Unbidden Flame

 

Running barefoot through the yellow-dry grass

Feelings frothing

Expanding out of self

Steam escaping in hurtful words,

Hands flying unbidden.

Often the rage comes hurling,

Triggered by nothings:

Words from a brother, 

Dismissal of mother,

Mess done by a sister,

Duty given from father.

I know how I should feel:

Thoughtful and calm, 

But the rage consumes

My eyesight and heart.

I should be able to seize it

Collar it

Control it

But I can’t.

Arriving at the edge of the field,

I scrabble with hands and feet, 

Grasping at offered knobs

Grey-rough bark finally underfoot

As emotions swirl, contorted

The tree

Absorbs these which I cannot

The only respite is out here,

The heat dissipates at this height. 

In these branches

Calm in the rough-grey

Deflate,

Fire dampened,

And descend

Walking barefoot through the dry-yellow grass.

100 Things I Want To Do With My Life (in no particular order, ongoing and unfinished) updated 7/12/22

1-Take the ACT and enter college*
2-Love a perfectly fantastic boy*
3-Continue to improve my writing* (ongoing)
4-Draw with sidewalk chalk all over the road to create a treasure hunt for a random stranger
5-Hike to the top of Horseshoe Mountain*****
6-Dance barefoot at the prom*
7-Go off of a zip line*
8-Learn to drive a stick shift from my dad*
9-Smoke a cigar in Yellowstone
10-Take my dad camping in Yellowstone
11-Visit a foreign country, any foreign country* (Colombia! Chile)
12-Build a tiny home, with help or not
13-Work in Yellowstone National Park (Might be too late to ever accomplish this one)
14-Raise a family with a wonderful, humanly perfect partner
15-Explore all of the back roads of my home county* (Close, though perhaps not complete.)
16-Graduate with my associate's degree from Snow College* (Also got my AFA)
17-Know a ton of stellar and amazing people* (ongoing)
18-Stay out of debt (Easier said than done, though I've not yet incurred school debt)
19-Learn how to make delicious, healthy bread* (And then I forgot it)
20-Learn the art of healing (ongoing)
21-Learn lots of art* (ongoing)
22-Grow my hair out long* (onogoing)
23-Learn how to learn, learn how to study and how to teach myself*
24-Homeschool my children
25-Bring my children up close to my family

26-Attend a SUN magazine weekend writing retreat
27-Return to Colombia!
28-Have my own art show* (Had my AFA thesis show, had a duo BFA thesis show)
29-Become conversant in Spanish (Perhaps also ongoing, but puedo hacerlo un poco. Tengo muchos amigos con quien yo hablo en español)

30-Get a puppy

31-Graduate from USU with my BFA*

32-Procure chickens and also compost in my backyard* (composting (and feeding the deer) as we speak)

33-Publish a book of poetry* (Bottlecap Press, poetry chapbook, "All I ask is that we walk together a while". Purchase a copy here)

34-Learn Welsh

35-Buy a house/land on which to build* (have the land, time to build)

36-Boulder at Cherry peak

37-Get a Maguire Primrose tattoo

38-Win a personal grant for art work*

39-Get into the Springville Art Museum's Spring Salon**

40-Work at Snow College

41-Raise bees

42-Boulder at Joe's Valley**

43-Take my youngest siblings backpacking up Fish Creek

44-Have my own studio*

45-Fix up my 4Runner, restore it/surpass it's former glory

46-Design an album cover* (designed the cover for my brother Asher's music, listen on soundcloud here)

