For Christmas I have a new addition to my creative arsenal:
A 16mm film camera - Krasnogorsk K3
I really don't have to mention that this already looks like a lot of fun,
and it couldn't have come at a better time, (considering that I'm back at square one in life...and I'm starting to think that night terrors are fun).
On the bright side- I'm growing a beard and yesterday I made $40 dollars in tips on ONE delivery.
But for now. It's time to capture some beauty...
to sync up with my music!
;)
These ones are the beautiful bars you put up.
Decorated with turquoise and cerulean barb.
Peering in through a broad frosted window
You may see the back room illuminate softly at night
The owner maybe knitting- singing at nearly a whisper
On display are closed boxes with unnamable objects that tinker while they chime
Painted in un-seeable colors that glow without light.
I walked down this street out of instinct one evening to find solace
From human traffic-as it can be good for most but not some
Having never seen day.
Following a rolling gold aurora borealis-heading north
I found myself at a storefront
And it sells my favorite things
But it does not operate during business hours
These ones are beautiful bars you put up
We are both closed during advent.
I got furious and threw a bottle into the sea with no hope of salvation.
No note, no letter, not a single verse of communication.
And I expect to be found.
Furious, I threw a bottle into the sea with no hope of salvation.
My friends behind me are beginning to quiet.
Their laughter dying into the rumble of waves that do their best to mitigate me.
I am deaf to them.
She who has won my affections may have a gleam in her eye as to why.
But I left no note, no letter, not a single verse of communication.
I should expect not to be found.
I continued down the shore without my friends,
screaming-throwing bottles into the sea with no hope of salvation.
I threw an empty bottle onto the sand.
Fall 2005 I began my college career. It is now Fall 2008-the beginning of my fourth year. I'm still a bad student and I procrastinate. I have not made it a point to be proactive. If I act now-as in today- I would be able to navigate through a difficult final week.
I'm sitting in class- intro to journalism. This course dedicates itself to forms of mass media. Television, radio, video games, music, radio. Today we're talking about the Internet.
[From class]
In the U.S:
-current pop: 337 million
-Internet users: 248 million (73%)
-U.S. represents 17% of Internet users worldwide
Earlier this session he recalled how difficult it was to go to a library every time he would have liked to learn about something.
This thought sparked my retrospective engine. I was raised in the information aged. My family was online with the Internet and email in 1995. It probably helps too that my dad has been a computer technician for the past 25 years. As I continue to think-
-he continues to speak,
"In 1995 I got my first email account. I thought it was the coolest thing in the world. [...] I had a friend in the army I knew in Singapore I'd email to. Of course at that time it would take a couple of days to send an email. That's how long it would physically take for the message to be transmitted electronically to the other side of the world."
His experience allows me to draw a comparison to some of my own.
[Tangent] In '96, my friend Brennan and I downloaded America Online Messenger and found a random SN in an obscure chat room that is by now far from obsolete and deleted.
Playindirt[something-or-other] was her screen name. She was a mother or a wife. She had a career- I don't know where she was from. She seemed genuine. We didn't know why she was on such a modern device like this- for her age? Maybe she was just up-to-date, or she was or had intentions to cheat on her husband. Maybe she wasn't even married and was without child-desperately lonely.
And even now I speculate...perhaps she was the lonely woman Brennan and I ran into at the top of Buena Vista Park in San Francisco. She has the well-meaning smile I imagined her to have- same up-beat voice that hides her depression, and the laugh that feigns her enthusiasm. Oh yeah, the same teeth that grind frustrations from dinner time-until midnight well into thick REM sleep. Yeah, its definitely her smile. What its like to be lonely in a city like that- I can't imagine. What's she been doing since 1996? Staying connected I hope-
-I had always imagined her living in San Francisco-some place up north...
[End]
Two days for an email to Singapore...
Two summers ago I had met my friend Jenny on a music Internet service called last.fm. It's one of those sites that look and act a lot like the other sites you are personally more familiar with: Myspace, Facebook etc...
We formed a nice friendship and after a few polite messages we began talking on MSN messenger-another messaging service. Exciting summer nights- they would end with me returning home still looking forward to the later hours of solitude where I would unwind, slap a sandwich together-pour a tall glass of water, switch the fan on full blast and talk to my pen pal, 5503.485 away (courtesy of Google Maps Distance Calculator via the Internet).
It wasn't until the spring of 2008 that while planning an excursion through Iceland on a whim-for-a-woman back home that thought I may visit a friend while staying in the Nordic countries. I ended up spending close to a month there in Tampere, Finland and was an active member in their social group.
The stark contrast of culture I experienced there was fascinating- although it was an entirely different place in many facets than one in comparison to the US. The serious, brooding character of these people and the depth of human nature they expressed was eerily familiar to me.
Being a romantic, the females here-having these innately deep mental/emotional traits, coupled in with their obscure Nordic beauty, were at the very least endearing and in my most level-headed opinion- haunting.
