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July 31, 2006
redreaming
so, i went to homeslice tonight.
i'm an odd writer, which is no surprise. everything about me and my environment kind of ideally needs to be in balance. the lighting, the chair, the computer or notebook, the pen, the ambient noise, the music.
the alternative, of course, is to get drunk, whic eventually brings me to some sort of baseline. i'm trying not to do that as much these days.
these needs could be dismissed as procrastination tactics, except that when everything feels right, writing is more likely to happen, and it's less likely to suck.
tonight, nothing was in balance. i got there an hour earlier than i'm used to, talked to andre for way longer, drank more beer right off the bat, and instead of my usual half a spinach salad and a slice, i got a half a spinach slice and an entire pizza, of which i ate half.
i left, went home, fed the cats, felt bad for having to leave them again, but i left them again, came here to kammi's house, where i'm housesitting for the week.
i've done it once before, a little over a year ago. everything was different, then. maybe some things were more stable, but today, i feel better than i did then.
last year, i wrote something on her very shiny and cool notebook computer, just as i am now. it was about a dream i had one night here.
this week, tonight, the dream is having me. it's still only a dream, but this time, for now, i actually want to wake up in the morning, to see what small but beautiful things the dream might hold for me that day...
"that's how i knew this story would break my heart."
June 03, 2005
(aimee mann)
i parked in the alley, was with a friend, walked through, stepping carefully between and across the puddles that rippled grey skies, just like the ones i pick my way through in the alley behind the coffeeshop.
my friend and i come to some people by the dumpster behind the record store, like the dumpster behind the record store i visited so often when i was back in college.
she was there, just in front of a group of people that had accumulated to watch some confrontation, under clouds that began to release small cold drops of rain on her as she quietly but firmly berated some surly guy dumping garbage. i was too late to know why, and what i heard i now can't seem to recall.
i watched her, then went through the back door into the record store, wiped the slowly warming drops from my face, my hands on my jeans, moved through the beige and glass room, just like the record store i went to with kristi in alexandria a few years ago.
she came in sometime later, began browsing, the clack of disc cases, small, wispy locks of hair under a knit cap lifting softly with each slow flip of a phonograph record.
I maneuvered down the aisle across from her, willing her to look up, to glimpse, to smile. i saw her, glancing slyly up from the racks, moving my way, too; cat and cat, mouse and mouse.
i was staring.
she looked up through her glasses, smiled, said, "what?"
"i'm sorry?"
"did you have a question? i don't work here, you know," still, all smiling.
"yeah, i know... but. ah."
nice.
recovery. sort of. "coffee. want to grab some?"
she looked at me warily. "you don't drink coffee, do you?"
"no."
"hm. well, that's ok. let's go."
sitting together, inside, but walls open away behind her to the lightening afternoon. we talked of many things, the girl and the walrus, everything so easy, finally.
i asked her name, but only heard her voice, and didn't catch it, and didn't want to just ask it again. it didn't matter, because somehow, once again, now, so many years later again, i was beginning to see, beginning to know.
it couldn't have been more perfect, it couldn't have more perfectly imperfect.
she was like everyone i've known, and like no one i've met. i was amazed at everything i had never thought to want or ask for, even as i had doubted that something far less could ever come.
she paused.
"you do know, right?"
i blinked, my eyes opened slightly, the day seemed to lighten as something in me fell.
"you're not real, are you?"
she smiled, sweetly, sadly, "no, i'm afraid not."
my stomach tightened, but i smiled, as i had before, how long ago, years and minutes.
"that's ok. if i were awake, and you were really here, it could just so easily be something else - married, gay, too young, too old. so this is just, 'not real.' funny, but in the end, it doesn't really make much difference, does it?"
"no, i guess not."
"are you having a good time?"
she smiled again. "yes. yes, i am. and that matters just as much."
i nodded. i wrapped my hand around my mug of tea. somewhere, something, my mind, my heart, god, decided it was warm.
"yeah. then, is it okay if we just hang out a little longer? can we just... do this?"
"i'd like that. but i think simon wants out."
"what? no..."
i could hear simon whimper, and it pulled me away, out of sleep, and she was gone, and i was there in kammi's house, where i was staying with simon and max and the cats while kammi was away, and i was alone, simon at my bed side, wagging his tail, wanting for some reason to go out at 3:24 in the morning.
i reached out and scruffed his ears wearily, stared at the ceiling and tried to put it all back together.
i can't remember her name.