47-Do the art for a beer can release

48-Climb a 5.10a

49-Learn how to goddam budget well

50-Travel to Chicago

51-Climb a sport route rated 12 something

52-Get my master's degree

53-

I am a composite of every person I have held dear, and I am also Myself

I've grown up watching my parents and imitating their actions, tastes, and opinions. This has carried over with other relationships in my life with my siblings and friends, and the people I've worked for. I suppose this is sycophantic, but I like think of it more in the terms of "the best form of flattery is imitation".
I pick up my taste in music from what the people I love listen to. My parents came of age in the eighties, and have exposed us to a lot of alternative new wave and punk bands; The Smiths, The Clash, The Cure, Blondie, Siouxie and the Banshees, Talking Heads, Devo, Madness, and The English Beat among others. I've heard almost everything from the genre, even if I may not immediately be able to name songs or the bands playing them. My friend Raven introduced me to Mountain Man, described as an indian folk rock trio, and The Lumineers, a folk band best-known for their song Hey Ho. My dear friend Yo opened up the world of Les Friction and Led Zeppelin (the former, indirectly) to me. He also brought Ben Howard to my attention, as you well know if you read this silly blog regularly.
I read most of the books my friends and family recommend, and I aspire to read every book on this list compiled by me, my mom, and my dad. I adore JD Salinger, my dad owns every book he's released to the public, and my dad also introduced me to Orson Scott Card through the Alvin Maker series. Three or four of my friends told me I had to read The Hunger Games; I held out pretty long, but Yo finally lent me (or rather, my dad) the first two of the trilogy. I got into the Harry Potter series because my great Aunt told my mom to give it another chance; originally she'd sort of banned it. That's one of the more indirect examples I've written so far, but it does illustrate my point pretty well.
Longboarding is something I decided to learn because of my siblings and Yo, who are all fantastic longboarders. I built my own board with another longboarder friend because I knew I'd be more likely to actually learn it if I had my very own board. (At the time, my siblings shared a few boards given us by the board-building friend.) I'm not very athletically inclined, though I do enjoy climbing trees, hiking, and playing games like tag. But I really would not have picked up boarding were it not for my family and friends.
One of the more abstract examples included in this essay-list; Sometimes, after spending at least half a day with a person, I'll find myself thinking in their voice and syntax. This happened with a southern guy I work for and it happened when I spent the day with my college-age friend a couple Springs ago.

I've grown up closely watching my parents and imitating them. Along the way I've also learned a lot of things and acquired likes and interests from my friends and the people I've admired. I haven't neglected my own innate tendencies or tastes in all of this; I am fairly discerning in what I copy from other people. I don't pick up everything my friends do or enjoy; I know very much who I am, changeable as that may be.

Whatever the frak you want (or something of the sort)

My question is this: why worry constantly about fitting in? 

Wouldn't life be more interesting if you had more stories about strange happenings and your own awkwardness and uniqueness?

These are my answers:
~The most interesting old people - the beings with experience under their belts as opposed to teenagers or those of middle age - don't tell stories of mediocrity; They tell stories of brave deeds and strange happenings, their own silliness or strength. They speak of ridiculous ugliness and indignity, and of astonishing beauty.

~The most memorable people often aren't the ones following fashion and fads, but creating their own world, dancing to the beat of their own drum and doing what they want, not what society or their peers expect of them. They are the people with big hearts, or acidic tongues, or even in the possession of both. They have their own sense of style, and oftentimes they genuinely care about other people, as curmudgeonly as they may be.
They can tell stories of their close relationships with their parents, or hilarious adventures with childhood best friends. They didn't let anything get in the way of having friendships with whoever they pleased, and also speak of lost loves and bittersweet romances. 

What you can learn from the happiest elders is this: don't worry about being normal when being the most authentic you can possibly be is not only more comfortable, but also more memorable in the long run.

On the other hand:
~Living an enjoyable life also means striking a balance between feeling comfortable and pushing yourself out of your comfort zone, finding the middle ground between doing what you want and doing what you know you have to do. If you're not comfortable being loud and talkative and outgoing, that's okay. But if you have a goal of making lots of friends and meeting people, you're going to have to chat up some strangers and learn how to compromise to other peoples' wishes every once in a while.
If you crave adventure, you're going to have to plan a trip, and whether or not if you go alone, you'll probably have to coordinate some things with other people, including your family, friends, and employer.
Doing the things you want, whether you like it or not, involves a certain amount of the unknown, which can also be intimidating. Adventure is tantalizing, but it can also be daunting.


