Tag: Short Story

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Nobody Likes a Clip Show

Especially of clips never shown

But it’s time to divest of myself some of my old writings that didn’t make the cut of becoming standalone posts but did make the cut of being good enough to be in a Frankenstein’s monster-like post (there’s a metaphor in here somewhere, maybe even two if you look closely enough / if I wasn’t lazy enough / if I just make up things and pretend and you do, too).

So, in here is over 4,500 words and 18 posts in what I’ve dubbed “Emo Passages”, “(Less) Emo Passages”, “Poems”, “Quotes”, and “Just for Fun”. Cause what is this for if not for fun? Well, besides the crippling depression, of course. The good ol’ crippling depression. But fun! Also fun. (And crippling depression.)

Emo Passages:

There’s something missing here.

It’s not unusual for me to feel this absence. I’m quite acquainted with it. I’m experienced in attempting to fill it, a hole that sinks deeper over time. The more I try to fill it, the bigger it gets. The more I fill, the more I fall. Am I just digging myself farther down?

I see the light echo against the pool tiles, dancing in the water, just before the city skyline. I look up to remind myself to live in the moment. I’m always making plans for myself. I’d call them dreams because they don’t often come true, but my ability to dream anymore is diminished and is my ability to be creative. Maybe that’s a good thing, though: less disappointment, if they’re plans simply written and forgotten than dreams and hopes and goals tried for but not gotten.

It’s cold. I can’t tell whether I like this breeze. I’m alone up here, but that’d be true even if it was crowded. It’s good bet that I’m alone at almost any time. True enough it could become a maxim or a theorem or another term I’ve long since forgotten. Perhaps I’ll follow suit in fate.

***

Five years ago; I guess nothing has changed.

Five years ago, to the same month, probably to the same week, and maybe even to the same day.

I drove to the beach at three in the morning. I drove 45 minutes to sit in the sand, to think, to ponder, to be alone with the water, hearing the waves come in and go out, crashing in the pitch-black dead of night, darkness and smallness and loneliness and emptiness in every direction.

The next day I texted my friend, mentioning my excursion. He rightfully said, “Woah man, what is up? Is everything fine?” The question was clearly rhetorical because obviously, for the question to be asked, the answer was already known. Everything was not fine.

What I was going through then

What I’m going through now

The funniest part of the incident was the drive home. While sitting in the sand, I must have picked up a passenger because when I was just about to get onto the interstate, I noticed a cockroach crawling across my dash. As any sane, rational person would do – “sane” and “rational” doing a lot of lifting here – I freaked out, but my instincts took over, and I safely pulled into a neighborhood road to swiftly remove the roach from my car. I had spent a portion of the night earlier (and many nights prior) thinking that I might be coming to the end of the road in the very near future. But here I was, letting my instincts take over, to ensure nothing bad happened to my car, myself, or others. Here I was, acting in the best interest to keep myself alive.

The question isn’t: five years from now, will I be saying, “Five years ago; I guess nothing has changed”? The question is: will my instincts be different?

***

Did you get what you wanted?

Was tomorrow better than today?

I did it. I moved. And I have to ask myself, “Did I get what I wanted?” because I know – or my ego would like to think – that the people I left behind are asking this exaction question, perhaps because I am, as aforementionedly (new word) stated, perhaps because my ego is too much to not believe that they’re still thinking about me – but I hope not. I’m still thinking about her, for example. And the others. But especially her. Maybe she’s reading this. Hopefully not. Hopefully nothing. Even in that situation, and in every situation, I find a way to make it about me. It’s my victim complex. I guess victim complex is the best description of what I’ve had, what I’ve known, what I’ve felt since I was maybe 5 and got in trouble for throwing a toy boat at my cousin in my parent’s pool and figuring out that if I hid underneath my bed and made it seem like I was really regretful and potentially not actually regretful but sorry and not sorry because I felt bad unless I could act that I felt bad but sorry that I got caught or I guess in trouble (and in so by doing this I would be ultimately resolved of my sins). Maybe. But I digress:

              I guess I don’t digress. It’s funny the things you pick up on the older you get. A few years ago, when I was 23 years old, probably the third week of March 2015, I did a small amount of shrooms and went to a trance electronic music show at the local club – and finally figured out that trance is, yes, I’m saying this, decent / too many dashes – and remembered back to a little NASCAR race car toy I had as a kid. Or also the reason that I’m so OCD – again, too many dashes / which I should remove from my vocabulary because people do suffer from OCD and I am not one of those people and I do not mean to belittle their differently-abled challenges, just like how I’ve worked the “f” and “r” words out of my vocabulary over the years – is because of the one time I was talked to as a kid about not cleaning up my room and my toys. I’ve now used “toys” three times in this, or four times, depending on how you’re counting. If you’re reading this.

              I guess I do digress. I have to ask myself if this is what I wanted. I need to know if tomorrow was better than today.

              I haven’t been writing in a while

              I have a friend who committed suicide

              Quote about not being put on earth to work 40 hours per week

So,

Did you get what you wanted?

Was tomorrow better than today?

No, I did not get what I wanted. I have what I need, but who knows what that means. I have plans for the future, and that’s all there is to me. Unhappy, but completely understanding. Of the life that we lead, of the blood that we bleed, of the fact that these however many years are the total years of me.

I miss her, and I miss me. Whoever I ever was, whoever I believe, whoever I am today, not that the day is true or real. It’s just relative, so I guess I can’t be better tomorrow, anyway. Not right now, not today. Anyway:

This isn’t even good writing, but I just have to imagine [I guess I have to use “have” a lot; just like I’ve liked to have started using brackets instead of parentheses] that after few hours of sleep, lots of drinks, and a couple lines of shit blow as I write a couple lines of shit that blows, the writing wouldn’t be good. Couldn’t be good. Shouldn’t be good? Have I used that pattern before in one of my writings? Will I use it again after one of my future writings? I assume my point was going to be that time is relative. So tomorrow can’t be better today, but I sure as hell try in my mind to make tomorrow better than today, lying to myself that it will be so that I feel better about my current state, never asking why I continue to be this way. Or asking and knowing but doing nothing about it.

The other day I was on the phone with a friend who told me that I was good with words and should be a writer. Not that I publicize my writing, I guess she didn’t know that I publish my writing.

(Less) Emo Passages:

I left my credit card at the bar.

Where? It doesn’t matter. I’ll just call the member services number and order a new one.

When? Last night, maybe. I seem to remember having it during the day when I picked up coffee and a breakfast sandwich, in the afternoon, hungover, at the coffee and breakfast sandwich place across the street.

But honestly the days blend together. It could have been any day, any purchase, and any restaurant.

The people, too.

I didn’t make my bed this morning. I don’t know why. I always make it. It just didn’t feel truly necessary today.

I design a schedule for the afternoon. Something to keep me occupied until the evening, when I will need to design another schedule to bring me home to sleep.

Tomorrow I will do the same.

The cool air today, uncommon in this region but reasonable given the season, breaks up the year a little bit. Otherwise, it’s mostly warm.

I feel the wind brush against my face as I walk outside for another purchase, to greet the outdoors and the same people I’ve greeted my entire life with the hope that today they might greet me with something different.

I don’t know if I truly feel the wind, though. I don’t know if my mind is just imagining its brisk chilliness because it knows it should be there.

I’ve lost feeling, but my head makes up for it by telling me that this is what I should be experiencing.

Or I have all and total feeling, and so I try to numb myself and tell myself I don’t.

I’m rambling. These thoughts come and go but are with me at most times and I’m wondering when I will come and go with them.