Posted by Rob at 10:57 PM | Comments (0)
July 28, 2006
say hello
ok, kids, check out the new linky dink, to my friend Ami's website.
yes, i feel it is redundant to say "friend Ami." it's like saying "my friend Amigo." i did not name her, so i am not responsible.
Posted by Rob at 01:24 PM | Comments (1)
texting, out of time
ok, it's been a busy week, so not much writing. but here's something i sort of found tonight, one short page in the notebook that i'm just starting to use again because kerbey lane doesn't have wireless. it makes me think of being in kerbey's not much better twin, magnolia cafe, a year ago. this year, tonight, i'm listening to thom yorke's new solo album, but last year, i was listening to him singing with radiohead.
things are better now than then, but that night was a very good one.
Here I am, alone, but not, sitting at the counter, the café full around me, but i’m a party of one, alone, but not. thom yorke is in my ears and head, but no one else can hear:
I’m not living -
I’m just killing time.
Your tiny hands,
Your crazy kitten smile.
The phone flashes as it receives another short burst of text from far away, a long evening’s silent conversation continues. Flirtation, honest questions, some censored, some dodged with a laugh that I can almost hear. I wonder what she hears, a thousand miles away, sitting and playing hearts with her family, glancing from her cards to the phone on the table beside her, smiling, I hope, when it lights with new words from me, from where I am.
I want to laugh out loud. I’m enjoying someone who isn’t here, laughing with her, lounging comfortably in the remarkable paradox of being here in my own world, but feeling so close, feeling not alone. All this, even as I know that this joy, this exhilaration, this quiet warmth I feel close about me is something that I can never have, that can never be.
And true love waits
in haunted attics.
And true love lives
on lollipops and crisps…
Luckily, this place always maintains its share of crazy people, folks quietly taking joy in the impossible, kept company by soft, unheard voices from the unseen.
Posted by Rob at 09:47 AM | Comments (1)
July 24, 2006
rooms of rest
a few days ago, i went into the men's room at work. my own alert level was elevated beyond normal. not like, red, not even orange. maybe, appropriately, brown. let's go with that.
two urinals, two stalls. the stall on the left is never even a consideration - the seat is broken, so it's inherently unstable. i might be fine for a moment, but if i were to shift my weight just the wrong way, all the careful layering of paper i'd done might be moot. things might touch porcelain. the thought gives me chills. those parts, of course, would have to be dipped in highly caustic cleansing fluids to ever make them right again. removal might even be called for.
the stall on the right is, therefore, the only real choice. but as soon as i went in... something wasn't right. there was some odor that wasn't even what you would, could, or should expect from a toilet. in a place that was made to accomodate so many posteriors a day, it smelled unnaturally like... well, ass.
i backed out, carefully avoiding the stall door (why do they open inwards?), washed my hands thoroughly, even though nothing had occurred, and left the bathroom. i wasn't sure what to do, so i decided to wait it out, went back to the office, washed my hands again, then resumed working.
an hour later, i headed back out to check on the conditions, because i know that the janitors come during the daytime, late morning or early afternoon. sometimes, i come in, and you just know the seat has been wiped, so it'll be clean under the inpenetrable inch-thick shield of paper i'll layer on it. sometimes, there's even the scent of cleaning products. it's still a public restroom, but it makes it all slightly less appalling.
no such luck.
wash hands, exit. i ran into my coworker robert, and i warned him off. i told him i was going to explore the other floors. it hadn't occurred to him that this could be done, and as we waited for the elevator for the next floor down, i began to impart my years of public restroom savvy.
it started in elementary school, really. i remember that the only occasional upside to being called to the principal's office was that the office had its own restroom.
they had real toilet paper, not the strange little unusuable squares the regular restroom dispensers were filled with. covering the toilet seat effectively was like shingling a roof, and there were other obvious problems, as well.
it was also the last time in my life that anything, in this case my sense of disdain for The Man, could overcome my realization that to touch anything in a public bathroom was effectively the end of my life. i would lock the door, then crawl out from under the door. it brought me joy, and no one ever seemed to catch on. very strange.
in high school, i discovered the faculty bathroom. there was no key required, i guess it just didn't occur to the other kids to go in there. by that time, i was under no illusion that adults were any cleaner than kids, but there was less traffic, and only one stall, so it was relatively luxurious.