This is just my perspective, as hard as I try to consider all sides, I can still only see a few from the lens of my own experience. Perhaps someone else to find something to gain from what I have written, or perhaps they will find their own experience reaffirmed or directly opposed by my opinions.

Wearing a New Story, y'know, so many tones. All one has to do is pick, and write blind-sided

Hullo little one.
Perhaps this will be a letter of sorts? I began writing an essay before opening up a new draft. I got so far as to write two or three sentences but quickly gave it up as too complex a subject which also had no supporting evidence.

Should a letter contain a subject? Or at least a theme all throughout to bind the writing together into a whole, neatly tied at the end? I'm not entirely sure. Sometimes I'll just write everything, or a great deal of what is on my mind, and I'll find it leads itself back to the beginning, all neatly drawn together with no conscious effort on my part. I haven't done that in forever. I guess I lost my muse for a time, though that might be a melodramatic statement. Deep breath...
Anyway, I guess Summer is drawing near, if it is the passing of time you wish to hear about, an account of days; perhaps an account of the firsts of the season. I got my first significant sunburn planting my garden last Sunday. The work was good, the sunburn, not so much. It lingers on longer than I expected it to, but then, nothing seems to be exactly as I expect it to be; the lilacs, love; they smell a hundred times better than I remember them smelling. If only I could wear a perfume of lilacs... It wouldn't even have to be all year 'round...
Like I said, Summer is drawing near, the days grow long and hot, and the heads of the foxtail begin to dry out and flake apart. Bad news for me, I'm working a job weeding several blocks down the road, and foxtails are easier to pull out and keep contained when they are still green and supple.
The ground is drying out, muted colors creeping from the dirt up through the stalks of unwatered plants, the wide strip of weeds between our fence and the road turning brown and crunching underneath bare feet. Storks Bill curling onto itself while Cheat Grass drops its head-full of long seeds to the dust. The stream rages, dirty dun-colored, racing onwards to the North; snowmelt slipping away from our little valley to cities and towns beyond.
These are the things one notices as a product of being raised in the desert by parents anxious for the future, and empathetic to the living cycle all around. And there, I suppose, is my subject.
Yours,
Amoniel

Sisyphus

I'm still just a child.

18 going on 19 going on four.

Messy hair and no driver's license,

baggy clothes and sometimes,

when I look into a stranger's face, I want to cry.

Locked in a glass box,

futilely beating at the walls 

I never knew were there until now. 

The only changes I can think of to make 

are my own appearance;

Shave my head or dye my hair. 

Even that, though, I only ponder doing.

So I study; people, schoolwork, society at large.

Moving tiny pebbles, 

trying to carve a door into a mountain

and getting infinitesimally closer each hour.

Cut not thy limbs, dam(n) not thy own blood

My life, my soul mimics the waters I was born from,
Two rivers joined together,
Nine other streams branching from their union.

My pattern follows theirs,
Even as I choose my own path,
My own feet will carry me, their hands rest on my shoulders,
We have bound ourselves together.

In this world as it is, as we've found it to be,
Nothing much is permanent,
But we hope to create a permanence of bond
In this swirling, fluctuating society.

Psalm To Life Prayer

Longboard lover, 

Swaying, like a fish through dry desert air, 

I hope I don't take anything for granted in what I mean to say:

I am in love, rapture, with god and all of the world.

Love is everywhere, longing forever lit, 

If you look closely, I wear a dark visage of yearning beneath this pale skin and clear gaze.

Life is not the pursuit of happiness, either you are happy, 

Or you aren't, 

Don't waste life in seeking what is already present, 

Or beckoning so close. 

I am in touch with my forbidden fruit, though I have not yet tasted it. 

A shrug of shoulders, and we find that innocence is never lost, 

But expanded, 

Growth is not innocence destroyed or covered, but innocence maturing, 

Childhood is never lost, 

But instead, made encompassing, knowledgable, and gifted further wisdom as age wears on. 