***

It’s 10:15 in the morning, Eastern time. All of the clichés ring true. The sun is shining. Birds are chirping. Flowers growing. It paints a pretty picture, but it’s one I turn a blind eye to. My head is pounding like a drum. My body would scream dehydration if it had the energy, or I suppose the ability. I would like to be captured by my closest companion sleep, but to no avail I try. I would like to rise from this prison, but as I consider moving, a pattern of pain slowly begins beating in my head, thud, thud, thud. Unable to rid myself of this hangover, I succumb to the only option I have left: lying in bed, scrolling through social media. It seems every time I tempt the limits of inebriation, I find myself in this predicament. Moreso, it seems every time I awake, regardless of state, I enroll myself to this same ritual. Wake up. Check texts. Facebook. Twitter. Instagram. Snapchat. Carry on. Study all night. Go to sleep. Wake up. Oh, Daniel’s in a relationship. It’s about time that happened. Carry on. Party all night. Go to sleep. Wake up. Ugh, I wish Lauren didn’t tag me in that photo. Untag. Carry on. This is what life is now. We are all plugged in, and there is no off switch. Set up. Past. Future. Unplug.

***

I felt the realisticness of your touch, and it seemed like we were close enough for your face to rest in my hands and my lips to press against your head, but the reality was too far to grasp, and the memory, sinking back into the past, was too far to grab. I shuddered at the thought, the moment I was convinced I’d never hold you again. I prayed it was just a bad dream. I begged deities I don’t believe in to believe in you, to believe in us.

Sometimes prayers go unheard. Sometimes they’re answered. By whom? Maybe just ourselves. Maybe by luck. Maybe by miracles.

Then, there you were. Here we were. Again. I could reach out and feel your warmth, your touch and your love, our skin against skin, soul against soul.

Words only wish they had the capability to say how I feel about you. The words of Shakespeare, actions of Van Gogh, the beauty of a universe’s lifetime of sunsets, captured in a braze, trapped in embrace.

Poems:

Head Case –

Winter nights
Spent alone
Summer nights
Never home
I’ve had enough of this
Creativity spurned
Loneliness adorned
I can’t get out of my head
This case is not adjourned

Spring delights
Shared with none
Fall twilight
Forgotten
I’ve had enough to live
Absurdity mourned
Confliction worn
I can’t get out of my head
Without a meaning born

Memories never made
Are memories that can never fade
Ones between you and I
As real as you
And as fake as I
Existed between us
Like an unfinished poem

***

Cold streets
Light sheets
And the feeling I’m incomplete
Discrete
Deplete
And wondering if we’d ever meet
Or have we met?
Did I forget?
The grey skies have a way of blocking the sunset

A solemn solace I never finished
An idealist vs. a nihilist

***

Words echo into the night

Dancing far against cars across headlights

Words drain out to delight

Of the ones who can’t see come sunlight

In the dark

No stars

No light

In the dark

So wrong

So right

If I can’t reframe the picture, level the frame, I won’t obtain

A peace of mind ever elusive, always alluded, only imagined

If I can’t reframe the picture, level the frame, I won’t obtain

A peace of mind

Ever elusive

Always alluded

Only imagined

***

Significant Deficiency –

Self-destruction

Reminiscing

On the good times had

Remembering

The times that were bad

Self-destruction

Trying to get back to the memories of youth and of love and of life

Trying to escape the ones that keep creeping in like a truth that you can’t get rid of until you grab the knife

Whatever that knife may be

I know what the knife means to me

Self-destruction

Self-destruction, from which I want to flee

Show me how

I thought I knew how

I used to know how

I no longer know how

Please show me how

Self-destruction

Addiction

Self-inflicted affliction

If you hate yourself

I hate myself?

Do I?

I guess I do

Is that why I do this?

Is that why I do what I do?

Show me how

What I’d say if I knew how to reach out

But I don’t really know how

For this I never have

Have I always hated myself?

Exit.

Escape.

This pain.

This pain compounded by this pain.

That pain compounded by that pain.

Times trying to quit only met with failure

Attempt in vain

In veins

Knowing it’s not the solution and it’s one of the problems but being unable to change makes me feel insane

Something about the “definition of ‘insanity’”

Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result

And on my body, my mind, my physicality and emotion

This is an assault

Perpetuated by me

Unfortunately

But at this point, I can’t take pity

Or maybe taking pity is part of the start of the solution

I wouldn’t blame any if they didn’t take pity on me

But I’ll already be

I’ve already been over how I don’t know how to reach out

But I must keep fighting

And I must admire it’s getting tiring

I must keep fighting

***

Is the promise gone
Or was it never here?
Looking upon my remaining years
With fear
That this will be my last here
My last year

Not by force
But by choice
I can’t use my own voice

***

It’s quiet

There’s white noise

From an air conditioning machine

But it doesn’t annoy me

It’s cool

There’s bright poise

From the sun creeping _

But it doesn’t annoy me

I can see the lives in the buildings that surround me

The past, the present, the future no longer bother me

It’s all I can think about, all I can write about, all I can dream about, and all I can believe about

To know, to feel, but I can’t

Inspiration

Metaphors

Death

I’m at their home knocking

Why should I have the right to take their lives?

Inspiration

Metaphors

Death

They’re just walking, talking

But what separates them from me, them from others, and me from them?

Hiding my face

It doesn’t make sense

Like some 21st century architecture

How can it hold up this?

Hiding my pain

A tug with a barge heading from shore

Hiding my wrist

Hiding my wrist

Can’t see to the bottom

But can speed to the side

Handwriting so messy

What am I trying to hide?

Can see into rooms and lives

Writing muse so messy

It’s something I can’t deny

Something I can’t deny

What it feels like when things are going right

2nd to 34th to 3rd to 25th and life

Walks every day, time relative, and every night

30 and maybe I’m finally feeling alright

Lights on and off

Both on and off for the lights

Lights on or off

Either on or off for the lights

***

I’m ever-consumed by the never-ending news cycle

I’ve been found guilty of succumbing to the free trial

When I was a kid, there was static I had to dial

Now at fingertips, it’s the only joy worthwhile

I’m both the mark and the product

Just looking for a hit

I’m advertised and advertised to

Instant gratification

Bought and sold

Artificial intelligence (but do we have intelligence, does it seem like)

Creativity dystopia

I don’t know what to do

All I know is I need something new

I don’t know what to do

All I know is I need something new

Quotes:

I  can analyze and realize until the day I die that these eyes will never do anything about the analysis and realization that I’ll never do anything about who I am.

***

He couldn’t tell if the writing he was reading was poetic, broken beyond repair, or even his own. His one comfort was he had tricked himself into believing his life was poetic because it felt broken beyond repair, and that it wasn’t his own.

***

Riding along a path, seeing faces, seeing places. I’m losing the capability. I’m running, I’m draining, I’m losing the capability because I feel like I’m training for nothing and running out of time.

Just for Fun:

At 7:45am, he was pulled from the embrace of enchanted dreams back into the grip of the real world. With 45 minutes until he had to be at work, he debated his options, weighing the risk of being late with the reward of 9 more minutes of tranquil fantasy. The internal battle struggled on for what seemed like lifetimes, counting down the amount of time he could return to his escape from reality – tick, tick, tick. Before long, he realized he had no other option but acquiesce to his fate. He rose from the protection of his silver microfiber sheets, and it began like any other Friday morning.

Hurriedly now, at 8:27am, he made his way from his maroon and beige, quote unquote luxury-style apartment complex to his freshly-detailed car. Nothing yet was out of the ordinary; running late was part of his usual routine. He opened the door to his car, started the engine, and began the drive to work.

While en route to work, he started to think of the duties he would be tasked with during the day, but quickly his mind drifted to 5:00 in the afternoon and the allure it presents. What bars would he go to? Which friends would he go with? What dumb decisions would he make? Suddenly he was jolted from his daydream with the sound of a horn and the sight of a middle finger. Still, nothing out of the ordinary, as he is generally a pretty shitty driver.

At 8:42am, he walked into the large, glass-walled, open-designed (read: modern) lobby of his firm’s building. As he walked in, he was struck by a condescending glance from the front desk receptionist and then by a pitying glare from the security guard. Not yet shaken, he cautiously stepped toward the elevator. As he pressed the raised circular button, he prayed no one else would congregate with him in the elevator. His prayers went unheard or unanswered. Six people – male and female, ranging from his age to upper 60s – joined him in the elevator. He was afraid he would be forced to succumb to niceties, but much to his surprise, no one said a word. Instead, he again found himself with disapproving eyes surrounding him, silently judging him. This was out of the ordinary.

