We wake up and we look around.
what do we see?
I often wonder if we know what we’re looking at.
I also wonder if any of this is real?
Is most of what we see an illusion?
The world. Each other. Life and liberty. The pursuit of happiness –
What are these things?
What is any of this if not an idea or lofty concept of life, which we are taught about and hope for?
I wonder.
Continue readingBreathe – It’s time to get away to a place where the destination is unknown.
There was a trip I took that began with no intention, other than to get away. I had no direction or reservation to be anywhere at any specific time. No, this was a whim or no, this was a long drive to nowhere.
By now, I’m sure you know that I love these rides. I allow the turn of a key to switch more than just the ignition. To be clear, the playlist is important on rides like this one. You have to pick the right music and once the door shuts and the seatbelt comes around the chest; once the buckle clasps itself into the holder; the car goes in reverse to pull out from the driveway and then in drive to move ahead.
And that’s it. Off we go.
The truth is . . .
No one wants to know. At least, not really. No one wants to lift their heads from their early morning cereal in the kitchen of their homes while reading their early morning newspaper, surrounded by a white picket fence, a two-car garage and their 2.5 kids.
It is a comfortable spot on this side of purgatory.
I’ve been told about this. Or, maybe warned is a better word to use here. But either way, I made a promise.
I made several of them to be exact and whether this coincides with a welcoming view and public acceptance or consumption; and whether people see this as “too raw” or “too real” has nothing to do with me.
I find myself in the night, thinking about the midnight air at places like up high, or on rooftops in the city where moonlight dreams hush down along the blackness of a late night view along the Hudson River.
I find myself reminiscing of things that never really happened yet I reminisce about them as if they were real.
I find myself standing in the late night mindset. I stand where the air is still and the streets are quiet. As I look upwards to the midnight sky, I find myself wondering what happened to the dreams of a life beyond our hopes – or is it better to say the life we hoped for that was beyond our dreams.
Who knows?
Besides, this is just a quick moment of introspection.
The secret is simple. Are you ready for this?
The secret of interpretation is there is no secret at all. I see what I see and you see what you see and no matter how we compare or relate, neither of us can fully prove that what we see are the same things.
I don’t know what blue looks like to you. I don’t know whether you relate to the coming of dawn and the colors of an autumn sky in the suburbs, about 45 miles east of New York City.
The sky is blue now and perhaps we have grown beyond our differences from this time last year. Perhaps we’ve improved or at least I hope we have.
I am watching the sunlight as it beams over the large old trees that stand tall behind the small chapel, which has been in my town much longer than you or I have been alive.
It is a moment that we share, now, in the early morning sunlight which has just risen above the horizon. It is warm which shows promise to the warmer weather that has yet to come.
It’s not here yet. But summer will be soon enough. I know it. And so do you.
Please forgive me but this is part of what I do.
It’s never easy to speak honestly or least of all to tell the truth about the so-called life or the feelings or thoughts and ideas that come along with certain disorders. And it’s true.
They pin stigmas on us like pins on a map. Perhaps the pins are red; as if to resemble a warning of what to expect (and what not to).
Perhaps this is to make a mental note of who we are and who we were. Or, maybe this is a judgment, which is more of a reflection on others.
Shakespeare wrote, “Hell is empty and all the devils are here.” This comes from The Tempest. I come from a place called Project Earth. My location is often in the city that never sleeps. I am born of this and from this; I have devised that I am me, a New Yorker (Or Nu – Yawk- a, as my accent implies).
I have seen many things from the great to the grand and from the poor to the sad. I have witnessed comebacks that were beyond my belief or comprehension.
I have seen destruction at the levels of war and as a witness, I was there to see my skyline fall – I was there when my City nearly fell; only to rebuild itself differently. Regardless of the holes in the skyline or the missing towers or Twin Towers to be exact; equally, I witnessed a call to join hands. I saw what happens when people stand together, to build back what was destroyed, brick by brick.
There was this thing we used to call outdoors. Remember it? There were places too, like playgrounds for example. We used to go there when we were kids. Or an open field was a good place too. We used to fly kites. We used to talk. We used to play. And as I say this, I tell this to a white computer screen in an otherwise dark loft. As I say this to myself, my fingers push keys to formulate the words on a person-made creation, which we call technology. I say these words in my head that appear on a screen to formulate my sentences. Yet, nobody reads anymore. Books and the traditional publishing business is and has been forever altered with systems that read to us for us.
Continue readingI want to go back to something a young diarist said. She was only a kid at the time. I think she was about 13 when she started her diary. While I’ve heard about the controversy that suggests the diary was not written by a young girl at all; still, I want to go back to the Diary of Anne Frank where she said, “In spite of everything, I still believe people are good at heart.”
Continue reading
The Written Addiction 