Tread Lightly, Enter At Your Own Discretion (This thing is a mess)

What of the world in my head right now?
What of the ability and struggle to arrange and rearrange words to imitate and represent things no word was ever born from? What of the tangled mess that is any one thought, tied up in everything else dwelling in mind, body and heart?

--However, A paragraph composed entirely of questions is not fun to read, no matter whether or not if I intend to answer them--

But the thought, the idea, floaty as it may be, --flighty as my writing is-- but the knotted thread and pathway of every concept, including god. The inability to vilify or angelicize anything altogether or entirely. This, in my mind, at least, makes it difficult to communicate effectively or confidently. Or even, I suppose, to make decisions.
Catching yourself in your ego-trapping, then writing that sentence and kind of mentally tripping. A shrug of shoulders and we move on, not to take anyone entirely at any one thing said.
What is life going to be like? Every year learning you knew nothing? Continually afraid, but watching for the day fear no longer comes knocking, but perhaps afraid even of that moment? (I'm really not as paralyzed by fear as I sound sometimes, I write more of my fear than of my courage.)

Look at us, finding ourselves every where. Resolving and falling and resolving again, self-conscious. Wondering if there is a place for our voice, flawed and inarticulate, though still beautiful, amongst all of those other voices, similar or not.


I sit here and pick myself apart, lay it all out in the air around me, suspended in reds and purples and whites. Constructing a world around myself, hopefully, but still not finding it altogether to my liking, and at the same time, feeling overwhelmed by what I perceive as the "outside world". Being terribly afraid of a god separate from me who would direct me where I don't want to go, though I say god is everywhere, in everyone, including at the heart of me.
I cannot see everything, but I would say that god sees everything. Even as this lends me trust and some form of faith, it opens all sorts of new intimidating doors, and trust ebbs away.
Not knowing the future, not knowing what will happen, but trying so hard to figure out how. Looking for when, straining to open my eyes, to see things clearly, and then blinding myself from (repetitious use of the word, but whatever) fear of what may be. Trying to know but not knowing and cringing at the prospect and offering of knowledge.
I once heard tell of a poem comparing communication, friendship, and love to two people flashing each other back and forth, lifting and peeling away clothing experimentally, weighing the other person's reactions. Rather ingenious, I'd say.
But that begs the question; why not just be soul and heart and personality-naked from the get go? Honestly though, even if we got past that particular affection, it still takes time to peel the skin away, for hearts to become familiar.

***

I've never attempted to articulate all of this before. None of it is concrete, all of it is a towering, flickering column or cylinder of fire. I have a thousand hands, and on each of them sits a small person, their own hands (more than just two) raised to eternity, mouths open and speaking in tongues on serene or animated faces. I don't know if anything will ever be black and white to me, even as I search so hard for the "right" path.

To break and comment for a moment: This page is not just white, it is flaming in so many colors, tangled with lush living leaves and bone and sinew. And back to the dance;

But bah, It is all in my own head, and who am I to influence the eyes and hearts of others? This is nothing but a page, with not even the barest trace of my fingerprints upon it.
What could it possibly retain of me? I suppose, however, that is the purpose of myth and story and metaphor; to put one's own personal stamp upon words strung together in infinite and impersonal combinations. What is the point of striving for that, though? Why should it matter?
I feel like I myself am fluid and blank, but I'm sure that too is untrue. Even as I so "modestly" back down from uniqueness, I am everywhere; I remember that in some way -on one of those hands- I am only here, therefore nowhere therefore both nothing and no less than everything. Monotone.
Have I lost you yet?
I am trying to leave a trail, but I don't know if it followable, for I created it and in creating it, I follow invisible trails of mind where I neglected to drop breadcrumb, ergo that does not mean it is in any way sensible to another person.