He sat down at his hotel-system desk and opened his company-issued laptop – time to look productive. Before he had the chance to hide Reddit’s home page behind Microsoft Outlook, he was called into his Director’s office.

Worriedly now, panicked thoughts raced in his mind and unnerved feet stumbled on the path into his boss’s room. The air was gradually becoming thinner. His boss’s lips moved in slow motion, but the words flowed faster than his brain could comprehend. The first sentence of his boss’s that he could make sense of was, “So, what is it, exactly, you would say you do here?” Inundated with fear, he was at a loss for words. He honestly couldn’t provide an answer. He wasn’t entirely sure what he does at work. Defeated and confused, he left the hostile room and returned to his little cube. However, this action did not provide relief or comfort. The feeling of being watched returned to him. He slowly noticed that his coworkers shared his Director’s sentiments. They weren’t really sure what he did there, either.

The temperature was rapidly becoming warmer. He had to get out. He had to find relief, comfort. He excused himself to the hall, and did what any other young adult would do when they have a problem: he called his parents.

“Mom, I need your help,” he slurred.

“Did you make your car payment this month? Why haven’t you called in a week? When was your last dentist appointment? How come you haven’t settled down with a nice girl yet? You’re not, like, into guys, right? When are you saving for a down payment on a house?” His mother replied.

He had no answers. He didn’t hang up the phone to be rude. He hung up the phone because he was speechless. The furthest he had thought about his future was 5:00 this afternoon.

“Wait, that’s it! 5:00!” he thought to himself. All of his worries would be assuaged, his responsibilities postponed, and his sorrows drowned, if only he could make it to 5:00!

Later in the day, he left work precisely at 5:00, directly toward the bar district. He arrived at his friends’ go-to spot at 5:15pm. There, he waited. And he waited. And he waited. At 6pm and six texts to six friends later, he was still alone. He even resorted to sending messages to group chats. But alas, nothing worked. His friends were either still at work, trying to advance their careers, or at home with their new spouses, enjoying a home-cooked meal while watching The Voice. It was almost like his friends all had their shit together. At first, he believed this to be a preposterous idea, but the more he thought about it, it became a clear conclusion. His friends did in fact have their shit together. No one wanted to go to a $10 all-you-can-drink well liquor happy hour.

Then, a tragic epiphany settled upon him: today is the day it happens. Today is the day everyone realizes he is faking it, and he has no idea what he’s doing. For 24 years he’s managed to get by pretending he’s good at work, school, friendships, relationships, math, deciding where to eat dinner, making dentist appointments, ordering completely-necessary items off Amazon, small household chores…. But finally people will realize he doesn’t have a grasp on being an adult. Hell, he’s lucky if he adults at a sixth-grade level.

And so he retreated again to write another short story and post it as his Facebook status. Because hey, if he can’t laugh at himself, well, then, everyone is still laughing at him anyway, so nevermind.

***

The second day after leg day, we find the young male in his natural habitat: peacefully asleep, likely dreaming of girls he will never sleep with. Abruptly he is greeted by the morning alarm, signaling that it is time to arise and perform fellatio on the day. The agitated adult struggles to find the strength to get out of his queen-sized cocoon, not because he is not eager to perform fellatio on the day but because he is simply incapable of getting up. You see, as the specimen works out, its muscles get larger, but in this process its muscles tear, causing the specimen’s legs to feel like jello. Indeed, in his current state his legs are weaker than those of a young, starving actress who moved to Hollywood looking for work, and who is so malnourished she had no choice but to ingest jello pudding found in the casting room of the Cosby Show. Finally he arises and gets ready for work. Once he completes this task, he prepares himself for the arduous journey ahead – a trek filled with the most rugged of terrain: multiple flights of stairs. As he walks down the maroon and beige apartment steps, morbid thoughts begin to creep into his mind: “Is this how it ends? This is how it ends, isn’t it?!” Painfully, eventually, he prolongs imminent death, and makes his way to his car. Upon arriving at the office, he realizes hell is now upon him. He must climb stairs that would taunt even the most revered sherpa. (For this to make sense, you must understand that this is a difficult feat for a Homo sapiens to accomplish, especially an American one.) Step 1, This isn’t so bad. Step 2, This could be worse. Step 3, “Ow! What the fucking hell? This hurts!” the tormented youth screams up at the cathedral ceiling. “Why have you forsaken me?” he curses the iron-plated God of Leg Muscles, but all that is returned is silence, as if this god is muting its menacing laughter. Before the human’s profane echoes can subside, he manages to make his way into the office.

As he sips his morning coffee, he decides, “Fuck it, I’m never working out legs again; I’ll just have chicken legs forever.” Satisfied with his resolution, he continues to go about his morning routine, deleting e-mails. Once he finishes his roast of dark and black heaven, with no sugar or creamer because those are for pussies, nature calls. The young professional braces his desk as he stands up from his chair. He slowly limps toward the bathroom. Truly vulnerable, he could be trapped in a conversation filled with small talk on his path to the bathroom, but he escapes to the Men’s Room door, unscathed. The 24 year old thinks he has successfully confronted all of his challenges for the day, but he is only deceiving himself. As he tries to get up from the toilet, his legs completely fail, and he comes to terms with the evil little fact he’s secretly known all along: leg day would be the death of him. Alas the young male is doomed to spend the rest of his days in the office bathroom, confined to a small prison of wooden bifold doors, with no hope of having cellular reception, and being forced to write this short story.

So, nobody likes a clip show, especially of clips never shown. But I do love me a good fucking slop bowl.

Now back to your regularly scheduled programming next time… (hey look another metaphor! or something. (you can just say things!))

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And Other Synonyms

“What would you do if you got everything you ever wanted?”

“Well, it’d be helpful if I knew what ‘Everything’ is.”

“Maybe that’s one of the things you want: to know what you want.”

“There’s not much I know about myself – less than I know of the world. All I do know is I can stare at my reflection in the window, pressed against the river, be grateful for what I have, be hateful for [apathetic toward] what I don’t, be thankful for the gift of life and curse it all the same. But that’s looking back; that’s not looking forward.

“What do I want? To not feel this lifer’s block, in this rut, stuck. That’s what I want.”

“And are you doing anything about it?”

“I’m talking to you, aren’t I?”

“Yes, yes… let’s see. Have you given any thought to what you need?”

“What, like Maslow’s Hierarchy?”

“No, no… much more spiritual… on a personal level.”

“Isn’t, isn’t that one of the needs?”

Silence ensues, he awkwardly looks at himself in the mirror, unsure of himself.

“What am I paying you for?”

“You’re not paying me anything. You’re pretending to be lying down on the couch, and you’re pretending I’m sitting up on a chair with a pen in hand, but all of this is taking place in the few square inches surrounding your face.”

“Oh, I see. So back to the point then, I guess?”

“Either that or back to the pint.”

A short laugh and smirk ensue, impressed at his quip, happy with himself, but lonely no one was there to hear it.

“Then again, probably a good thing no one is around to hear me talking to myself,” he interjected.

“So, so, back to the point then.”

“Ending another sentence with a preposition?”

“Okay then, let’s propose this:

“You’re the result of a universe creating, expanding, and lifeforms emerging, evolving, for billions and millions of years. Thousands of years ago, your needs began to be met. Hundreds of years ago, your quality of life started to increase exponentially. But you’re still not happy. You’re not being fed – mentally, emotionally. You don’t know what you want to eat, but you’re hungry. You don’t know what you want.”

“I’m unfulfilled, discontent, and restless.”

“You’re unfulfilled, discontent, and restless.”

“But if the rest of my needs, fortunately for me, are being met, does that mean I’m just chilling? Is there something wrong with just chilling and not looking for food?”

“Well, maybe for some time you’ll be fine. However, like your body, your mind needs food. You might not have an appetite at the moment, but your brain – your consciousness – your whatever-it-is will inevitably send signals that it wants to be fed – and not fed some over-processed, under-cooked, unnatural aisle-to-microwave boxed frozen food slop. Otherwise, your mind will invariably wither away.”

“So, where do I find the good stuff? What can I do to nourish my mind, nurture my soul, and other synonyms?”