only once was i caught. i was only going in for the urinal, so brazen was i in my sense of entitlement, and i was taking my own sweet time about it, too, when assistant principal coach oscar zepeda came in. he looked at me, went to the urinal next to me, and asked me why i had skipped class the week before. it had only been the first time i ever skipped out of school, but he asked me to try not to do it again, and i mostly didn't.
i filled robert in on the restrooms at the driscoll hotel, knowledge that had been imparted to me by my friend michael years ago. if you're ever out on sixth street, there is absolutely no reason to go into the flooded skanky-assed bathroom at the ritz when you can luxuriate in an individual real-wood-paneled bathroom with a real door.
robert and i exited on the sixth floor, the executive offices of a bank. the bathroom was in the same place in the hall as on our floor, but as the door opened, i felt like dorothy opening the door of her house just after the crashdown.
instead of the nondescript mauve tiles on the seventh floor, there was faux slate tile. where our urinals and two stalls were divided by beige sheet metal, here there was simulated cherrywood, and only one grand stall. someone had even left the sports section hanging on the railing there, although, of course, i could only read what was visible without touching it.
robert was suitably impressed, used the urinal, and left, and i settled into the luxury stall. moments later, i heard the door open, and heard the clack of leather-soled dress shoes on the tile. i could catch glimpses of cuffs, a white dress shirt, a conservative tie through the gaps in the stall wall.
i realized i was in jeans and one of my three or four wearable, though wrinkled, short-sleeve shirts, and bright red trail running shoes, the sort of thing you can wear when you're a 37 year-old attorney doing temporary document review grunt work.
i'm used to being places i don't belong, but i still felt conspicuous, and though i was done, i waited for him to leave.
i thought briefly of locking the door and going over the top of the stall, locking the suits out of their own domain, but thought better of it, washed my hands, and slipped out quietly.
Posted by Rob at 11:04 AM | Comments (2)
minimalist random musical connection blog of the day
if you're listening to the new thom yorke album (which, clearly, you should be, right damned now), think about prince. prince could have written all the music...
that's it. that's the whole thing.
note:
this blog entry dedicated to the friend who just wishes i would get to the damned point when i write.
note 2:
pretty much everyone will think the previous line refers directly to them.
Posted by Rob at 09:36 AM | Comments (0)
July 18, 2006
the best of times
what a week! and it's only tuesday!
two landmark events have already occurred in only two days.
for one thing, i have finally learned to do a basic task that has always eluded me.
there's something i really love watching a girl do... i love seeing her grab a straw in her soft hand, her long fingers wrapping delicately around the shaft of the sippy device. she taps one end of the straw against the other hand, or the counter, or even her lightly tanned leg, and the straw pops out of the paper wrapper, where she can bite it gently or grab it with her lips and pull it out.
it's probably obvious why i love watching this so much... because i have never been able to do it.
i rarely use straws, because i tend to drink too fast with them. but they are often the only way to adequately stir sugar into an iced tea without wasting a plastic utensil. so, i have my own, decidedly less intriguing straw-opening process. first, i attempt to do it like everyone else, which has only ever succeeded in crumpling the straw while it's still safely in its flimsy paper cocoon.
next, i curse loudly, usually the "f" word, and start shredding the paper manually into lots of little bits that i then have to clean up.
i've long known the issue is one of pressure - how to hold the straw in the wrapper lightly enough to push it through the paper, but tightly enough to get some grip. and at this, i have never, ever succeeded.
but yesterday, it came to me - i brushed my fingers lightly against the outside of my plastic cup, till they glistened with dewy condensation, then grasped the straw with those fingers, and tapped...
the pride i felt when the straw burst free from the wrapper was... indescribable. i wanted to cry. and maybe, quietly, to myself, at the drink bar at schlotzsky's i did...
so that was a big landmark accomplishment, an epiphany enacted that will change my life. but in terms of an event, little could compare to what else yesterday:
yesterday morning, i fought nobly through the grogginess of minimal sleep and my hatred of monday to make it to the bus stop on time. fortunately, there is a second bus that comes a few minutes later. once on board, i exercised my newly regained ability to read in a moving vehicle. it's still a tricky operation at best, and there is still just the faintest hint of nausea. but with this superpower, i may now be able to read more than one book a year. stay tuned.