If I can be so many flavors, hypothetically so many people, does that mean I am nobody? Or a new kind of self? But that too is presumptuous. Guessing and theorizing and second-guessing and cross-referencing and doing it all far too shoddily in almost the only way I know how. But life is like cake, there is more than one way to bake cake, and more than one way to live life. There is an infinity of components and combinations to both. That, I suppose, is why I figure I can go about creating my life on my own, and it will, hopefully, be a better fit than the institutionalized, industrialized version of life. The one problem with this is I can see --if not all, a great many different possibilities, and it is difficult to drop my star-struck eyes back to the path ahead and choose, or just walk on.



Yes, this thing is a mess, but somehow I like it all the same.
What of the world in my head? What of it? This is the closest I've ever come (In one piece of writing, at one time of being) to mapping it all out.

All Things Wound Together

A question:
Am I the creator of the world around me?
Or is the world around me the creator of me?

-(It would seem that this sounds awkward and unmusical and a little bit muddy no matter how I write it.)-

A winding-gliding answer:
I think it goes both ways, I create and am created. The path I take is drawn, but also chosen.

I seem to be a woman of few words today...

This is something I did not choose *grins*


I was reading this blog on a college website the other day, and marveling to myself at the craftsmanship of the writing. It's a little bit intricate, but in a way that pretty well covers the entirety of the subject at hand, I think. It's fairly descriptive and it doesn't float off into the air like almost everything I write, it's solid and occupies its space.

So I am doing my best to pare myself down as a person and reach the very heart of me which I guess also translates to my writing, but it feels like a sort of simplicity and spareness of words that's boring rather than refreshing? *shrugs*
I have no idea, but I do think it links somehow.
I have to try, kinda really hard, to wax lengthy and delve deep into any matter. But I guess that's just how it is with such things, no matter who you are. It all takes focus and determination.
That's not something that seems to come easily to me most of the time, determination. I act like I'm good at it, but I'm not so sure anymore. What have I really seen through to the end?
Mostly I feel flighty and like a shallow dipper, hummingbird drinking from the surface of a small pool.

Musing, not intellectually plotting out and methodically sifting every rock from the sand from the dust. They're all full of universes anyhow...

Understanding all of this, though, allows me to consciously choose instead of merely following a path drawn or dug, I don't have to fall into the ruts of my own mind and experience, I can forge a new path for myself.
(For a minute it looked like that was going to draw itself to a close, but the thread of thought continued and I watched it split once again into ten different branches, all a different color and voice.)
I suppose I enjoy following every little path, either physically or metaphorically, and that is why I don't often like sifting the soil to fine treasures. It all looks like treasure, it's all breath-takingly beautiful and fascinating. So either I want to hold and see every treasure, or forget it all and continue on forward with blinders. A horse and carriage in London, don't you know... That's not fun for long though, so then, I suppose, I enter supernova.

You wouldn't believe how analytical I can be, but that's not all there is. That would be why I try to refrain from "I am" statements. It's all good, it's all me, and it changes so quickly. I've said I'm contradictory before, but it's funny how much more even that means now.
Creator and created, so it goes with god? Perhaps, perhaps.
After all, if we are god, if god is within, all around us, wouldn't god look so strangely opposite, though yin and yang are inseparable? God being inseparable from anything, everything, and Good/ Bad, separated by the human mind with the imposing forward slash, really being more gad, or bood than anything else. Black and white, spaced apart and brought together by the word "and", being more of a beautiful swirl and swoop or gray than the harsh straight line between them.

I'm not entirely sure any of this is following, or rather, leading whatever came before it, because the longer I sit here and type, the more my mind becomes a mess of color and static and my eyes light up with the glow from this strange tapestry that seems to be weaving itself from the movement of my fingers, the dance of my thoughts.
The longer I meditate, or think, for that matter, the more my language dissolves into something purely from that space in my heart that isn't entirely of me but is also the purest me there could possibly be. The more parallel universes and strange dimensions open up into milky galaxies and colors unknown by any psychedelic experience.
I can barely follow myself, so how should I expect another being to? I wouldn't personally know if this is a quandary experienced by all or none. I tend to relate my philosophies to all of the world and human race, and sometimes I don't seem far off, but at others I am quite sure I have missed the mark altogether.