“Well, therein lies the problem. You’re asking me, and I am you, and I don’t know.

“Perhaps you can begin by asking, ‘How?’ Not ‘Where’ and ‘What’.

“Because as you start to find little ways of ‘How’, you will find yourself chipping away at ‘Where’ and ‘What’. And if you find yourself chipping away at ‘Where’ and ‘What’, maybe you won’t wither away… after all, in the end, and other synonyms.”

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Solemn Solace

Sometimes you have to accept the timeline and just be okay with the way things are. How you got here. How we got here. And where we go from here.

She said it with an unrequited coldness, her voice confident but unsure, unrelenting in her quest to convince herself. I could sense her change in temperament from who we used to be to who we are now. I could feel the temperature drop.

Outside, the air was still and quiet, eerie like the calm before a northeastern storm. It was a grey winter day, the kind where I put my faith in the sun, the kind where I knew if I could see a hint of brightness in the lightly dimmed sky, I could be happy. Faith and hope are not the same. One does not follow the other, and one like the state of leaves on trees in cold degrees remained.

Inside, she sat coolly across from me, half upright, half laidback, on the dark shaded, maroon tinted couch we shared for years as young lovers who didn’t yet know ourselves individually but loved ourselves collectively, and then for more years while we became who we are and while we grew apart. I saw her mind was made-up and she had resigned herself – ourselves – to this fate. It was the logical choice, but it was also rational to want to fight it. In the end, I decided it was not worth it: although she was having difficulty convincing herself it was over, I shared the same difficulty in convincing myself it wasn’t. Just one more thing we shared.

***The above is a snippet to revisit, to become part of a larger piece***

Those words reverberated through the room, through my head to spark dread for ages of all the things that couldn’t be said.

Sometimes you have to accept the timeline and just be okay with the way things are. How you got here. How we got here. And where we go from here.

Those words reverberated through the tomb, through my bed to dark threads, in ages soon enough we’ll all be dead.

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Disappear Here

There are three states that matter.

The first one, it’s like a liquid – you’re always moving, constantly searching. For what? It doesn’t know. I don’t know. Searching for the next thing, I guess. Something.

The second, someone is running. Running from something. Escaping, and hoping to soon be dissipating. But as the gas fades and transparency forms, and there’s no sign of anything having once ever been there, you’re still there. You haven’t escaped. You haven’t escaped yet. And by the time you do, you’ll never be any the wiser.

The third and final – and equally the worst but maybe even the best – is contentment. You’re not moving. You’ve found it. You’re solid.

“So is this you now? You’re just going to be philosophical? I’m trying to have some fun.”

“We’re all trying to have some fun. But the sooner we can face that we’re in one of these three states, the sooner we can try to do something that matters.”

“Yeah, and what’s that? Go to a coffee shop and pretend to be sophisticated? Watch the cool, new movie that has a plotline that’s been repeated and regurgitated since mythology written hundreds upon thousands of years ago? Organize a spice rack? Look around. This is all there is. Either get with the program, enjoy it for a few years, or disappear. That’s all there is.”

“So now when did you get all philosophical? You really don’t think there’s anything more?”

“I know there isn’t anything more.”

“I believe there is. There’s got to be.”

“There’s not. Try to have some fun. Be a solid. Be content. With the fact that this is all there is. So: Have. Some. Fun.”

“You heard yourself, though, right? You’re talking about one the states that matter.”

“Nothing matters. Just disappear here. If you can’t admit it, you should just disappear here.”

“Disappear where?”

“Here.”

“Where is here?”

“I don’t know. It’s fucking right here. What do you mean?”

Voices weave and stream through my head. Be something good for the world. Be someone who makes the world a better place. Leave it better than when you entered it. Leave behind a legacy.

Disappear here.

Or be happy with a family, a good job, and a hobby or two.

Disappear here.

Or just party. Always. Constantly. Consistently. And say fuck it and anything and everything.

Disappear here.

Or go off the grid. For now, and forever. Until this life is over, and until you’ve disappeared here.

Where?

Here. There. Wherever. It doesn’t matter. Nothing does. Keep searching for what you’re supposed to be. Run from who you are. Or achieve enlightenment and be content – and apathetic and easy to forget.

Disappear here.

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It’s a strange parallel

It’s a strange parallel, that at the same time you can’t conjure up a story to write about, you also can’t create a story to live about. Every time I try to put pen to paper, the ideas don’t come and the words are scrambled. Every time I try to do something new and exciting and adventurous in real life, I still think to myself, “Is this all there is?” It’s not like the latter is an unfamiliar feeling, but the former had previously always been my outlet. Experiencing both at the same is a first for me, and it’s not… well, it’s not fun.

Is this what depression really feels like? I’m not talking the sadness most people may feel on a periodic basis, nor am I talking the low-grade depression I’ve experienced on and off over the years. Is this what depression really feels like?

I’ve certainly experienced it worse now than ever before, but lately it seems I’ve come out of it, like I’ve come out of my analogous bed; however, the words still won’t come out of what I’m worried has become my idealess head.

Do we have time for creativity anymore? Make time for what’s important I guess. Is creativity just not important for me anymore?

No, I refute that. I refute that statement that it isn’t, although the statement is a question no one asked of me but me and no could answer for me but me.

I really just want to write short metaphorical stories again about the feelings I’m experiencing and what the world seems to be going through, through a hopefully unique and original lens and within the context of a philosophical psychology.

So that brings me here, to this point, this moment in time, where I’m explaining my absence in my writing, not to my totally very many readers – instead to myself.

I’d planned to write *these things*:

-different poems than the last three in this series; <better> poems
-two shorter stories, mixing in prose with poetry, one with more pose and one with more poetry
-two longer stories, one on the topic of disassociation, and delusion, viewing writings in a diary (Personalities on Different Days), and another on the subject of, well, also observing writings in a diary, journaling the timeline of a goal to find love within a year, and if not, on the eve of the new year, jumping from the roof of the building the individual got a job at, at the beginning of the year in order to execute the plan and perhaps execute themself on 34th and 5th (Empire State Essays, or more cringe-worthy, Dreams of Death / I clearly should be writing lyrics for a liquid metal band)

What I’d like to write is how life can be so simultaneously beautiful and ugly: how can life be so simultaneously beautiful and ugly? I’m constantly amazed by it. Half the day, I’m mumbling under my breath, swearing because of the selfish scenes I see, cursing the lack of empathy in the majority of opinions I hear. The other half, there’s pure astonishment for the world we’ve built. For the universe, the planet, and our species… for every little thing to occur exactly as it did for us to be here like we are today, if anything occurred differently, who’s to say I’d be writing this or then reading it on the internet. We might not be here, or we could be here but things could be much worse than they are (while noting they still stand to get better). There’s pain, but there’s beauty, humanity, comradery, [still some] empathy, love, and pleasure. It’s the small acts, the kind words, and simple gestures that say, “Hey, things are going to be okay. It isn’t always great, but we’re in this together, and we’ll make it through today.”

This is the world I’m witness to. And I couldn’t be happier to get the chance to observe it, even if I feel like an outsider at times, a background participant, and even though I lose the happiness for temporary, momentary lapses of it.

Sometimes it’s like I’m still driving through that dark tunnel: Slope revisited. Once I see sunlight – and green – I realize that I may be out of the tunnel but I might now find myself with a new struggle. It’s foliage I now see, with bits and pieces of blue skies overhead obstructed by bark and limbs. I’m not sure whether I’ll ever make it out of the forest: how many miles it stretches in any direction is anyone’s guess, and my only compass is the sun and knowing that when it sets, it sets in the west.

So I suppose I’ll just find the beauty in it all until then. I’ll look up at what seems like dead trees, and I’ll watch them grow the most stunningly colorful, wonderful leaves.

And one day, I know, when I leave, I’ll leave knowing I experienced the beautiful highs and the ugly lows, that I did the best and also sometimes the worst I could do, and as depressed as I got at times and thought about ending it all, I’m grateful I didn’t and thankful I got to be a part of this experiment – the most beautiful and ugly one that’s ever been invented: life.

