Archive for the ‘ Observations ’ Category

Tapestry

I was going through the last few months of posts while I silently debated the direction of my novel.

Dear add meds, thanks for the focus necessary for the aforementioned multitasking.

It’s funny, I’d never been able to focus on my studies, in high school they assumed I was bored with the curriculum and I was, just not in the manner they supposed.

I was talking to my dad about the fact that I was never diagnosed with it until college because my ‘rents don’t believe that add exists. He said, “sucks to have hippie parents doesn’t it boy?” and recommended a heavy metal detox to improve my concentration.

God love ya dad.

In any case, my grades are always good, although I sincerely have no idea how to study. Luckily for me I can skate by with my (very nearly) perfect memory for anything I see, hear or read.

I often wonder where I’d be today if my ability to concentrate were a match for my memory.

C’est la vie, nothing is truly gained by such exercises. I am where I am meant to be. Although I’d imagine that I’d at least have taken over this hemisphere by now if I weren’t so easily distracted by shiny things.

“I have known no man of genius who had not to pay, in some affliction or defect, either physical or spiritual, for what the gods had given him.”

~Max Beerbohm

At any rate, the new power cord for my laptop arrived yesterday and I am writing furiously, insensate to all else that flows by me. I had been literally lost, ideas running through my mind with no outlet, no place for them to go; folding back in among themselves, combining with other ideas: a confused welter of thoughts and feelings, melting into a stream of potential.

It’s always the visual. I can literally see a glowing flow of them running through my mind. Close my eyes and there they are, golden and gleaming, lit up like a city against the dark tapestry of my mind.

Waiting, rushing forth at my call, begging me to make them real.

❤

2011
08/14
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CATEGORY
Inspiration
Life
Observations
Writing
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Cold Summer

A definite – and by proxy definitive – coldness had (has) entered my life. Maybe the passion is gone, but the people I speak of had become important parts of my life. I do not feel passionately about my right hand, but I cannot imagine living my life without it.

I find that I tend to shut down emotionally when I’m hurt by someone, I become cold, unaware – to an extent, unfeeling. I try not to, I try earnestly to internalize the pain, to experience the heartache fully and then to let it go. My subconscious betrays me constantly in this, it will only let me go so far before it’s automatic safeties kick in. Failsafes my mind has designed to protect me. I despise my subconscious at times like those, I think that it gets in the way of healing, of closure.

I seem to talk about closure a lot. I have found that no relationship is free of problems, the issues are always one of scale; in the sense of scale of the issue personally and perspectively.

One person is always more hurt than the other, one person always thinks the issue more serious than the other and this creates a schism. A cataclysm. A break.

It’s hard to recover from such things as a unit, one person always gives up.

I’m not completely certain of whom I am speaking of at this juncture, only that the last couple of years have been hard on the heart and draining in my soul. I find a new cynicism vying with my natural optimism; fighting for equal footing in my thoughts.

My ideals battle my experience: in my mind, in my dreams, there are two Ryan’s; each with his own diametrically opposed views, speaking words that I can never hear and when I awake I never know which of them wears my face.

❤

2011
08/12
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CATEGORY
Inspiration
Life
Love
Observations
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99 Problems

I had started a post a day or so ago, typically (of late anyway) it was somewhat whiny, slightly philosophical; a dubious contribution to literature.

Then I watched a documentary about Burma, shot in secret by a man who risked prison by taking video of daily life in his own country.

That’s what real problems look like.

Check it out if you’ve got hbo or can find it: Burma VJ: Reporting from a closed country

❤

2011
08/10
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Activism
Anthropology
Documentary
Films
Inspiration
Life
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99 Problems

I had started a post a day or so ago, typically (of late anyway) it was somewhat whiny, slightly philosophical; a dubious contribution to literature.

Then I watched a documentary about Burma, shot in secret by a man who risked prison by taking video of daily life in his own country.

That’s what real problems look like.

Check it out if you’ve got hbo or can find it: Burma VJ: Reporting from a closed country

❤

2011
08/10
POSTED BY
CATEGORY
Activism
Anthropology
Documentary
Films
Inspiration
Life
Observations
2 comments

Harbinger

There is no such thing as someday. There will never be a later. Either you go after what it is that you want or watch it fade away forever.

I can live with the regrets I have, because I only regret things that I have not done, or waited too long to say.

I regret chances I didn’t take, risks I thought too much.

There is only now, yesterday is simply wasted time, tomorrow is a might have been and the ephemeral future; hazy and indistinct, beckons with a frenzy born of desperation. It screams and wails and rages against your plans, and your hopes and dreams fall away.

Only you have the power to create a destiny that you can live with, it seems that there is no “we” in this, the land of eternal “I’s”.

“And I wonder why, I never wonder why, the easiest things are so hard.”

When you look back what do you see?

❤

2011
08/07
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CATEGORY
Life
Love
Observations
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Hmmmm

Have you ever noticed how many pharmaceutical commercials there are these days? It’s a little weird. What I really want to know is why do so many of these drugs cause anal leakage? I feel like that is a rather unacceptable side effect.

Just sayin.

For once, I really don’t have much else to say. Odd, I know.

Maybe later.

❤

2011
08/04
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CATEGORY
Health
Inspiration
Life
Observations
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Moi Aussi

Today I am looking back.

Not going back, but looking; a vista through the rearview mirror. Encased in a frame and seen peripherally as I continue to move away.

I see so many people, left behind, standing lonely or in pairs. Separated, cut off.