workout bag over one shoulder and cake keeper full of a botched blueberry pound cake balanced on my right hand, i stepped off the bus and into the over-cooled air of my office building's foyer, unaware of the peril that loomed ahead...
i stepped onto the elevator, joining a woman that works down the hall from me. as the doors were closing, a guy holding a giant cylindrical vase of weird flowers aloft came into view. we opened the door for him, and he slid in.
the doors closed. we started talking to the flower guy, then the elevator lurched and clunked. my copassengers didn't pay it any mind, but i was suspicious. our building has some of the fastest elevators i've ever been on, and they're very smooth, but i was pretty sure we weren't moving.
after about a minute, they were staring at the doors, too. it's interesting that when you're on an elevator that stops, there's really nothing to look at to size up the situation, so you stare at the buttons, then the doors, the floor number display, even though the only thing that matters is the lack of movement.
i was immediately thrilled - my life has been fairly lame and unremarkable in terms of things like meeting celebrities, getting arrested, and, yes, getting stuck in an elevator.
the woman from down the hall opened up the panel to the call box, and hit the emergency button. there was a dialtone, then lots of clicks, then an automated message, and then we were on hold.
eventually, a woman came on and asked what our situation was. we told her.
"OK, sir, do you see the 'door open' button?"
"uhh...yeah."
"I want you to hold the door open button for five seconds."
silence.
"ok, nothing."
"nothing happened?"
"no."
"the doors didn't open?"
clearly, she didn't trust my definition of "nothing."
"no."
"OK, sir, I want you to hit all the buttons so that they're all lit up."
i was actually sort of concerned about the operator at this point, because her suggestions seemed to be the sort of things people trapped on an elevator would do once they started panicking.
of course, nothing continued to happen, and the operator said she'd call somebody. she asked if we were alright, and we shrugged. we clearly were, but we wondered if maybe we shouldn't be.
i slid down the wall and made myself comfortable. the woman from my office put her purse on the floor and, to my amazement and only slight disappointment, was able to gracefully maneuver herself to the floor in her skirt.
we sat for maybe two minutes before she wondered exactly where the car was stuck. it occurred to me that i was so thrilled to be finally stuck on an elevator that i wasn't really doing much thinking about how to get off. i pictured the morning wearing on into afternoon. she and i would eat cake with our hands. later, needing protein and wanting to minimize the air consumption, we would kill and possibly eat the flower delivery guy, though the idea stirred slight feelings of homophobia in me.
eventually, of course, her husband would have to give up on her and move on, and she and i would have to repopulate the elevator with our own young.
clearly, my mate wasn't thinking clearly when she wondered what floor we were on. i stood up and did my best action hero impression, pulling the doors apart with my bare hands, revealing...
the security guard staring at us from the first floor, a precipitous drop of at least five inches.
we stepped down, and like lemmings, onto another elevator. we rode up, and all went our separate ways, another potential future dashed.
Posted by Rob at 12:16 PM | Comments (5)
July 17, 2006
call and response
this blog has, as i've pointed out, veered so far away from what i originally intended for it. i foresaw a forum for me write on a daily basis, to entertain. the megalomaniac in me saw my friends telling their friends, them telling others, and so on and so on, until the thing took on a life of its own and somebody would pay me to write, and i'd live happily ever after.
as i sti writing, this has clearly not occurred.
a lot of it's my own fault - i became enamored with the ease of confessionalism here, with the release, with the indulgence, perhaps, of everything that roils in my heart and my head.
there is no denying that an element of that is a cry out to be heard and understood, maybe for easy solutions. the downside of that is that i'm a bit ashamed of my lack of shame, at my openness, and at the things i feel. and, i'm ashamed when it makes my friends worry.
one great friend wrote a long email to me last week. she's an amazing person - another lawyer who just quit it all, except that she has the strength and focus and yes, faith, to commit herself to working for others. her strength is in Christ, and in that regard, she's in the minority of my friends. while my own spiritual beliefs are perhaps not entirely orthodox, many of the people i love mistakenly call themselves aetheists, driven away from faith by the real-world stupidity and corruption that seems to naturally overcome religion whenever a lot of people get involved.
one person i think of the most is someone i love and respect, a father of a best friend, who lived around the corner from bat-shit crazy andrea yates, the woman who claimed that God told her to drown her children in the bathtub.
it's hard not to blame someone for the acts of their followers, even God.
i think it's sad. anyway, i finally responded to my friend, and i think there are other friends and readers i need to say this too, as well...
