She was wearing her best dress and dancing to the sad rhythm of her loneliness. The bottom of her dress balled up in her fists. She was hopeless and asking for help out of her unbearable solitude. Clinging to every indifference like a child to his teddy bear, I looked at her and said, “I’m sorry, there is nothing I can do for you.”
.
I felt a pull from offshore – from where I watched the sun press back into the earth just moments ago. A beckoning that felt as if it had wrapped its cold fingers around the bottom of my ribcage and dragged my torso into the waves. I felt my father out there among the tide, and layers of him surfaced and crashed back into each other again and again and nothing could possibly stop it – nothing I could fathom. Every wake breaking into my chest was a funeral. And the trees behind me howled in the wind and the lights of the hotels flickered and there was people along the boardwalk crying and laughing and fucking – but here under the waves, under the creaking oak of haunted ships, and between the endless limbs of leviathan – was the quieting of everything eternally.
Excluding me.
.
It was never a surrender to ones own deviance that unnerved me. In fact, when it’s done correctly – openly and genuinely – I tend to find it quite endearing.
It was never those beautiful, chaotic souls that embrace thier animal instincts that worried me. Rather, most of the time it would make me swoon.
After all, a wolf will display it’s teeth before it springs forth and sinks them into your throat. And a spider will raise unto it’s haunches and let it’s venom slowly drip before it spills it into your bloodstream.
These are the warnings, and those of us who choose to ignore them duly deserve the latter of each scenario.
But what’s so interesting about complexity of the human mind is although we know very well what happens next…….. there are still those few of us who crave it.
Some of us desperately.
.
There’s an old tree that I used to climb growing in a park close to where I grew up. One day, as I was jogging through, I noticed that they layed out a new cement walkway quite close to the tree which I felt was kind of odd. A few weeks went by, and as I was once again jogging through, I saw a small group of men out there with a chainsaw cutting the old tree down. When I got close I had to slow down and walk around where they were working and as I passed by I asked why they were getting rid of the tree. They said it was growing too fast and getting too big in a direction they did not anticipate and if they don’t get rid of it soon, it will overwhelm the beautiful new walkway they just put in. I didn’t say anything in response but I kept thinking it was equally sad and funny because they knew the tree was there when they built that walkway – They knew what it was and what it was capable of – But instead of admiring and respecting it’s own natural progress, they destroyed it because it was impeding on a more comfortable, aesthetically pleasing, predictable progress that they had intentionally begun right next to it.
Sometimes I am that tree.
And sometimes I am that chainsaw.
.
I do adore the architecture of old churches. The sharp edges and points that reach up far into the clouds and seemingly stab violently at the sky. Almost like nails hammered in from below the earth. I imagine that if the heaven’s were to ever slowly try to drift down to earth, all the countless churches of the world – with thier towering sharp steeples – would almost be similar to a bed of nails. To send them recoiling back into the clouds from whence they came. And how suitable that would be, for there are few things farther from God than a church
.
“I don’t get it. ” I said.
I’m irritated and I’m trying hard not to make it visable. I don’t want anyone in this small cafe to notice. Thats my ego. I hate that about myself: I feel humiliated at the slightest hint of any emotion.
“I’m not aware that I’m doing anything wrong, but I keep getting in trouble. Its like the better I feel, the worse I make others feel.”
“Well of course, my boy. You’re a wanderer”
Its been about two hours of bullshit but the man across from me still speaks with ease as if we had just sat down. “The only thing you need is something that will still be there when you get back”
I don’t drink coffee, so I’m staring down at the table. No eye contact. My back Is slumped and my shoulders are arched inward towards my chest. Im making myself small. This is a habit of mine. Im sure its psychologically indicative of bad self esteem. But, I think its more agoraphobic than anything. When I go places, I habitually find a dark corner or back chair to slump into and make myself small so that no one knows I’m even there. I can come and go as I please. If I need to escape, I can do so without incident. Its almost like I’m a…..
“A ghost” he interupting my introspective daydream.
“Huh?”
“Its like you’re a ghost or a wild animal or something.” He said while sliding his cappuccino back and forth between his hands on the table.
“I was under the impression that there was a pretty distinct difference between the two”
“The similarity is that no matter how much they are loved, they can not officially belong to anyone. No matter how many leashes or séances. A wild animal will eventually wander off into the headlights of a truck, and a ghost will eventually “go towards the light”” He looked down at his lukewarm drink and smirked a little bit. “…….I guess what im saying is….. stay away from lights.” a soft chuckle finally burst through before the mug touched his lips.
“What happens if I go towards the light? Do I wake up? Would you be alive again?”