30, 60, 90 years – however many it is, when I go, I’ll be glad to return to Earth to decompose and let it grow.

Because in the end, at least I got to bear witness to the show.

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Slope

I feel like I’m driving through a dark tunnel.

I’m driving through a dark tunnel – or “riding” might be the more accurate verb because I do not feel like I’m in control.

I feel like I’m riding through a dark tunnel, and I get glimpses of light here and there. I can’t tell whether it’s the artificial lights strewn atop the ceiling on both sides or the natural light at the so-called end of the tunnel. It doesn’t matter that I can’t tell: the invented lamps are half-broken, blinking at best, and provide no real benefit in me knowing if I’m traveling north, south, closer, farther. They do not give me any semblance of direction, and like me, they seem to serve no purpose. If anything, their fake and false and untrue light confuses me because I can’t tell if I’m almost out of this dark tunnel. When I see the flashes, the blinking on and off, the light illuminating an otherwise pitch-black inside and underground road, it draws me in again just to turn me around again. But without them, I’d be unable to see at all.

It’s supposed to be that when the light appears, I am saved, and when the light disappears, I don’t know where I’m going.

What direction am I heading?

I don’t know.

Did I ever know where I was going?

Not when the lights were off.

Not even when the lights were on.

Every year this dark tunnel seems to get longer, and wider, and although it’s straight, it develops more left and right turns every… single… year. I could do a 180, and I’d still have no idea where I’m driving. Where I’m riding. If I’m unable to discern left from right and top from bottom, then I’m unable to discern 0 from 180 from 360. But this does feel like the bottom. And each time I believe it is, I’m reminded I was wrong. My conviction about my life in this sense is not resolute – that my mental emotions have reached the deepest depths; I know they can go lower, yet I always without fail deceive myself to think they can’t, and then I’m surprised when they do, when they descend, when they drop. I wish I could do a lot of things in life always without fail. This is not one of them.

It almost sounds like a simple task. Almost. To tell if one is traveling in a straight line toward the end (the light at the end of the tunnel or the end overall?). One should be able to tell. But like a seasoned hiker lost in an unfrequented forest, I’m unable to discern left from right. And like a skydiver in free fall unable to track the sun, I’m unable to discern top from bottom.

This feels like bottom.

I am falling, I am spiraling from an unknown height to an undetermined floor. Ground. Bottom.

9.8m/s2

Hypothetically speaking.

Velocity.

Metaphorically speaking.

Vuh·laa·suh·tee.

Of course, if I did find the floor. Ground. Bottom. Inherently, it’d have to be determined. Accordingly, I know I have not hit them yet.

It doesn’t matter if the lights are artificial or natural because I’m so accustomed to seeing artificial ones I’ve almost forgotten what the natural ones look like. I’m trapped.

“I’m stuck. Does it get easier?”

I’m trapped, and although I don’t hold much faith that I will see and sustain real happiness, the brightness of it, again, I still hold some level of hope. I’m holding out not that the sun will once again make an appearance – I know others can feel its warm embrace of their skin and light upon their face; it is making appearances for others. I’m holding out that the sun will once again make its presence known to me, so that I can at least know there’s still a chance for me, whether I’m merely witnessing the sunlight from a far distance while uncomfortably stuck within the tunnel.

Notwithstanding, I can’t help but think that it doesn’t matter if the lights are artificial or natural because either way, they are fleeting at best. One flickers visibly, serving to guide me to nowhere except the inevitable end. The other flickers internally, giving me hope each time that I have not reached the inevitable end but rather the end of the tunnel, which is what keeps me from reaching the inevitable end.

I then ask, though, what’s the good of being reminded of the joy you no longer share with the world or the world no longer shares with you? The joy comes and goes in moments, indeed, but the coming is less often, the going is more often, and the moments are shorter.

And the joy really isn’t the issue. The problem is the tunnel is simultaneously becoming longer while seemingly getting shorter, still with no exit and a single escape. The tunnel’s ceiling gets lower, its sides grow closer, and while the bottom also gets lower – because it can’t get higher – the rate at which the ceiling gets lower outpaces the race to the bottom.

Soon I will be stuck between the six constraints of forward, backward, left, right, up, and down, and no light will be able to sneak in, even if just to mock me.

It’s been coming to this for a while. It’s been getting worse, and worse, and worse, and I’m waiting for the e to be replaced with a t.

The loneliness when I shouldn’t be lonely.

The unhappiness when I should be happy.

The addiction to anything to keep my mind off my self-hate.

The self-hate that derives from the addictions.

The vicious, endless cycle.

Endless until –

The understanding of the issues but incapability to fix them. Or maybe it’s the lack of dedication or desire to. What motivates you? Not thinking. Being numb. Being numb leads to not thinking which leads to not hating. This is what I desire and have grown dedicated to. But it’s a vicious, endless cycle, one that a person cannot live with forever. Endless, until –

What direction am I heading?

I don’t know.

I have a guess, and it isn’t good.

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Hope

also known as the final installment of The Fourth Series (read The Fourth Series from the bottom post to this top post)

Life is short.

Or it’s long.

I don’t know.

I’ve written about this idea a few times.

Like a lot of things in life, time is relative.

And when you look at it one way, it might mean one thing.

And when you look at it a different way, it finds itself meaning another thing.

The exact opposite.

That’s when you find the meaning in life in the first place.

That’s when you find the meaning in life to begin with.

Or end with.

Life warps you like this – you are warped in life like this.

Maybe not you. But definitely me.

And I have a sneaking suspicion that many of you

Find yourselves like me.

If you ever find yourself – you know where I’m going with this.

I have a sneaking suspicion that many of you

Are pretty similar to me

I’m not that unique.

Not that different.

Perhaps that’s the problem.

I want to be unique.

I want to be different.

I want to fit in.

But I don’t.

I want my cake.

And to eat it, too.

But I can’t bake.

Or buy it from you.


Michelle wondered how she got to that point. She was in her car, driving to pick up a piece of Canvas art she’d found online and taken notice to the moment she’d seen it. It was just after noon, just after she spent her morning reading on her porch, with the brisk winter air dancing against her exposed skin – the small amount that was not covered by comfort. With her morning coffee warming her up, it was the best prescription for waking her up. Slightly groggy when she’d awakened at nine, she was able to sleep in an hour past the sun’s light rising, and it, too, was time for hers.

The book was The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath. She’d ordered it and consumed it immediately. There were other books she hadn’t ordered on such an impulsive whim and other books she didn’t so quickly take in. Other genres of fiction, self-help, and biographical, historical non-fiction. Ones that sat under her bed or in her closet for months before she could bring herself to read them. Those were in the past months, when she had spent all of her time in her room but didn’t spend the time reading; didn’t spend the time finding the strength or even the desire to find the strength to move from her bed – much less to place her hand over the side and search underneath it for a book she had researched on Amazon, expecting it to be the one to tell her how to have the will power to make it all click, once and for all.

It was a thirty-minute drive in each direction, so including getting out of her car, walking inside, and completing the purchase, it was going to be close to an hour and thirty-minute round trip. Michelle didn’t mind.

Sitting in traffic, Michelle thought about the past months when life just didn’t seem like it was worth living. She remembered when she was a kid and also a teenager, the beach was full of fun and associated with nothing but good memories. Then she recalled over the summer when she drove to the beach at 2am, to sit on the sand and listen to the waves of the ocean, unable to sleep, thinking she was losing it, and being quite sure in this belief. She walked out to the water, to let the tide gently break over her toes. It was so inviting, she stayed there standing for a minute, before returning to her designated spot to sit alone on the sand in darkness. Normal people don’t do this, she fathomed. She wasn’t normal though, she told herself.

Now traveling at an expected speed, Michelle kept her eyes on the road, but while maintaining her car between the dotted lines, allowed her vision to occasionally drift to the streetlights, buildings, and sidewalks, passengers, pedestrians, trees, and birds and other cars and other roads that surrounded her. She contemplated how many thoughts, how many efforts, how many people and lives went into creating these tangible feats like highways and intangible faiths, like the one in the system that regulates the highways. Society as a whole. She marveled at the miracle. Created by creatures that evolved from single-celled organisms, that now are composed of a symphony of interacting nerves, veins, and organs. The body as a whole. She marveled at the miracle.

