rain.

Out there it is dark
The clouds loom and swirl
Rain pounds relentless
Wind howls
Trees bend
Storm

But here
There is finally calm
Inside
In her mind
In her thoughts

Finally the chaos outward
Quiets the inward
This is how she thinks
How she lives
Breathes

Continuum

“The boundaries which divide Life from Death are at best shadowy and vague. Who shall say where the one ends, and where the other begins?” -Edgar Allan Poe

I want to know where I am on that continuum, the one with life and death on either side. I imagine, in fact I know for a fact, that I'm closer to death than the majority of the people I know, but why? What parameters put me there? Realistically, those parameters are just as arbitrary and vague as the boundaries between extremes. So does that mean they matter more or not at all? These are my non-rhetorical questions of the day, although I'm not sure of whom I'm asking these things.

Grapple

I don't know what it means to be here. I know pieces of the purpose of existence. And for the duration of this post, I am choosing to be outside the context of any supernatural force, if at all possible.
Far be it from me to assume that I could ever have the mental capacity to hold the universe's ideas of my life at all. Yet we all seem to pursue those ideas, almost mindlessly. Time moves and shifts on beyond that of here and now. Even as you read these words, they are aged. My mind has certainly already changed and found some other concept of struggle to tackle.
But at one time, in one moment, these are thoughts I had: I am indeed a broken and fallen individual. I have lost the motivation for a season. I am rolling down a hill that ends in a cliff, consistently picking up speed, bumped by rocks, sticks, and branches that all try, to no avail, to slow me down. I honestly don't know know if I will stop before flying off the edge of that cliff. Or if instead, I do fly and am somehow caught by something or someone just before the fatal end. Those are simply thoughts I have right now.

The Fall of the Bridge

There is a small park close to where I lived during that summer. It's some sort of train station memorial or something. All that's there is the small memorial building, a short path, four or five benches, a couple picnic tables, a gazebo, and a bridge going over the old train tracks. The bridge is mine. I mean, not really. But it's significance to me is far greater than to anyone else. I know it. On that bridge I come to the brink of reality and life. I grapple with questions of existence and purpose and pain. One night I stood, leaning on the bridge's railing, breathing with the wind, and thinking of the fall. Not the season, but the fall from healing to broken, from wholeness to fractured. My mind can't contain the concepts, nor can my body. The whole being that is me desires to release them into the air as separated atoms that are nothing but lost particles in the moving air around me. That release is as varied as the elements of the earth.

Bridges are built to withstand great pressure and to facilitate the crossing of whoever would will the bridge to do its job. I once saw a bridge, not mine, collapse right in front of me. Simply too much pressure and the bridge failed. It fell. Cracked. Splintered. And every person on the bridge had looks of fright and confusion. Because it failed. And fell.

The fall is forever and infinite. Both separately and mutually. We are the fall. We are broken and fearful and splintered. When I stand on my bridge, I can jump and run or simply walk or stand upon it and I, naively, trust that it will manage to hold it all. But if it fell, even if it fell while I was with it, I would not condemn the failure of the bridge or its architects. I would only empathize. I am falling. So I stand on my bridge and breathe in and out as existence and failure and purpose float through my being.

where

Where is my head today? Where is my mind? Where is my heart? Who knows?

Heart & Soul
Burn & Loss
Heal & Soothe
Break & Crush
Feel & Breathe
Pray & Strain
Press & Stretch
Drive & Rise
Touch & Seek
Hurt & Joy

A Yearish Later.

For some reason, that is too easily identified, I have not given any attention to my blog in nearly a year. I'm not going to make any commitments about future frequency of posts, because I will not follow through with them. I do want to post more though. Fortunately, posting more than once a year is a fairly tangible objective.

Recently an internet personality named Alex Day, whom I admire greatly wrote, recorded, and filmed a video for a brilliantly optimistic and endearing song entitled "Good Morning, Sunshine." Alex, himself, is a strange and opinionated, yet optimistic British fellow whose personality, in my opinion, is reflected pretty perfectly in this song. The following is a selection of the lyrics to that song:


Good morning sunshine
I wish for your heart
There's no point pretending
That you won't burn out.
But you're still a symbol
To all that you meet
'Cause you keep on shining
You're extraordinary.

If the darkness came tomorrow,
Could I keep you in my mind?
Where you rise I gladly follow
Just for the chance
To stand in your light.

I couldn't help but think of those exceptional individuals in my life whose light I stand in everyday. They should know that, shouldn't they? However, the farthest I could bring myself to telling them was to post the song on my fb wall and then a bit of the lyrics on the wall of the friend who immediately came to mind while listening to the song. But there are so many others who I want to tell about the unique inspiration they give me everyday to live my life by being a dear friend of mine who will listen and provide encouragement whenever needed.

I do hope they know. I really do. Sometimes it's just too hard to put into words, so you have to hope that someone else can do it for you. Thanks, Alex.

Changes

This is going to take some getting used to...
Basically, much of my life has changed and as a result, I have to make some modifications to the way my daily life unfolds. For starters, just the acceptance of responsibility is a fairly new aspect of character that I have never fully embraced. Not that I never took responsibility for my actions; I did, but it was never very long term. My mind is one that can develop rationalization for about anything. So eventually, I could write off any action I took as acceptable.
Also, while I immensely enjoy being alone and in my own mind, I have found that, often in those times, I end up thinking about and wanting to be with my close friends. Then I quickly realize that being with friends is a much more difficult task than I would like it to be. College is just not conducive to my social well-being. I don't want to force myself upon my friends, but I also don't want to be alone so much of the time.
And so, a week into school, I am trying to understand and adapt to this new way of thinking and new way of living.