean it 'means the same thing' whether we win or lose?" He used to be a drill sergeant in the Army. Whatever.
But I maintain uncertainty. I do know that it was fun playing this last evening. The rush of the game is during the collisions, for me. It's during the sprints; pouring every available bit of energy into a graceful shot of motion, aimed to an understood end of nothing, but meaning only that that energy has been expended in an effort to advance the team (team!). I love the tactics of an open field. I love that motions which don't concern the main effort of the team make such a different outcome in the end. I love that running into a congested area and bringing a defended with me opens up a section of the field for someone else to run into. That, to me, is pure poetry.
I love the scars on my shins afterward. I love that people kicked me when they failed to achieve their goal; they failed to get the ball away from me. They failed to win the war. Not that I necessarily accomplished anything. I was just running around like a fruit loop, doing non-verbal studies in the sociology of team (team!)-building.
My last game was some time during my senior year in high school. This first game back, this game this last evening, was a memory. It was a memory of team, of loss, of physical pain (as a try to stretch out my tightened left ankle), it was a lesson in adaptation. And I come back satisfied with the results.