Like I said, sometimes the “when,” moments are not so bad. Some of them pick up the branches of memories that fork into different channels and lead us to tunnels of thought, like the time when I first heard music from one of my favorite bands.
I was so young and unaware of music at that time. I knew that I liked the sound. I knew that I liked the words to the song. And I could tell that there was something about this, or something deeper, but I was too young to really understand the lyrics.
But either way . .
Do you remember the time when you heard one of your first favorite songs?

Time is a strange thing.
What I mean is a second is only a second and a minute is only a minute. Better yet, to take this further, an hour is an hour, and a day is a day, but time is always moving, and the clock is always ticking.
It always amazes me how time is always the same; however, if time flies when you’re having fun, what does this say about time when fun is far away and pain is close to the heart?

It’s amazing to me how a year can pass and somehow, you look back as if time never moved—or maybe time moved so fast and last year seemed like it was another lifetime ago.
How many times have we looked back and shook our head because in fairness to the truth, we have no idea how we survived the worst.
How’d we get through it all?

Sometimes . . .
The “when” moments are not a bad thing. For example, there was a time when I reenacted a chapter from the first book I ever read. And I say this mindfully because I did read before this. However, those books are something which I would call mandatory reading. This book was different.
This was the first book that I ever read from cover to cover. This was a great piece of work. But more, this was a book that was written by a hero of mine.
Although, unknown to him, I am nothing more than a fan—at the same time, the book was a piece of art. This was the first time I ever read the work of Robert Fulghum.
Yes, he is a real hero to me.

I have spent years this way.
I have been on a search. I’ve been looking and waiting and wondering or hoping that, if at all, one day I would find my way.
I’ve often looked around and wondered how challenges to me seemed so simple to other people.
Is it me?
Have I done something wrong?
Was I out the day they taught us about the word tenacity?
Or am I like the underdog, cold-nosed and hungry, and able to endure pain or the neglect and the rejection from your common, everyday crowds?

More than anything, I just want to be. I want to belong. I want to fit.
I want this more than anything else. I want to be comfortable, as if to know that in my heart, this is exactly where I am supposed to be, and even if things go astray, or if the days are not kind or when life takes a turn, I want to know and understand that regardless of everything, deep down, I know that I’m okay.

I want to walk through my front door and open up to a place which I call home. I want to have this. All of this. And I want this to be complete with all my dreams and all my wishes which have at last, and finally all of my work has paid off. All of my troubles were obviously worthwhile because, through it all, I endured enough to make sure that my dreams were not just dreams. And at last, they have all come true.

I want to go outside and feel the wind on my face. I want to watch the early sunrise or be like the great writers, like Kerouac , or the great ones to me, like Carroll. In some way, if I can, I’d like to reach the greatness of O’Hara and recite poetry, nearly half as well and, somehow, I want to find myself out in some new town or living in some new place, and like a lunch that I recall during one of my last visits to Los Angeles, I want to blend into a new scene and be a complete and total stranger. However, the comfort of my new anonymity offers me a familiar comfort, which is rare and old, like a lifelong friend who never turned away from me or strayed.

I want to try some new food. I want to eat something that I never heard of before and, maybe, there could be a walk, or a long stroll, or some trip on foot down Hollywood Boulevard.
I did this –

Rise . . .

Get up like the sun and rise. Today is a new day. Yesterday is gone. Tomorrow is just an egg that hasn’t hatched yet, but tomorrow is brewing and so are the plots and the ideas and the problems we assume will take place. But now is not the time for this.
Today is here, as in right now.

So, rise!

I remember it was way after midnight, or at 2:00, maybe. But again, this was long ago in a lifetime that seems far away from me now.
I was on The Farm and the month of August was in mid-swing. The air was hot and the sky was scattered with trillions of stars. This was beautiful. Peaceful too.
The moon was full and the moonlight shone down across the fields.
The pasture was empty of its previous tenants, namely the cows. However, there was something beautiful about this moment. I was closing in on my 18^th Birthday. I was sifting through the ideas of my former self and my future world, which is also known as adulthood.

I was facing a new and upcoming chapter of what I considered to be a so-called freedom which is not to say that I was jailed or imprisoned, at least not per se. Or at least, not really.

We are moving towards the end of another journal. This means another journal will begin soon enough. This means when one door closes, then another one opens. At least I hope so.
And there is a reason for all of this. I need to give myself something to look forward to. I need to feed my brain and let it chew on the meat of better concepts instead of eat the fat from some unhealthy thoughts which, in the end, do nothing else for me except leave me hungry.

I have more to say and more to do. At the same time, I have the need to keep moving.
I have to keep growing and if I am to grow, then I have to allow myself to move beyond this point. Otherwise, growth is limited, or stunted, or frozen into some immature mindset which never improves or adapts.

I admit that I am scared. I admit that I am intimidated and yes, I admit to the thoughts, which are not just about the “What now,” questions.
Instead, they sound more like, “What if?
What if I turned left instead of right?
What if I listened more?
What if I found a way to put my pain or fears and my worries to the side?
What if I did more instead of resisted more?
What if?
This is a both a great and painful question.