I wonder if sometimes I am too harsh when I cut people out of my life. I wonder if I believe in redemption or if it is a fairy tale like so many other concepts we are taught, then forget.

I find it harder and harder to forgive people’s trespasses, (this is a bad thing, in both of the traditions I am heir to) and I wonder if I’ve been forgiven.

I do not want to become cold, unfeeling. I remember that young man, he did not feel much pain, but neither did he feel much joy. I wonder if we really do define our lives in terms of levels of misery; if we have to feel tragedy to know miracles.

I always think that I think too much, and consequently sometimes I do not think enough.

I have made many mistakes, I’d like to think I’ve learned from them. I wish I had more trust in people, I find that I keep most at arms length, outside the wall, circling the moat like a band of hungry sharks.

Always my metaphor is dark.

I need a vacation.

❤

2011
08/02
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CATEGORY
Life
Love
Observations
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Fire

Sometimes I realize that the fire that has always burned so brightly within, grows dim.

I wonder where the passion, the surety of purpose and place has gone in those moments.

I remember the feeling of drive, of ambition; that burning flame inside of me that has always pushed me to excel.

I know that I have accomplished many things that are difficult to achieve, I’ve conquered every challenge thrown in my direction, or that I have sought for myself to continually push the envelope.

I still have drive, I still push myself, but I often wonder if I still push hard enough, if the fire still burns as brightly as it always has. I wonder where the fuel comes from, if it is inexhaustible or like any other resource if I am coming closer and closer to the limit of my inner-endurance.

My thoughts always move from this into purpose; where am I going and why.

What is it that I am driving myself toward?

I wonder about the people that I have met on this journey and what I have given to and taken from them. I wonder about the people that have put dents in my heart, rents in my soul and thoughts in my mind.

Always I come back to why.

Nosce Te Ipsum

❤

2011
08/01
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CATEGORY
Inspiration
Life
Observations
3 comments

Welcome to the show

I think this is going to be more of a disjointed general update, rather than a focused update.

Of sorts.

At any rate I’m healing, it’s been a mixture of good and bad news. The scarring has been minimal considering the seriousness of the injury.

That being said, the docs don’t know if I’ll ever regain full use of the right side of my upper lip. C’est la vie, I was too pretty anyway.

I haven’t been able to run, which is annoying since it’s one of my better outlets for dealing with emotions that I am unable to articulate with language.

I feel like a curious mixture of both hope and despair. That being said, I am in no way depressed, just reevaluating and speculating.

I have always found that my life nearly always gives me what I need, the reason for this escapes me but I’m sure it will become clear in time.

I am becoming more and more excited about moving. There are several choices on the table, all of them involve sun, sand and salt water. This makes me smile (well half a smile, it’s all I can currently manage).

There are things here in Ohio that I will certainly miss, but the lure of new adventures is simply too great to ignore. I enjoy starting new chapters, it’s a blank slate, there is purpose and direction, but the pages are waiting to be written and I find that filling those spaces with experiences is something I cannot live without.

Life here has become routine, stagnant; an unhappy medium, something I simply cannot let myself become comfortable with.

My life has always been about going big. I have always felt that you can create your own greatness, your own story can be whatever you want it to be. You just have to want it enough. I have always been a creature of passion, of extreme desire to succeed; on my own terms.

I will not become an old man, filled with regret.

There are still so many stories to be written, songs to be sung and adventures to be had. My ambition is to make sure I capture as many of them as I can.

❤

2011
07/31
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CATEGORY
Health
Injury
Inspiration
Life
Love
Observations
Running
Sports
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I, Jedi

“There is nothing so dangerous as a dimwit who thinks they’re a genius.”
-me (during a convo avec ma souer [that’s my sister for all of you non-francophiles])

I feel like long after my death I will be quoted in snarky tones. I wish I could be there for it, but I suppose the foreknowledge that it’ll happen will have to be comfort enough.

I should, once again, be asleep. Instead I am giddy over a softball tournament in the morning and am writing in my blog.

Have I told all of you how much I appreciate the fact that you read the things I write? Well, I do. Muchly, good looking out everyone, you’re the smartest and best-looking bunch on the intarwebz.

Not a whole lot to dish out at the moment, I just enjoy writing, even when I’m writing about nothing. Which I’m sure all of you know by now. I can actually hear my own voice in my head right now as I type this on the ridiculously small virtual keypad on my iPhone.

I realized the other day that I only use my laptop to write books on, I can use my phone for everything else: take that starwars datapad-comlink combo, I have one device that does far more in a galaxy much closer and not so long ago.

But I can’t use the force and to my infinite frustration and regret absolutely no amount of birthday wishes will spontaneously create me a friggin lightsaber.

So we’ll call this one a draw k George Lucas?

Speaking of space, I still feel as ripped off today as I did when I got my first pair of glasses over the knowledge that I’ll never fly a spaceship.

I remember being in third grade, everyone is going around the room with what they want to be when they grow up and the inane chorus of “fireman”, “policeman”, “teacher”, “astronaut” and “doctor” gets to me and I, without hesitation, say: “I’m going to be a Jedi when I grow up.” To which my teacher (who shall remain nameless lest the secret agents in charge of squashing children’s dreams decide to award her a medal after they find out about her infinite evil) replies, “Now don’t be silly Ryan, you can’t be a Jedi.”

I looked her square in the beady, reptilian eyes and said: “Maybe you can’t, but I can be anything I want to be.”

So yes, I have always been this cocky, although I think that confident sounds much nicer, ya know?

❤

2011
07/23
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CATEGORY
Inspiration
Life
Observations
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