I woke up to the sound of rain and my heart filled with regret and again, it's one of those mornings where your heart spills into the lungs and the harmonics and the molasses and the ache... This feeling, it's really depressing me.
I wanted to say hi and maybe do something stupid like get ice cream. but then I would've been that guy. but I thought the idea of getting ice cream would've been nice and kinda funny . Integrity sucks.
I woke up with static in the mind.
I stumbled out of bed and walked into the kitchen and looked outside at the white blurred sky and the cold air and the smell of rain made me shiver.
My dad called me last night. He asked if I could drive down tomorrow because he and mom wanted to talk. I shat myself and thus the static.
I drove down today on the 101 while it was raining and decided not to use my windshield wiper. I let the raindrops accumulate on the glass until all of reality was a speckled, distorted mosaic. And then I drove faster, and the wind carved lines across my field of vision. And then I drove faster, and now I couldn't see anything at all, so I turned on the windshield wiper and that was that.
We ate at a Hong Kong styled cafe.
We talked about family.
We drove home and sat down in the living room.
And they said to me:
“You are 24. You are still very young, but you are not young forever. And you might meet someone soon, and you might love her, and you might have a child - and your life is going to change, and life is not going to be about you anymore. So you have maybe 6 more years where you can just be you. So what are you going to do now? What are your plans? What do you want? Where are you going? ”
And then my head exploded.
And then I told them how I'm just gonna hustle, and that I'm doing the work I do now so that I can make ends meet without sacrificing experiencing as spherical of a reality as possible. And how I want to learn the world for what it is, and absorb and struggle and find the good souls. And how I want to live in risk, and throw myself at opportunity when I find it, and how I want to one day run my own show. And then find someone I love, and then share my reality with hers, and then it will be good.
I didn't tell them about all the other things...I didn't tell them about the art. I didn't tell them about the meaning. I don't know how to talk to them about those things yet. But its okay. I think they know. They are old and wise and my parents and they must know. They've known since I was a boy. It's why they're worried. And I'm worried sometimes too. But its okay. Die with love in the heart.
They told me to move to Shanghai and learn Chinese.
They told me I should go for at least half a year.
They told me I might stay there for a decade.
They told me to live another reality.
They told me to not forget the forest.
They told me to remember that ginger ages slowly.
They told me to stay hungry.
And they told me to dream bigger.
I think I'm going to do it.
中國 ， 2016 。
I met a girl who writes letters to a man being held in solitary confinement.
I asked her,
“What do you guys talk about?”
She laughed and smiled back,
“He just writes me back a thank-you that lasts two pages every time. ”
“He’s an artist too. He can draw real well. Sometimes he sends me his drawings and sometimes asks me questions, but most of the time he just says thank you.”
“Do you write?”
“Yeah”
“About what?”
I drove to Mori Point and stood next to an old man at the edge of the cliff.
He turned to me and asked,
“Would you jump for $5,000,000.00?”
I inched closer to the edge and looked down at the waves destroying themselves against the rocks 150 feet below and thought for a second and said,
“Mm... no.
Would you?”
“Aw HELLLLLLL no.”
I played in the sun.
“What do you think about the moment you wake up?”
Today, I woke up and listened to the sound of silence.
It was one of those mornings where you open your eyes and slowly writhe upside-down under the sheets until you can stick your head out on the other side.
It was one of those mornings where you can sense every square inch of fabric against the skin and squint your eyes into the sun and look at how the little invisible hairs bend as you breathe across your arm.
It was one of those mornings where you mash your face into the sheets until you can see colors in the eyes and listen to the floorboards under unknown soles gently creaking and a faucet somewhere running over a muffled baritone.
But I didn't answer the question did I.
“What do you think about the moment you wake up?”
Today, I woke up and felt a sharp pang somewhere underneath my breastbone.
It was one of those mornings where your heart overflows into your lungs and the harmonics pass through the molasses until there's no more room and you don't even try to understand what's going on anymore.
It was one of those mornings where the impressions and the floaters blurred back until stop.
It was one of those mornings.
But I didn't answer the question did I.
I drove to Ocean Beach again and brought my soccer ball and Charlotte and I ran around and kicked it back and forth on the sand and stood in the water and we talked about I don't really remember and I've been nerding out over how many steps I take everyday and usually I take 8000 a day, but yesterday I took over 18,000 - fuck yeah - but now my feet hurt.
And then we came home and we all hung out in the kitchen and we made pasta and another souffle and this time it was better and then I laid in my bed while Ben sat at my desk and showed us videos that try to explain quantum physics and we talked about Mormons and Charlotte prompted Fuck Marry Kill with Stalin, Genghis Khan, and Hitler; Alicia Keys, Kelela, and Tink, etc.
And I woke up and now I'm about to go play tennis on Russian Hill with some dude who said he was rated a 5.0 in high school and I'm going to get my ass kicked - maybe.