“No, then you make people cry even more, asshole!” He laughed even harder this time and I noticed some of the other patrons shoot us “the look.” It was a joke but I could feel a hint of seriousness behind it.
“Lets face it, kiddo. Your instincts will always betray your intellect”
.
Once you begin to feel enthralled and passionate without the need of any type of reciprocating entity or conveniently placed body, the entire population is at your mercy.
“Love” is such an odd endeavor that you learn just as much about when its absent as you do when you’re in its grasp, and the very moment you start to feel those same sensations without any type of target for them, it becomes no longer a game of ‘who will make me feel that way?’ but instead ‘who will I share this with?’ and you will immediately notice a phenomenal increase in the quality of your enviroment, and particularly your company.
.
When I was young, my father would take us to the dock overlooking the Gulf near our house and let us run around while he stared off into the dark blue. I never knew why until now. Looking out across the lake in Cassadega, I had this overwhelming urge to rattle the earth enough to make waves in the murky water. Thats what it was all about for him. Waves. Watching the ocean topple over itself in sheer chaos and then calmly withdraw itself exposing hundreds of feet of clear, smooth sand that it was hiding underneath for only a few seconds until the choas comes hurling itself towards the shore again. Theres nothing more important than that because thats how life works. It comes in waves.
I learned from watching him stare off at the sea as a little boy that there are two types of men; ones who only see the water crash and break over itself while hurling towards the shoreline, and ones who only watch it cower in on itself and withdraw back from where it came. Those who can do both must be something more than human. If you are stranded out there, floating at the top of the ocean, being pelted by waves, you don’t think about the bottom. You cant fathom that there is a blissful silence beneath you when you are so overwhelmed by the choas surrounding you at the top. What kind of a man can furiously tread water with the understanding that everything is OK because underneath is the most pleasant calm imaginable? That would be an ideal way to look at life, though seemingly impossible.
I know that what I see, and what I need to learn to see are entirely different. But I have been learning to be grateful for the times when I notice the empty shore between waves. Even though its brief. The more you learn to pay attention, the longer it seemingly takes for the world to fill back up with dark water again. Thats how you start. Only seconds at a time, and then soon, it will take a minute or two. And thats just enough for a couple deep breaths of fresh air in order to make it just a little easier next time you go under. I have friends right now that are being pelted by tumultuous waves, but there will be a break again soon i assure you. Its corny but that’s how life works. You’ll be able to get a couple good breaths in. Goodnight.
.
Its all sort of a game, really, when I think about it. Everyone you meet leaves some sort of imprint on you psychologically. Maybe a wrinkle in your brain from knowledge gained, a wrinkle of your forehead from induced stress, or a wrinkle in time from the frenzy of intimate encounters moving so quickly.
All impressions last forever whether negative or positive they help shape who you are right now. Every one. Ever since you were a child.
I imagine that my subconscious is like clay and there is thousands of fingerprints all over from these encounters molding me into me. Maybe one side has a huge dent from some sort of trauma. And maybe one side has a burn mark from being used or abandoned. But its all part of me now.
I wonder who’s soul has my fingerprints? Who’s soul has a imprint of my fist in its surface? Who have I burnt? Maybe there is imprints of my palm on a few where I tried my hardest to smooth out the dents that someone else left?
I wonder who I’ve influenced and who has turned their past negative encounters with me into something positive?
Its a game you play throughout life whether you like it or not. Like a walking jigsaw puzzle disassembled, looking to see if we fit in others lives. Hoping pieces of us stay. Hoping to find places to hide pieces of us.
Usually nothing fits and we never see them again. Or we try to force it for a few days or weeks and inevitably fall free.
But sometimes they pick up our clay and leave fingerprints and palm marks where they tried to sooth our damage.
.
In my own self exploration, I noticed that sometimes there is a type of guerrilla warfare in the mind. Hidden feelings, Paradoxical emotions. They are the sniper fire of brain chemistry. Completely inconspicuous, waiting to strike when the target is most vulnerable.
Really the only effective defense against a sniper is the hide the target or make it hard to hit. The target, of course being me. The rest of me. Seclusion.
I guess what I’m trying to say here is that a persons enemies can say a lot about them. You can learn volumes by studying a persons foes. So in self exploration, the key would be to locate enemies of my mind. Maybe bad or undeveloped emotions and analyze them. Find the source and they should, in theory, disperse or become my ally.
The problem is, I’m not entirely sure where the enemy is sometimes.
and in the battle field of the mind, friendly fire can be devastating.
An Introduction To Terrible Things.... 