------
I hate that I've waited so long to respond, but I haven't wanted to
just throw down a hurried answer. As it is, this will still not be as
thorough as I'd like.
There's definitely no offense taken. I love that you care enough to
share all this with me.
Here's the thing - I've chosen my burdens. There are a few things that
are a little outside my control, like the psychiatric issues. But even
with that, there's shelter to be had, medications that could shut a
lot of it down. I could choose not to care what my parents have to say
about my life, or about how others do and don't see me, and as hard as it is, it is ultimately a matter of choosing to have the strength to do so.
My spiritual beliefs are not readily apparent, but they are a central
guiding force. I'd like to think that seeming paradox exists because
I've successfully integrated my faith and my view of the world. It's
hard to believe, given the way I feel, the way I think and criticize,
but I see nothing but miracles.
Science brought me my faith during my undergrad years, in the simple
realization that if something exists, then something must comprehend
it. Later, I realized things through some science fiction, oddly
enough. I knew that power and omniscience are meaningless unless they
are one with a moral force. Without love and compassion, the most
powerful being imaginable is nothing more than just that - a powerful
being, certainly not worth loyalty or worship or study. And that
cannot be.
I also realized that our divisions of the supernatural and natural,
miracles and simple laws of nature, are arbitrary and primitive. Why
is scientific prediction different The existence of bark on a tree is
just as much a miracle as the transmutation of water into wine.
my issue is that i believe i have failed the miracles, the possible destinies i had been given. that is a burden that has to be my responsibility.
I believe in forgiveness as a critical article of faith. We can all
seek forgiveness from each other, from our parents, from society, but
when remorse is true, none of that should be enough to absolve us of
sorrow and guilt - we need something more powerful. We need the universe itself to understand and forgive us. There is, indeed no way to salvation but through that one overarching, unified force.
This is just scratching the surface of my beliefs. I don't really feel
doubt about them, though they are clearly matters of faith. I think
you know that I've also learned a lot from some zen ideas, which I
feel work hand in hand with Christian principles.
And, of course, I have a few friends that keep me grounded in my
spirituality as much as anything else, and you have become one of
those over the past couple of years.
I don't mean to concern you - I'm touched by your concern, but I also
feel bad about it. It is important for me that you know that I'm not
lost. I know where my soul is, and what's truly important out of this
life, and that it's those matters of the heart and soul that, at the
end of the day, are the only things that truly matter.
I have it in my head that at some point, I'm going to write about my
beliefs. I've talked to people about them, and I feel like maybe it
can be helpful, as helpful as what you've said is to me. My way may
not look and sound exactly the same, but have faith in me - I want to,
and believe that I am, and know that I could aspire to no better, than
to walk that path with you.
rob
Posted by Rob at 09:33 PM | Comments (1)
July 16, 2006
afloat
last thursday night...
sometimes, i wish austin was being kept weird at a more manageable distance.
a few minutes ago, i sat down at the bar at kerbey lane, needing dinner, and armed with a bag full of laptop, notebook, newly returned iPod, and the book i've been reading, the time-traveler's wife
i feel like some simplicity tonight, and after a little internal debate, i end up ordering the "american classic": a couple of eggs, toast, and homefries. for the first time maybe ever, i order my eggs scrambled instead of sunny-side up. i don't really know why - it just seems right.
i try reading for a bit, but with the newly-regained stability of a steady income, my mind has turned back to all the writing i should be doing, that i have to do. as i pull out the laptop, another diner plops down to my right, a slightly disheveled-looking woman, naturally fair-skinned but cooked over decades to a deep brown, topped by an incomprehensible convulsion of dirty blonde hair.
almost immediately, she begins singing along with the piped-in music.
after several minutes of booting-up and opening a separate word processing window, i have blank white lcd waiting patiently before me. i begin to type, and i hear, over my headphones, singing. the kyboard bounces back up from the bar lightly. she's drumming. and singing.
she starts looking around, having apparently chosen something from the menu, and i begin to be a little conscious of how visible anything i might type would be, whether she were being nosy or not. i close the notebook, and pull out the old small spiral, and the montblanc pen that was my father's first gift to me when we reconnected almost eight years ago.