Life feels weirdly fun again
I feel like its college again, us three hanging out - we're only missing Dylan now. Need him to come back from NZ. I think life will be another animal if we're all together again
This bitter earth
What fruit it bears
What good is love
That no one shares?
And if my life is like the dust
That hides the glow of a rose
What good am I?
Heaven only knows
This bitter earth
Can it be so cold?
Today you're young
Too soon your old
But while a voice
Within me cries
I'm sure someone
May answer my call
And this bitter earth
May not be so bitter after all
I hear someone brushing their teeth with an electric toothbrush or maybe shaving with buzzer ... but it's 4:27AM...??
am I actually going crazy?
is it a giant fly ?
maybe it's a vibrator... from the neighbors above me who always fuck loudly ?
oh it stopped
thank god
you said you were gonna get into words?
you didn't really believe that you would.
words for the sake of writing , you've never been able to maintain this habit before
but hah- look now
words on words on words on words
its good
my mind feels sharpened and keen
my heart is learning how to speak more clearly
unbelievable you let it live so quietly for so many years
and now you're a crazy person bantering to yourself for the sake of it, because you love it, because you know it's worth it to keep this all alive, because you can set your own soul on fire, what a lesson learned
no
someone else set your soul on fire
but you can keep it burning
that's what nice
the words keep it burning
so what next now
you haven't remembered a dream in recent memory
lets try to wake the ole subconscious tv again with this new fuel
with this invisible fire & murakami moonlight
silver, green & gold
I'm a little scared
nah fuck it - it's going to be beautiful
blah blah
one of my clients fell thru and I am experiencing for the first time the uncertainty of freelance life. I'm a little stressed right now...I know I don't need to be and that such is life and to just keep the hustle running through the veins...don't make rash decisions just bc you feel temporarily threatened and scared by the specter of instability ... you chose this path for a reason and it's already given you so much, don't fall back to seeking a stable job just yet - there are pros and cons to both ways, but you've been fucking free the past 3 months and have grown so much --- don't forget that. don't forget that. just hustle, set up more meetings, life isn't supposed to be easy - good things don't always come easy - the fight is worth it --- blah blah blah--- blah blah--- relax , don't let greed or pride delude you, 6 months ago you were alone in Boston with no idea what you were going to do with your life; you hit rock bottom; you didn't see any light; now you're independent and impassioned by art and life and your soul is on fire and you are tazmanian devil speeding thru an entirely new life and you're doing just fine- you haven't hit a bump, you've just slowed from flooring it to a brief neutral forward moving coast. 160...120...100...80...70...65...65... the speed limit pedestrian coast, no one brakes at 65...find the next opening and get back up to the blurred triples please. And come on don't do it for the money. it's not all about the money...don't be fooled by greed...remember you've chosen this life so you can be free. free to be a full time dreamer and part time worker, full time artist and part time mercenary... you did this so you can have fuckkng time and space for meaning - not extra $$. discovering new meaning and relationships and experiences and memories, these are the death bed metrics for success. don't be another one of those poor souls who plows through life hunting happiness in the form of "more". it's not about more for the sake of more - you know this. die as someone with love in your heart. die with love in the heart. nothing else matters and you know it. die knowing you gave someone love in their heart too. die smiling
I got to hang out with Charlotte and Ben
we talked about the experience of knowing someone's soul .
we watched videos of the sun in 4K
we browsed NASAs website
we cooked red curry with so much spinach it was basically all spinach
we made a goat cheese chocolate soufflé with coconut flakes and ice cream
we drank a bottle of wine that Ben and his French as fuck dad hand picked
we kicked a soccer ball down grant st
we moved my car
we complained about the cold but then embraced it
we noticed the sky was pink
we pondered the thought of continually moving west
we learned about how insane ghengis khan was
we talked about how we were too young to truly comprehend how much of a disaster Katrina was
we ate dinner sitting on the kitchen floor coz I don't have a dining table or a dining room
we discussed robes
we got confused trying to explain the theory of relativity to ourselves
we got a happy hippo magnet in the mail
we talked about our respective heart aches
we thought about Puerto Rico
we are all sleeping now and it's cold but the heater is on and I have a cup of hot tea and I'm tapping away on the screen and I
Soul
Rhythm
Blue
Soul
Rhythm
Blue
Soul
Rhythm
Blue
Soul
Rhythm
Blue
Soul
Rhythm
Blue
Soul
Rhythm
Blue
Soul
Rhythm
Blue
Soul
Rhythm
Blue
Soul
Rhythm
Blues
I've got three beers in me and
I cooked five pieces of asparagus
And I know my pee is probably going to smell later but
such is life
And I bought a pull-up bar last weekend
which took me forever to set up
and I didn't know how to set up the 'safety' bracket properly so I'm just praying the thing doesn't collapse while I'm using it but it probably will coz
such is life
And music is doing me good today
And the neurons in my brain are electric dancing left and right
and my next MRI is coming up soon isn't it? I hope I don't find out I'm going to die
such is life
I miss sleeping in a bed with someone
It's been a really long time
but you know...