To wrap this whole thing up finally:
As with many of the questions I ask, there are two answers, or an answer disguised as two, when really it is one thing of two colors wound together. Perhaps the question should not have been separated into two itself in the first place.
I would say that I am created by my world as I create the world around me; It is a dance, no one partner doing all of the leading or following.

Saturday Morning

Gather Again

Grief And youth

You-th and grief, 

We were young, once, 

They all say, 

And love was bitter-sweet, 

Touch was sweet pain.

Growing up hurts, 

The pain doesn't stop when your limbs cease to stretch, 

Your skin ceases to stripe, 

Your mouth ceases to crack and whine. 

Love is like breaking, 

But it's also like living and growing and learning, 

It never stops hurting, 

And nothing is happily ever after. 

Once upon a time

Wasn't so long ago, 

And it will come again 

Before it is all over and the sweet black pool swallows you whole

Or piece by piece. 

You are young still, 

And youth is its own peculiar sort of grief.

Morning Musings

I want to be a mystic. I want to devote my life to the pursuit of learning and spirituality. I really want to get married and have a family as well. A career or any kind of work outside of my own home and family would make this very hard. 

I don't want to work. 

But I don't know what to do, okay? Because yeah, I'd like to be some form of independent for a while, I'd like to travel and live and take care of myself, but what do you need in this world for anything? You need money, dammit. I have a really weird mindset about money, a really weird relationship with it. I hate it but I understand why it has its place in this world and that it is kind of essential right now. Sort of, but not really. And I deeply hope I can live to the age where it is given up as the bad and destructive habit it is. Maybe I'd like to help bring that day to a pass, but I don't know how to do that. Living as I do in my parent's house, relying on god's will and kindnesses: the kindnesses of other people (that must never be forgotten, and thanks must always touch down there first), all of these things generally spring from money in some form or another. Not my own money, but somebody else's. So here I am, avoiding attachment to money and the making of it, but it's still all around me like a hobbit tangled in spider web. 

I have this idealistic vision of what I want my life to be, and it's constantly changing, but there isn't a bridge between now and "the future" yet. I think I've given up on the wanting for saviors, that was never very realistic. Still, there's a balance between relying on your own strength and trusting the community you build around you. I don't think we're meant to be alone or fanatically independent ever, it's not very healthy for the heart or mind. 

I want to be a mystic, I am a mystic, but I guess I'm cloistered right now, all shut up in my monastery, or, what's the Buddhist word? Maybe that's what I need to grow into, what I'm trying to find my way into, there's a Buddhist word for a spiritual community, the people around you who support you in your pursuit of living a life of revelation. Maybe I'm making this up, but it does sound lovely. I guess mostly I just need to connect all of this "then" in my head to now. 

Hello idealistic future, I always forget that you live within the present. 

Gather

(Written last night. I was reading some poems in the theme of youth and grief on a poetry app and noticing this pattern all through them and wondering how, as a young poet, it all applied to me. I am writing in my youth, now, it is not yet nostalgic, though it may be in the future. Still, I intend to carry my youth with me all through life, I have not left behind each age as I grow older, they are still inside of me, like many layers of cloth, or an onion skin, if you will, and they ebb and flow back and forth across my days and life.) 

Grief And youth

You-th and grief, 

We were young, once, 

They all say, 

And love was bitter-sweet, 

Touch was sweet pain.

Growing up hurts, 

The pain doesn't stop when your limbs cease to stretch, 

Your skin ceases to stripe, 

Your mouth ceases to crack and whine. 

Love is like breaking, 

But it's also like living and growing and learning, 

It never stops hurting, 

And nothing is happily ever after. 

Once upon a time

Wasn't so long ago, 

And it will come again 

Before it is all over and the sweet black pool swallows you whole

Or piece by piece. 

You are young still, 

And youth is it's own peculiar sort of grief.