this week, i've felt like i'm getting my balance back. oddly, though, i don't know when or where some sense of balance last truly existed for me. am i finding it as i emerge from the confusion and darkness of the last few weeks? or am i regaining it after the disarray of the last few months? or after these last many years?
i do know that i'm better than i've been, but i also know i've been better than this. and, of course, i know that nothing has been set right - i still feel the sense of a better, more fitting destiny slipping away. i still feel love is harder and harder to foresee in my future.
but this is good. i'm just getting my feet solid, a bit more squarely under me. i feel like i'm regaining lost ground physially, and getting my mind back a little.
my meal comes, and for a moment, i juggle plate of food, iPod, and book. in the pause, i realize that my neighbor is now talking worriedly to herself. for her sake and mine, i prefered the singing and drumming.
so, more and more, i'm getting back to O.K. with the present, trying to be able to appreciate the moment, to be at rest, at peace. it feels as much a process as learning to run, or more aptly, like learning to ride a bike again after years of letting yours collect dust.
the future, though... that's different. what is the future? i sense it, and in some way, it's sort of a wall that i'm rushing to meet, or is rushing to meet me. sometimes i think of the line from an old genesis song - "and i'm hovering like a fly, waiting for the windshield on the freeway."
no, that's not quite it, though. it's not quite that.
ironically, despite my beign annoyed earlier, and the slightly wary eye of the night manager, it's the two guys sitting on the far side of the woman that end up making a mess, knocking a large glass of water across tha bar, an inland sea forming around her slice of carrot cake. she, however, thinks it's great, and helps them clean it up - it's a chance to talk to someone. that i understand. i feel bad that, ironically, i've pretty much ignored her.
here's what the future feels like: an ocean that i'm being carried ever deeper into, like when i would go to the beach and wade farther and deeper out, until i was just able to keep my nostrils clear of the water by bobbing up and down with the waves. there was always a mix of exhiliration, of freedom, and of fear.
there's a certainty in the water, in the overwhelming immenseness of it stretching before you, with the familiarity of the shore receding behind you. there's certainty in the buoying strength of the waves, and in the pull of the undertow at my feet. it's all out there, both the terrible and the possible.
she's gone now. someone seems to have paid her bill, and i wonder if the well-intended notionbackfired - does she feel conspicuous, self-conscious for the first time this evening?
there's a pause, maybe a glint of sheepishness. a quiet mutter of thanks, then she announces happily that she's going home to watch "king of the hill," then go to bed.
she exits cafe right, leaving all us other crazy people sitting at the bar, listening quietly to music, thinking of words and worrying about the sea.
Posted by Rob at 11:02 PM | Comments (1)
July 11, 2006
peace
back in march, a couple of weeks before my last day at work, i took a day off to look for what i might do next. after a morning of diligent searching on the web, brainstorming, and making lists, there was really not much left to do in the afternoon.
i gave amber a ride home from the coffeeshop, and she invited me to hang out with her on the porch. it was difficult, letting go of the feeling that i had to change everything in my life right then, that day.
we went to the little corner store, she bought a bottle of wine, i bought a single, large bottle of beer. i asked for a brown paper bag, because it amused me.
we sat on the porch. she brought out a little jam box, and played bob dylan. i had never really sat quietly and listened to dylan.
she reclined on a couch out on the porch, i laid down on the cool surface of the porch itself. after some shifting, i let my head hang back slightly off the first step, and i saw the sky and everything around me.
hours passed. i drifted off to sleep a couple of times, for brief moments.
snapshots of sky and power lines and backlit leaves and wrought iron bolts, and something that i knew my new life needed to have...
Posted by Rob at 11:06 PM | Comments (0)
July 10, 2006
together forever
"fly me to the moon" played in another part of the museum, and i imagined the little figurine, dating from one of the early ancient egyptian dynasties, resonating slightly with the music.
part of my mind was switched on - i felt the confluence of so many points in time, so many lives, on this one moment. a piece of clay in the likeness of a goddess, molded by a common man thousands of years ago to rest in the tomb of a queen, now sitting clean and pristine in a climate-controlled glass case in san antonio, texas, humming slightly in harmonic sympathy with the band that played in the other room for the wedding of a friend of mine, the ceremony itself steeped in maronite tradition, delivered partially in aramaic or some other archaic biblical language.