It may appear that I am much like Playindirt. Communicating with or meeting people online. I do not search for people because I am lonely- I search because there is more beauty to be seen. There are definitely times where I am lonely, and depressed, and hopeless. But I am still blessed and will always have an aura of loyal friends revolving around me. Its intimacy that I fear for now but not forever. But as I write this every rhythm tapped on this keyboard surges me into further self-understanding. I am lucky; blessed by glorious moments. Recently I began letting myself accept the pain of others in order to strengthen not only my tolerance of people but to understand the cause and effect of human nature and the outcomes of my own actions reflected unto myself by others. I am like Playindirt in some ways, but everyone is inside or out. I can see it as well as its inverse all around me. It depends on how you carry yourself I guess.
On this second session of discussing the grand influence of the Internet- I am unaffected by the description of its magnitude. I am simply more aware of it. Its heavy pull has my eyes focused in my professors direction but stopped 30 ft closer at the sight of this screen. Distracted, sacrificing tangible, academic knowledge for the abstract- streaming into my head from never-ceasing deltas of information. At the end of this session I will submit this written work for someone else who might unearth it someday and come to understand an archetype of human nature. From this swell of turbulent water-labeled as a blog- in the ever-flowing nature of a never-ceasing delta surging ones and zeros. Come find me.
It's funny the way the mind processes things. When it's affected by powerful instances.
Influential, inspiring, detrimental, catastrophic, euphoric, dull, insipid, mundane. In my mind each experience is an eyebrow raise, hesitant word, ray of sunshine apart from each other.
I've picked up a few bad habits from my travels- but even these are a benefit. I tend to myself and live and feel life as if there were no tomorrow. Not to say that I act obnoxiously but I relish the time I am with my friends and treat them like royal siblings.
The blight that this attitude imposes on me is a definite strain on my physicality. Plainly put: I'm wearing myself out-over exerting myself.
And when I do put myself in social situations in this state I usually require alcohol to retain a smile-seldom seen already.
Last Saturday I went to Jason Y's and Tiffany's birthday party. Having worked a double shift prior-it seems hardly believable in retrospect that anyone would be in any mood to party.
However, in past experiences when energies had been low, there were glorious moments that sprung up within a moments notice. Trips to LA, to the beach, walks at 2am, private parties in my living room; etc, etc, etc. When with good compatible people the setting truly does not matter - just context, true friends create context: my justification for staying out.
Last Sunday [after the party] I woke up hung over, slightly-ashamed that in social settings my more distant friends always see me intoxicated. I suppose I'm just not as close to that group as most others there.
Fuck. I'm probably just not willing to accept that I hold back.
...or am beginning the first and central stages of alcoholism. NAH.
When I'm high- I feel best when I speak. I feel at home. In Europe I was relentlessly myself. New. I've comeback still changed but hindered.
I'm limiting myself.
[Back to Sunday]
I woke up. Hung-over, cotton-mouthed, and blank. I moped around my house for a while in a triangular motion between sprawling out on my bed collecting peering sun, the kitchen to grab a slice of pizza and diet coke and the computer to let see if anyone wanted to come with me to LA-via bike.
Even after the fact-even more than I led others including myself to believe-the ride itself was inspiring, reflective, and self-revealing. Humbling.
[Back to the moment-outside of its timeless metaphysical gradient]
I thought: Brian. He'd be a good person to ask out to a venture like this. Within 30 seconds I received a call from Brian and we were off by 15:00. It's funny the way situations work out.
I hesitated to call only because I might have desired quietness for my thoughts. Considering this-I concocted a hybrid plan of solitude and close companionship. We synchronized iPods. Blessed was the moment when we happened unknowingly upon this song, which epitomizes my point during the day and in altogether life.
Sunday comes alone again
A perfect day for a quiet friend
And you, you will set it free
I see new morning around your face
Everybody says it's another phase
And now, now it's come to me
See the magic in your eyes
I see it come as no surprise
And you, you turn your eyes away
Yeah, you, you turn it all away
I guess it's true, it's never too late
Still I don't know what to do today
Oh, why can't I set you free?
Will you do the same for me?
Sunday comes and Sunday goes
Sunday always seems to move so slow
To me, here she comes again
A perfect ending to a perfect day
A perfect ending, what can I say
To you, lonely Sunday friend?
With you, Sunday never ends
It's funny how certain days feel. The properties they hold. Ineffable, or seemingly so. Sunday.
I just needed perspective. I feel jammed with a set group of people. Over the course of a short life I've developed life long relationships with people. I hold a strong role in the life of a handful.
I thought back to my time In København with Fernelly...
To aid my development I must be able to roam. I love my friends and acquaintances so much, though. If they gracefully accept my departure I will return to them more able to give back.
"New pals have adventures; old pals just reminisce every now and then, about the ones they had at one point shared."
(Disregard that statement. It is only partially relevant to this blog but very relevant to this past evening).
I realize now that the most important thing a human being can offer to another is a better self. Self-centered, calm, passionate, spontaneous, stable, cooperative, understanding, magnanimous, honest, flawed but aware.
I may simply need new friends. Honestly, I think I straight up need a bitch at this point in life. I'm not even worried about the sexual aspect. I'm just down for romance and late nights conversations-intimacy I suppose.
Regardless, it is time for me to continue on my journey. A wayward soul is all I'll need. 
If I may be so bold-I will go as far as to say that we will both continue down the unknown road together.