Ben Howard: About Still Waters, what his music is to me

This is actually something I'd planned before that whole Kesang Marstrand

 post from a while ago. But now the two have inspired and collided and spun off from each other. Anyway, I rather enjoy documenting some of my music discoveries on here, lengthy or otherwise, and it creates an interesting sort of stream-of-consciousness commentary, which is something I feel like writing at the moment, but can't really figure out how to begin. 

Ben Howard - Oats in the Water
To begin with the first, found by my best friend, shared between and then adopted, a thing not my own enfolded into my being, by me.
Probably the one many of his fans heard first, for whatever reason, lately as a result of the song playing in a Walking Dead episode.
Absolutely beautiful, my love. Heart aching in a way, and the music has a lovely rhythm to it.
I love Ben's intonation and inflection, it sounds like he's singing it for the first time, with all of the thoughts and emotions fresh in his own mind. Reflective and darkly tranquil.

Ben Howard - Esmerelda
Lordy this video is lovely, black and white, the stormy skies, the waves crashing backwards, like time is rewinding underneath everything being said. It very much evokes a feeling of looking back to something long past and deeply missed.
All of Ben's music makes me just a little sad and rather meditative. It's fun to pray along to as well.
That all probably sounds pretty weird, and it's hard to explain, but that's as close as I'm getting at the present.

Ben Howard - Depth Over Distance
This is one of my very favorites, I first discovered a fantastic layered version on Tumblr, which was haunting and beautifully rainy. I adore both versions, though; this one's warmer, the other very still. Here's a link to the layered version, Layered Depth Over Distance

Ben Howard - Black Flies
Terribly lovely, and it seems like it was serendipitous the day I heard it, though I'm not sure. I think I wrote the October Fly poem the afternoon before I first heard Ben Howard, the first three of which were Oats in the Water, Esmerelda and Black Flies.
I remember walking in the dark, speaking about Ben's music, and having simultaneous thoughts, speaking at the same time, weaving bright threads of gold in the dark of the night, the winter not yet cold enough to draw our breath upon the air.

Ben Howard - Old Pine
He makes want so dearly to learn to really, truly play guitar.
All of his songs sound so different, and have such different subjects, but still they have a blue thread wound through, a life all their own shared throughout.

Ben Howard - To Be Alone
It sounds like he puts a lot into everything he writes and sings. Seriously, the emotion of it all, every one of his songs sounds like it's being made up as he sings it, every feeling felt in the deepest way. Reflective, Introspective... Do you suppose every artist, musician, public figure is a mirror whether they mean to be or not?
I act like I'm a mirror, though I'm not entirely sure I actually am. Or maybe I am too much a mirror.
Watching "Rise of the Guardians" last night, you wouldn't expect it to, I didn't expect it to, but it raised some rather deep questions within me. What is my core? I don't think I really know, and that's why I'm kinda lost. But I guess I also don't really want to look.

Ben Howard - Promise
"I think," he said, "that it's a good thing to get out of your usual, you know, surroundings. Because you did things out about yourself that you didn't know, or you forgot. And then you go back to your regular life and you're changed, you're a little bit different because you take those new things with you. Like a Hindu, except all in one life: you sort of get reincarnated depending on what happened and what you figure out. And any one place can make you go forward, or backward, or neither, but gradually you find all your pieces, your important pieces, and they stay with you, so that you're your whole self no matter where you go. Your Buddha self. That's my theory, anyway." 
-From "Criss Cross" by Lynne Rae Perkins 

Ben Howard - Keep Your Head Up
That looks like so much fun, can you imagine doing that? The grandeur of building and then using that magnificent slide? Can you imagine thinking of that and then actually sharing that dream with others and acting on it? :D It's absolutely beautiful, and yeah, it's a music video, so it's terribly idealistic and it's taken for granted that it was edited and a little contrived, but that's still cool, and from watching the behind the scenes video, it looks like it was a ton of fun. 


What does his music mean to you? How does it make you feel? What does it make you remember?