and me, standing there, smaller worlds struggling and writhing against each other, trying to assert dominance, trying to establish who i would be at that moment.
i tried to read the card for the figurine. the gravity of time and history compressed within it pulled at me, but so did the tidal forces in my own heart and mind. i read each sentence over and over, trying to establish control over my own senses. this is what it's like. to some extent, it's about sucking it up, toughing it out, staying positive, having faith, seeking help, taking medication. but winning, or holding my ground, just means the struggle isn't as obvious to the people around me - it doesn't mean it's not being waged.
my friends were nearby. i wanted to be with them, and they make it easy to be with them, despite all the noise in my head. but i want more. i want to be that best me again. i want to have the mind that is firing off so well that i'm fun and funny, the kid that used to love watching a younger robin williams go off because he could see and understand what was happening in his head, could make the seemingly random connections that comedy is made of.
i wanted to be good-looking. i wanted to be smooth. i wanted to be like billy and slide in with the band. i wanted these people, on this night, to see who i am and what i could do.
but what i needed was for it all to quiet down, to let me get a handle on things. i couldn't think, couldn't be myself. this is what it's like, but it's worse in some situations.
beer and music and friends, repeat, repeat, and repeat. with time, and yeah, with the alcohol, the mind slowed, quieted a little, and i was able to join my friends, dance a little, sing a little with them, talk to people, be a little more myself.
battle won. it doesn't seem that significant, when so much is sketchy about my career, finances, mind. but few wins could be so important. i had my friends, they had me. i had, i have love. i had glimpses of me, and i'll keep trying to beat back the demons, and on another day, another night, maybe i'll be that kid, that guy, that man, that me. i have to remember this night to know that the evasive reason the struggle is worthwhile exists only in those moments, and in the memory of it.
Posted by Rob at 09:05 PM | Comments (1)
July 07, 2006
about last night
so, a lot of times, i've written things here, only to pull them back off for any number of reasons, often because the switches in my head get reversed at some later time, and everything looks different.
i've had a couple of people suggest that i journal rather than do so much here. it's not like i'm going to get much more honest than i do here. on the other hand, not everyone is probably so cool with some of the things that i write.
anyway, i'm leaving last night's up, because the whole thing was just sort of bizarre. i was in some completely other place. i wonder if it's something weird about the unbelievably cheaper generic medication i just started introducing into my uninsured body. i'm backing off that for a bit, and we'll see what happens.
really not much of a point to this entry, other than to make it clear that i'm not completely psychotic.
Posted by Rob at 09:27 AM | Comments (1)
July 06, 2006
i
it seems that the past few times i've walked from the new apartment down the couple of blocks to the cafe, it's rained.
i've been lost. friends thought, like i did, that things were improving, but suddenly, beginning sometime last week, they weren't.
the past couple of days have been struggles. struggles to stay quiet in my seat, not to stand and scream, not to cry, not to walk quietly away. i see myself and how i feel and who i'm being, and i hate it, but i can't find or generate or confabulate the energy and will to change it. my body, soul and mind feel like they're in a deep gravity well, straining to keep their form.
i hate this, and it makes me hate myself all the more.
i skipped the workout yesterday. i declined the invite to go out with the visiting attorneys at work. this morning, i heard the stories about last night, and once again, i saw myself standing far away, watching the others, and i'm the only one who can see the ghost of the person i really am, laughing, having fun, being fun, flirting, being interesting and attractive.
i meant to run tonight, but couldn't get myself to do it. i didn't want to eat. the idea of food nauseated me, but i was hungry for something, too, real or virtual, to fill the space.
at about 10, i went to kerbey lane cafe. several times, i stopped, thinking there would be nothing i'd want to eat. i ended up there, nevertheless.
i sat alone at the bar, and it was as psychedelic an experience as i've had. i watched a pitcher left under a water tap, felt the anxiety unbearable as it was left to overrun. i sat and wanted to cry. i sat and fought the urge to rest my cheek against the metal pole to my left, to feel the comfort in its solid coolness. i tried to shake away the image that flashed into my head of smashing my head repeatedly against the same pole, and i could almost feel that same coolness mixed with the warmth of my own blood.
i finished half the sandwich and homefries, with difficulty, paid my bill and walked out into the rain. it was cold. i looked down at the asphalt before me, and the rain blew across it rhythmically and consistently, like the rolling of our old television when the horizontal hold began to go out. roll, roll, roll.
i walked up to my own building, and water rolled over the soles of my sandals, whispering across the bottoms of my feet. to my right, in hte gap between the buildings, i heard the creek run, and another vision, peaceful this time, of me floating in it, still, but carried along by dark, cool, clean water, the smooth rush and burbling sounding deep in my eardrums, but unheard.