The artwork she would soon be picking up was a painting of an ocean to resemble a heart rate. She understood the ocean will come and go forever but that the heart rate will one day end. The pulse has a finite timeline until it flatlines.

Going faster now, she was suddenly overcome with a wave of emotion: joy, appreciation, wonderment, and love for the world and even herself. The miracle was beautiful. To see what she was seeing, experience what she was feeling. To be thankful for it all. It was beautiful. She was so grateful for the opportunity to be here and to live it.

Although overcome, she was able to comprehend the situation. While she was better now, she wouldn’t always be. She wouldn’t always be period. But that’s part of life. And while she felt such a deep appreciation of how little could and should have been expected of humans and how far we’ve come, she held such a deep understanding that she would again have her doubts of the genus as a whole.

She pulled over and cried. She wasn’t overwhelmed. She was happy. She was happy to know she was capable of feeling again. And she asked herself why others didn’t take the time to sit back in their car and sometimes think about it, pull over, and cry, too. But then she remembered every person’s timeline is different. And every person is entitled to live it as seen fit. Because one day, that pulse will no longer be seen on the monitor’s screen. The heart rate will flat line. When that time comes, the goal is to be at peace. The objective until then is to live a life how one deems fit, within the tolerable guidelines that we accept even if all are technically, subjectively right or wrong. Whether it’s to leave a legacy, improve the world, have a family, or simply to enjoy the time here; most likely in all cases, to be happy. Even if there is no defined meaning to it all. There are roads we’ve constructed to tell us where to go to pick up artwork. There aren’t roads to tell us how best to lead our lives or the right way to do so. The only real road is the “exit only” we will all one day take.

She put her car into drive once more. She had hope for the future. She had acceptance for the present. And she had appreciation for the past. For her and for others. Sometimes she’d be in park, and other times even in reverse. But she had hope. She was going to lead her life through the dark times and the good, sometimes alone, self-isolated on the shore, and other times she was going to celebrate the world. And she hoped others would, too. She hoped others would have it, too: hope.


The waves will break

Over the shoreline

The tide’s wake

Left behind

Our finite heart’s flat line

The waves will break

Past all of our time

Our one fate

Left behind

The definite end to our timeline

Hope is all I have in mind

To be okay when I leave my life for the shoreline

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Burn It All Down

She opened her eyes.

Breath heavy, but nerves as calm as a secluded river, cold as one almost frozen over.

Voice ready, she began to speak from behind the podium, in front of a crowd of waiting ears.

“One day in the future, not many days from now, the effects of what we are doing to the environment, the Earth – this planet, our home – will be irreversible, and catastrophe will take hold. We are seeing the impacts now, but the impacts now are minor in this year compared to what they will be in upcoming years.

“The polar ice caps will continue to melt, with the one difference being the speed at which they do – the acceleration at which they do. Glaciers melting and breaking off into icebergs. Icebergs melting, too. The heat trapped in our atmosphere giving rise to heightened sea levels, which will sooner or later contribute to calamity, if we do nothing. Rivers will be unable to freeze over.

“And I say we do nothing, and I say we hope it is sooner than later that we see this tragedy.

“Usher it in, and burn it all down,” her voice echoed throughout the room before its reverberation was overcome by applause.

Taylor was speaking at the Misanthrope Convention, whose tagline, “Getting a bunch of people together who hate people,” was a perfect description of the event.

Taylor was one of the guest speakers for the one-day convention. (Two days around other people would be too many.)

After her mid-afternoon speech, it was time for the small group breakout sessions before the keynote speaker and goodbye salute. She found herself sitting alongside nine other attendees, to discuss the different ideas that were brought forth by the convention’s speakers, what they thought of them, and the final address still to come.

The conversation turned to Taylor and her speech, aptly and almost too obviously titled, “Burn it All Down.”

“So, I think one thing the other misanthropes can agree on here, myself included, is we dislike humanity, and it seemed like a lot of this resentment went into your main theme. Can you explore more of your disdain for us?”

Taylor nodded in agreement, and although she wasn’t overly excited to share an unrehearsed response to people she hated and who hated her, when she opened her mouth, the words flowed like an unobstructed current:

“Well, it’s simple. And I’ll try to articulate it in an eloquent manner to allow my quote unquote contemporaries here to understand. When you grow up, for most people, the world seems like an alright place. You learn about the past and some of the atrocities committed in the past, and you don’t ask yourself how they could have been committed, you just tell yourself that’s how people were, how it was, and that’s why the sins of yesterday were committed. You don’t even use auxiliary verbs like ‘used to’ because there is such a complete break between us and them, our present and past, that it’s not appropriate to say, ‘That’s how people used to be, how it used to be, and that’s why the sins of yesterday had been committed.’ You learn about the past and some of the atrocities committed in the past, and you don’t ask yourself if they could be committed today because we are different now than we were then.

“But then when you grow up, when you really grow up, you realize auxiliary verbs won’t even help us now. We are no different today than we used to be during the times of barbarians and cavemen, only with better technology, worse attention spans, and more ways to kill.”

Taylor paused on kill, her controlled anger building.

“Are we empathetic? No. Are we selfish, stupid, and self-centered? Yes. Do we wear masks during a pandemic? No. Do we fight with complete strangers across the world online? Yes. And our countries’ governments do the exact same? Yes. Do we deserve this world that’s been given to us? No.

“And that is the resentment, the disdain, that went into the main theme. Right now, we can’t even come together to mitigate the risks of climate change for our species’ survival. Good. If we can’t do that, we deserve what’s coming to us. Let it happen. Let it all burn down. Let the Earth be a home with a gas leak, and let us be the inhabitants.”


He snapped back to reality. His eyes had been transfixed on nothing in particular, just a point off in the distance, while his mind wandered. He was sitting in a circle of nine people, who were sharing their stories of how they found themselves here – how their vices started, how they knew it was time to get help, and how they strived to get better.

He was jolted back into this actual reality when the question was posed to him, “Taylor, what do you think triggers your addiction?”

He reflected for a moment, needing inspiration to greet him first in order for introspection to arrive.

He answered:

“What feeds my appetite is, when I do reflect for a moment, I see something I don’t like. All I see is a person who isn’t the person I want to be. Someone I can’t stand to be around but I am with constantly.

“And when I look inside myself, there are three miseries I keep revisiting that make me want to crawl into a dark hole and never return, like a coward who can’t face the visible truth and instead retreats into darkness, hoping for but too scared to enter the void on his own accord.

“The first, it’s like I have everyone fooled. Everyone who thinks I’m a good person. Not that everyone, or anyone for that matter, thinks of me often enough or knows me well enough to hold a true opinion. When I’m reassured of being good, if good has an objective definition, I just know I’ve fooled them again and their reassurance is coming from a place of blind love and not truthful facts. Which only serves to confound the situation because then I start to wonder if it’s imposter syndrome, and maybe they’re right… at which time I realize they’re wrong and remember what I’ve always, secretly known, and that is I am a bad ‘insert non-subjective definition here’ person.

“That’s the second hang-up. I’ve known it, worried about it, and contemplated it for such a long time, but at the same time buried it until it rises from the surface, not been concerned with it until it makes itself known, and compartmentalized it until it hurts others and I continue the trend of hating who I am.

“That there is number three. How I’ve known this, and I’ve done nothing about it, and still don’t see how I will do something about it. This, this just might be the worst of them all. No, this is the worst of all.

“That’s what triggers me. Triggers me to do what I can to forget who I am. To forget what I hate. To be home and enter an alternate reality in which I don’t have to think anymore. To be out, wearing my best clothes as a charade, to post online my best life as a façade, surrounded by people I don’t know if I can stand, with a drink and drug in my hand. I just like to forget who I am. It’s easier to pretend to be something you’re not than to actually make an attempt and put in effort to become someone better than you currently are. It’s easier to forget.”