Criss Cross and Peering Intently: Talking To Myself And You

I.
Do you think I could tease you out of your corner, my dear?
Take your hand and coax you from the wall.
But maybe I don't even see that as it truly is,
    maybe it's not a corner, but a whole other world,
    different and not so different from mine.
Perhaps you like everything just as it is.

II.
I want to reach deep into the universe,
    --my arm plunged in up to my shoulder,
and pull the heart of it into sight.
I halfway suspect it would also be my heart,
    your heart,
their heart.

In theory, I am the adventurous type,
In theory I want to get out, to go far, far away.
And then maybe I will come back, and I will find what I am looking for
    Right here,
Where it has always been.

III.
I yelled down the stairs, deep and loud,
    and in the silence left alone afterward,
    a string on my guitar rang in reply,
    and I smiled and laughed and said hello
before flying away.

And so it is that I always find these things again, and they are different,
    I am different;
With a firefly
Blinking in my heart
    and guitar dust shining golden on my fingers,
in my soul. 

Character Sketch

He smokes smarties and swears like a sailor.
Dark, dark eyes under a mop of blond hair,
insolent swagger even though he's not yet old enough for a learner's permit.
Thinks he knows all the girls, but they haven't even started looking at him.

Takes pride in petty, childish theft; silly boy, don't you know you won't ever have to grow up?


Even under all of this crustiness, he says please and thank you
with sincere gratitude,
Pure heart under pretentious bluster,
pretty song flowing from a clogged stream bed. 

Who needs Wwoof when you can just work for the people in your community?

I've totally accidentally done my own version of WWOOF this year, except I'm the one getting paid :]
What with my dumb garden, all of the work I did over the Summer, and the work I'm doing this fall, I'm getting a couple seasons of the equivalent of signing up for WWOOF, I think.
Today I learned how to track and catch gophers, and I'm learning a lot about yard and garden winterization.

I'm still thinking I could just apprentice to people in my town instead of going to college, but that doesn't really solve my problem of not knowing anyone my age :/ Oy... 

Negative charge on negative charge

Underneath it all, I really do believe that life and the world are good. I believe this is all worth it, not so much that all of the garbage and static of life is worth it, but that fundamentally, living is worth it. 

One day at a time, even the days that do nothing but make the inside of my ribcage itch; even those days are worth it. The days where I want to do nothing, nothing but disappear and possibly melt into a ball of apathy and laziness and terror and quit thinking and caring and worrying and wondering about the future. I suppose that even those days are worth it. I've learned that on the whole, the good out-weighs the bad, even if the good is or seems to be so long and far in between. There's so much small good interspersed within the overwhelming bad. 

But today I don't wanna anything. I'm dragging myself through the sludge of hours by my fingernails, every cell quailing against every single responsibility and requirement. When did I get so self-centered? I want to change, but I don't want to change. I want to change, I'm so bored and tired and apathetic, and i really, I'd rather be happy and have fun, but I don't want to change because it's scary and it would require work and trying and I really just don't want to do anything. I'm bored, but I don't want to do anything. Even writing seems a little like a waste of time. I feel like everything's a waste of time, but I can't figure out what isn't a waste of time. Tug of war, I suppose. 

The thing is, I won't feel like this later, most likely. I might feel like this again, it's a possibility, but I won't feel like this later. Who shot me on Marvin's wavelength with the empathy gun or whatever it was called? Not fair. 

Ehh, it'll pass. It always does. But what do I do when or happens again? What do I do to prevent it from happening again? 

Guitar Lessons and Driver's Ed.

Forget all you thought you knew
in the effort to learn

Empty memory
Empty mind
For you cannot fill a cup that is already full
or can you?

First the golfballs, you know,
Then marbles, sand, and beer.
Can you still fill it?
Or, as with everything,
is there infinite space always within?

Sore fingers
and terror.
Missing days,
but in the future it will all be the same.
Or not.

Too much homework and no money
But I'm preparing for the future, right?