Posted by Rob at 11:03 PM | Comments (3)
July 04, 2006
light and sound
i was mellowing. i had been drinking, but had let up just before the fireworks began so i could take a friend home. i had poured out the rest of my lone star, gone out and stood in the light rain with her and fagan and the other people that had set up camp chairs on the corner on the hill looking into the city. i had watched the fireworks with them, the sounds of symphony just ephemeral whispers in the distance.
occasionally, as the patch of sky above the city lit with phosphorous and magnesium, the atmosphere itself lit from horizon to horizon with millions of volts of electriity arcing across the night, as if god was trying to keep the fireworks show in some kind of perspective.
when man's attempts to light the night faded as smoke trails in the city's glow, we went back to the party, found my keys, headed home.
and once again, the parties over, the light and sound dying down, i knew my place. maybe different this time, maybe for different reasons, i could tell myself, but i knew, i know, better. it's the same. five, ten, twenty years have made no difference.
i dropped my friend off, and the rain was still light on the windshield. i drove westward on oltorf towards home, only wanting dim lights and cool couch under me, cradling me against everything else.
at congress, the street that runs almost three miles away from the south steps of the pink granite state capital building, i saw the green light, saw the intersection unimpeded. i didn't let up on the gas. i caught a glint of damp white t-shirt and skin. someone was running out into the street in front of me, and was squarely centered in front of my car. left foot to the clutch, hand shifting quick and hard into second, right foot putting the brake to the floor. anti-lock braking took over, and i felt the pulses of computer-modulated braking run up my leg, into my heart, as i steered slightly left.
the person scrambled back to my left, to the curb, and i missed him... or her... it wasn't clear. it was immediately clear that the person was not your regular pedestrian trying to get to the grocery store.
i stopped just past the intersection, no one behind me, and i got out. "dude! you have got to be more careful, i could have fucking killed you!"
the person grinned at me, held his or her arms to the sides, and hands waved from wrists. i'm pretty sure some strange noise was made. i repeated myself, and the hand-flapping and grinning continued.
this morning, i had awoken early, gone to run in the third 10-kilometer leg of a marathon relay with good friends. i felt strong, despite myself, then i felt weak. i am usually able to imagine, visualize, fantasize something to keep me going, to keep me pushing myself for some imagined, worthwhile glory.
today, as has been the case lately, i could find nothing. no sense of accomplishment, no admiration, no love could take me very far beyond the pain of the moment.
my friends came to my house afterwards, and i loved them all. i cooked, and was happy just to watch them, just to feel them around me. then they left to go on about their own lives.
i pulled up the energy to go to another party. i continued to talk to two people who had been at my party, only to eventually realize that we inhabited, probably wanted to inhabit, vastly different worlds.
i stood in the rain. i lost and fond my keys, i watched fireworks and ligtning, i went home, and i almost took a life, through no fault of my own.
my cats were waiting for me, and i poured them food. i took a shower, had a slice of the cake holly made.
nothing changes, not really, not meaningfully. nothing changes. the tension of life and death flow against each other. i try, i work to change myself, to change my environment, to change my life, but nothing changes, not really, not meaningfully. despite my efforts, despite my will, despite the person i try to be, i seem to have run up against the limits of my ability to change my life for the better.
i'm fortunate i wasn't the mechanism for someone's death tonight, but that's a meager measure of a day or a life, isn't it? i feel like it ties in with the course of things. i feel like it means something in conjunction with the ever-failing degree of care i have for my own life. i want to at least be able to use it to wrap what i have to say here in some nice, clever bow. but i got nothin'. i feel it, can'ts quite say it.
some people would have come away feeling some renewed sense of the worth and value of life. to me, i came away feeling even less... as if life were just another simple reaction in the universe, a chain of causality that stops and ends, but means nothing in and of itself.
there's something ironically comforting in that, but it makes me want for a solution that isn't one, just the lack of problem. i wish i wish i wish
Posted by Rob at 10:52 PM | Comments (1)