The circle was taken back by the starkness of the response. These circles were meant to be safe spaces, where a person with a problem could share their feelings freely and openly without judgment, but even then, the answers were not typically this free or open. Candid overtook comfortable. This was real self-hate – truer than self-loathing, and less of a woe-is-me mentality than self-pity.

When it was time to share in front of the larger audience, of around 30 in total there that night, Taylor jumped at the opportunity, as if what he had just disclosed was an epiphany and not simply a confession, known for many years but just now only said aloud.

“I’ve thought about these words prior to stating them tonight. I’ve told myself, and I’ve told others, that humans are good people, and we need to do what we can to make the world a better place for the greater good. And recently, I’ve recognized I was incorrect in this belief all along. If there’s one lesson the global reactions to a pandemic have taught me, it’s that we are not good people.

“Similarly, I’ve outwardly presented a consistent appearance, and that is that I’m good people. But unlike with the world, I didn’t need to learn that this was false. There was no recent revelation. Inwardly, it was a fact cloaked in fiction.

“And when you know that both you and the world suck, there isn’t much more to hope for than to burn it all down.”

He overlooked the crowd, which was silent. He prayed they were no longer free of judgment. He wanted them to be his jury. To decide his fate. To let him take the easy way out. To be his jury and executioner.

He thought of Meursault waiting for the jailer to escort him to his death. Taylor, too, felt the indifference of the universe, but unlike Meursault, he did not just resign himself to the end: he actively wished to be one of the spectators greeting himself with cries of hate when the time comes.

“So, in my home, I hope a gas line’s age leads to wear and tear. And I hope that wear and tear allows gas to leak from the line. And be it a candle or cigarette, I hope there’s a reason to ignite a flame. And with it, the sky will fill with a painting of red stars on a black canvas, ashes falling to the ground like snow. With me inside, at the time, there will be no place to go. It’s easier to burn it all down than it is to grow.”


||||||||||||||||


Question:

Do you ever think about that song, “I Hate Everything About You?”

Plot twist.

It was written in front of a mirror.

Double plot twist.

It wasn’t, because the next line is, “Why do I love you?”

Nonetheless –

Your depression isn’t an excuse to be a bad person.

“My depression isn’t an excuse to be a bad person.”

(And me hating myself isn’t an excuse to be a bad person.)

Am I truly one, though?

Probably, but I’ll never be able to objectively decide.

Maybe I just have everyone fooled, though
everyone who thinks I’m a good person
everyone except the select few
who know
the truth

put down the book
finish the line
become so entwined

So, it’s probably best to err on the side of caution
And believe myself when I look at myself in the mirror and tell myself I’m a bad person

put down the book
finish the line
it’s all it took

Believe me
When I look at myself in the mirror
Tell me I’m a bad person

put down the book
finish the line

Burn it all down
This poetry will finally end in due time
///
Shit poetry will finally end in due time

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Waiting (for the Elevator)

Ring.

Beep.

Some high-pitched noise that tries to sound pleasant but comes off as shrill.

Ring.

Beep.

Is it here?

These things, he thought, as he pressed the round, raised button to go downstairs from his condo floor.

“And will I have to make small talk? Please, I don’t want to make small talk. At least with a mask on they can only see my eyes.

“But my eyes tell so much.”

As fear of talking to people he didn’t care about sought to overcome him, a different thought overtook his mind.

“What is the life that will be presented to me when those doors open? Who will the person be who’s standing in front of me?”

He wondered about their lives, their stories, backgrounds, futures, and desires. If something was currently going wrong that day, or better yet, if something was actually going right. His imagination was intrigued even though the doors hadn’t opened.

He hadn’t seen them, he didn’t know who they were, but he was fascinated with the concept of who they might be.

He hadn’t seen them, he didn’t know who they were, and soon they would see him.

Worried again, he contemplated with anxiousness whether the situation may be returned in reverse. But before falling into the trap of thinking so much of himself that strangers would think so much of him, he realized just this. There’s no reason to be overwhelmed in a life that underwhelms us so often.

He further assured himself the barrier between tenth floor foyer and two door elevator would be enough to provide protection from them getting to know him, the one-inch gap he would have to cross over to enter the contraption. Somehow it seemed like the long, slender hall was completely separate from the eight-by-eight feet square space. Even with the doors open, he decided they couldn’t see him.

Still, he wanted to see them. And he wondered what their lives and their stories may hold.

“What if it’s a doctor, a nurse, bartender, or teacher? Deadbeat? No, a deadbeat couldn’t live here. Deadbeat on their parent’s money? More likely.”

He thought to himself as eternity awaited him; it felt like eternity, at least, waiting, watching, wondering.

“Will they have a family? Be single? In a relationship with someone they love? Stuck in a dead-end marriage with a dead-end job with someone they love but who doesn’t love them back? Ah, unrequited love, just like high school.”

It was now taking some time, a noticeable amount of time, for the elevator to arrive at his floor and the doors to open. The elevators in this building were fast, but often one or more did not work. How much does he pay to be inconvenienced? How much does one pay in life, he reasoned.

“There are so many endless opportunities, it’s truly astounding and amazing and invigorating to think of all the things one can be! And enticing and exciting and… upsetting to think of all the things I could have been.”

His internal voice trailed off in his head, his jubilant attitude turning downcast, wide eyes shutting and ear-to-ear smile fading.

“I… I could have been anything. Well, maybe not anything, but many things. Not this.”

He searched his inner soul: thoughts and feelings he hadn’t experienced in some time, but the pain of which he knew all too well, familiar when recalled from the deep caverns of his mind.

To be fair to himself, it’s not like he lived a bad life. He had a good job – whatever that means; a good condo, good car, good friends. He was as complete as one could be without the ‘l’.

But looking back, is this really where he wanted to be at this point in his life? Standing in the hall, waiting for an elevator in this condo, about to drive his car to his job so that he can afford this condo and car and buy drinks with drinking friends he wouldn’t invite in on a non-night out?

Retreating from his mind, looking back: at the elevator door, still not open, forcing him to be alone with his thoughts. Is this really where he wanted to be? Can’t someone from another room on his floor walk up? God, small talk would be preferable.

Purgatory, this truly was.

“When did it all go wrong? Was it ever right? Oh, who I could have been… who could I have been?”

His brain began to repeat the loop before he caught himself again. This time though, instead of pain, it almost went to pleasure – to get off on the high of fantasizing of who he could be and what he would be doing at this given moment if he was someone else, in lieu of becoming depressed he wasn’t someone else. The adventures that await. Hell, it almost gave him a kick of dopamine.

“It’s too early in the day to be day-dreaming.”

Standing in hell, waiting for the elevator in his condo.

“I’d rather be asleep. Damnit, I need my black double shot coffee.”

He retraced the steps to how he got here: from his room to this space and from his birth to this place. He couldn’t pinpoint the exact date and time it all went wrong. Maybe one month ago, one year, a decade, a day. Perhaps 1/1/2011 or 8/8/2007. 12:13am or 7:06pm. All he could make out is, over time, no coffee turned into coffee with creamer then to black coffee to one shot and now two. There’s got to be more to life than me waking up and requiring my fucking black double shot coffee.

“And what is taking this damn elevator so long?”

He was starting to not care anymore about the life on the other side. There’s a possibility he never cared in the first place except for his own relative comparison, a jealousy of greener grass and a reminder of his own shortcomings; he’d never be tall enough to climb the stairs up and take the tumble down when needed. No, he’d make plans for another day, not even in his real life journal that he didn’t even keep, but jot them down in his memory, a day-dream he’ll revisit from time-to-time in the car and again on runs or while going to sleep and wish he could actually visit in his dreams.

He could’ve been anything, he figured. Arrogant, he was. But although he was arrogant, he was also insecure, and although he couldn’t have been anything, he was still something, not nothing – no matter how often he tried to tell himself he was.

It was true he (or she) could have been very many things. As life continued, though, he reasoned he must continue to be the one thing he has known, to remain on the path he has chosen but did not pave, to keep going forward on this journey with the hope that eventually it’ll lead to happiness and fulfillment. He had pushed the button to go down. What was taking this damn elevator so long?

Ring. Beep. A high-pitched noise that tries to sound pleasant but comes off as shrill.

“Who will be in the elevator when the doors open, and will I have to make small talk?”

The laminated stainless steel doors opened, receding into the sides of the machine. He brought his attention up from the ground to eye level.

And he saw no one.

The elevator was empty. Potentially it’ll lead to life and be full tomorrow.

“I guess this is my reality. This is who I am. I am a no one. I am nothing. I thought I’d done so little with my life that I could have seen any number of individuals in the elevator and pondered a life like theirs and be envious with my desire. Apparently, I’ve done so little there aren’t any individuals to see.”

He moped, his dejected brain contemplated the button to push: G for “Ground” might as well have read RB for, well, you know. He selected it, and down he went.

He didn’t realize he had eight other paths to choose from, still, even at his age.

Ten floors, including the one he was on, the rock bottom, and the eight between. This didn’t count the many more above. The many lives above. The many stories in the building. The many stories to be told.

The elevator doors closed in front of him. He acted like they shut automatically, but they only shut because he pressed the button.

He was boring. He was normal. He didn’t understand the reason the word “extraordinary” existed since he was just extra ordinary. He wanted to be someone else: to either sell his soul and become powerful or feed his soul with creativity and charity. He was stuck between the two. Stuck is a compliment, because truthfully, he was too lazy to go all in on a commitment. Getting high on the thought was the single form of effort he could put forth.

The elevator lifted him momentarily before beginning its descent down. Just another 10,440 times and he’ll be dead.

Only he could permanently lift himself up.


He’d repeat the same routine tomorrow.



Could it be the one who I’ll marry? Is this really how we’ll meet? In an elevator, a story we can tell our kids and their kids if we’re still revolving around the sun by the time we’ve gained enough financial security and “adult”-like maturity to adequately plan for, afford, and raise kids in the first place. Ah, I can’t wait until I can accomplish all those things with someone I haven’t met yet but will really marry in a year or two. Indeed, that will be quite the story.

He’d repeat the same routine tomorrow.

If I was a famous _, I’d be on _, _ing _ _ _.

If I was a famous singer, I’d be on tour, playing shows for millions.

If I was a famous actor, I’d be on television, acting in big hits.

If I was a famous athlete, I’d be on ESPN, catching passes from Brady.

If I was this, if I was that.

Businessperson. Entrepenuer. Start-up. Painter. Venture capitalist. Politician. Mover. Shaker. DJ.

If I was this, if I was that.

He’d repeat the same routine tomorrow.

Let me get high imagining myself as this and that, how my tour would go and how I’d curate my shows.

Let me get high and not actually do anything but write subpar, bland prose.

Let me get high imagining myself as this and that and those.

And not actually do anything about it.

Not actually do anything to make it happen.

Because getting high for a moment is good enough until another distraction comes up, until you’re standing, waiting for an elevator, and no person comes up, no stranger for small talk, and there’s no small talk for yourself, only your problems that make you think you need help.

So get high for a moment. But not a high off a drug, unless that’s your thing. No, the author is speaking metaphorically.

Seven continents of billions of people. No one unique. But everyone has their stories. And I’m here waiting for the elevator drinking my double black coffee. So many things I could have done. So many things I could still do. But I’m here waiting for the elevator drinking my French vanilla hazelnut double black coffee. Who the fuck put these two flavors together.

He’d repeat the same routine tomorrow, except with a house blend double black coffee. Maybe iced, if he was feeling particularly risky.

Posted on

Chord Progression

E | rest | B | rest | A | rest | rest | rest
E | rest | B | rest | A | rest | rest | rest

The chord progression, played by a synthesizer keyboard, underscores the melody playing through my headphones. Or more accurately, the melody underscores it, as its sustained, stringed effect is the main driver of the song.

E | rest | B | rest | A | rest | rest | rest
E | rest | B | rest | A | rest | rest | rest

And then the notes softly, E A B, slowly, B A E. To the right, and in reverse. To the left. Forward, and the converse. Backward.

The song is “Slow Buchla Sunshine” by Above and Beyond. The song, likely a nod to Don Buchla, who pioneered sound synthesis in the sixties, is part of a larger piece of work, the “Flow State” album, which lends itself to a slow, building, and burning sunshine. I write this myself, while I watch the sun do just that.

And while my mind wanders, I wonder what would happen if the chord progression was played backwards like the notes, when the sun retreats for the night to its home.

Last night, when the sun had done just that, I was myself retreating to bed in the hope of sleep, depressed with the world and this life and my state of mind. I was coming up short in this hope of reprieve, to not think and to sleep – similar to how I come up short in other pieces of self-regulated unfathomably and unnecessarily high standards – when I thought: If the past were to change, would we ever know it?

The consensus I purchase, labeled as the grandfather paradox, dictates, “No, we would not.” This is because, per this paradox, by traveling back in time and altering the past, one would be altering the future and, with it, their reason to travel back in time and, as such, no longer have a reason to do so. Ergo, is time travel even possible to begin with, in the first place?

But I put to point, if this wasn’t the case, and time travel did exist, we would still not be aware of it. If someone changed an event that occurred in our past, the history we once knew we would no longer remember, and a new history would take its place. Everything we learned about it would be gone. Everything we now know reflects this new history. And the cycle continues, and we know just one. We are part of the line, not the loop.

In fact, if we look at this chronologically and not linearly, didn’t history happen in such a way that the past happened, the time travel occurred, and the past then happened in a different way, so that all of it was real, and all of it is part of our history, yet we are none the wiser, and we nonetheless only know one history?

I pontificate (because that’s what this is, pontification) that when looking toward the future, there are infinite possibilities at any time that could create any number of realities, yet by the ceaseless decisions we are constantly and simultaneously making, we only have one universe, the one we live in right now. The one in which I wrote this at 10:01am, the one in which you are reading this at whatever time you find yourself in. If I get up right now, if I lie down, these are seemingly small choices to be made and probably do not have a butterfly-like effect on the rest of the world, but they still constitute the ceaseless decisions we are always and often times sub-consciously making, which shape the world around us on the grand scale of billions of such moments a minute. And so this is the life that was formed and will continue to be formed, based on this construct of time. It almost seems like we can reach back and grab the past, grasp it, touch it, feel it again – we remember it so well, it was just so long ago. And we forever fade into the future, but the future never comes, since we find ourselves in the present (even if we don’t choose to live like it).

We break time down into seconds, minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, years, and so on and so forth. It’s almost tiring to write it all out, but it’s all been invented, constructed. Look around and see the wonders of innovation and creation of the past hundreds, thousands, millions, and billions of years (it’s frightening to think we’re so cocky in this one year, our time here).

And now understand all of the unknowns to still be answered or simply asked, explorations to still be made, and things to still come to be. It’s humbling to think how tiny we are.

But I digress from pontification because pontification has no purpose in this passage, a fate potentially shared with humans and other species. I put to the point, that if history A came first, time travel took place, and history B came second, both histories happened and have their place in time. But to our minds, we’re not aware of the cycle, and history B replaces history A.

Then, does it make sense that if in the future we can time travel and change our conscious past, we can write our past in the future?

The grandfather paradox be damned.

If in the future we can time travel and change our conscious past, we can write our past in the future.

No, this does not mean we should lean on the future to change the past. It means our future will one day be the past, and if our future will one day be the past, what do we want history to say about it?

             If the future writes the past, what do we want history to remember?

Indeed, the grandfather paradox be damned. Yes, there would be no time travel because there would be no reason for it, but not because we traveled in time to fix the past, but because we did what was right in the future for there to be no need to fix it [the past].


The notes play in reverse. The Earth completes its cycle around the sun in what we’ve determined is one year. The sun resets and then rerises in what we’ve decided is one day. Backwards. Reset. Rerise. E A B. B A E. A scene from a movie reverses the timeline of the events, with the destruction reversing its nature and water refilling a glass.

If, in 200 years from now, we were given the opportunity to time travel to right now, what would we do? We would do better to ask ourselves now, since we’re given the opportunity to live right now, what should we do. So, I ask again:

             If the future writes the past, what do we want history to remember?