A New Home

I guess it was sort of unfair (to all 3 of you who actually read my blog) to move without telling people. So here is my new address (about half a year late):

http://www.xanga.com/fusion986

Yes. I gave in and sold out. But I guess I realized.. what good is a blog when most of the people you know can't keep up with it?

Please come and visit.

Vacancy

We all have a strong yearning to be needed. We desire more than a simple want from those around us. We want those we care about to need us - sometimes in the smallest senses and sometimes in the greatest.

I want a small place carved into the heart of each person I share a relationship with. I want to be given the creative freedom and endowment of trust to architect great structures of strength, beauty and virtue within the spaces I am so cautiously allocated. To have a chance to paint great murals dedicated to the intoxicating highs and crushing lows. I want the opportunity to leave something behind more beautiful than the vacancy that would have been in my absence.

For that, I would hollow out a place in my own heart for the same.

Moving Backwards

I feel like I've been driving around all weekend, only to realize that the direction I've been going in the entire time was reverse. And tomorrow, I'm going to have to go into work and lie to my colleagues, with a smile on my face, about how great my weekend was because of all the wonderful things I did. Great.

A Face in the Crowd

The times I spend with the largest numbers of people are also the times I'm often reminded of how alone I really am. Whose fault is it? Is it my own? Possibly. It's hard to tell these things.

The Sensitivity of Artists

My theory on why creative people are more sensitive to what people think of them, and the things they create, has always been that their works come from such a personal place that any criticism on those works becomes a scathing comment on the origin of those creations - namely, their hearts. While I still consider this a valid idea, a few days ago, I realized that it may run much deeper. This is one possible explanation.

Artists take much of their inspiration from the world around them. These include their own emotions, social surroundings, physical surroundings and social interactions. A greatly heightened level of awareness is required to take the mundane and make it into something inspirational. This inspiration, in turn, leads to great samples of human expression.

A side-effect of heightened awareness is that the source which drives self-awareness also feeds into an element of self-consciousness. An artist's soul needs to be laid bare so that she can draw from it. Once confronted, in perceived honesty, with all the beauty and ugliness of one's own soul, it is difficult to close it back up and pretend that what had been revealed had never been cut open and examined in the first place.

This leaves a layer of raw persona that the artist is fully aware of and cannot ignore when interacting with others. Even if those around her cannot see it, it is easy to map simple, innocuous statements to a negative aspect of self that only the hyper-self-aware individual knows of.

The result: an extra dose of sensitivity.

Homeownership

I went to look at a house with my mom this morning. I've been thinking about setting back out on my own and deliberately burning cash on rent, but the voice of my mother's hardened practicality is pushing me to invest in real estate with the entire $600 I have in my savings account.

During the tour of the house, I tried very hard to imagine what it would be like to live there. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn't see it. For the 9 years that I lived on my own, I always lived in small spaces. Even when I resided in a large apartment, I spent 98% of my time in my cramped little bedroom. I don't demand much from living spaces, so the thought of an entire house (without the thought of wife and kids in sight) is, at best, disconcerting. After the tour, my mom asked me what I thought of the place. I had no response because I couldn't completely fathom the idea.

I know that investing in real estate is the "right thing to do", but I find it difficult to imagine myself living like this for a while to come. I'm young, and I still want to live out my youth with a bit of freedom. The idea of purchasing a house in suburbia comes with the idea of "settling down". I don't think I'm ready to settle down yet.

Some older friends have been telling me recently how they are regretting not saving enough money in their twenties. They are now finding it difficult to scrounge together the funds necessary to acquire long term living spaces. Hearing things like this from friends does help me to maintain a better perspective on the situation as I continue to flounder back and forth.

Ahh... the folly of my youth.

Standard Deviation

Took my car in for service this morning, so I spent a bit of yesterday evening plotting an alternate route to work. It's such a small thing, but it was a great feeling to deviate from my usual routine of driving down to the town bus stop and taking the same bus that I take every day.

The minor challenge of having to figure something out and being unsure of the physical outcome was refreshing. Lately, I've been trying to detach myself from depending on novelty for satisfaction. The longer I pursue this, though, the more I'm beginning to think that we're actually made to thrive on novelty. Not in a superficial, fleeting way, that permeates much of affluent society, but, at the core, to seek after experiences that encompass meaningful struggles and challenges.

I've been thinking a lot about moving out, lately. For a while I thought it would be wiser to stay home and save money to buy a place, but these days I'm starting to think that, more important than actually owning my own property, I want to be cast back out into life and forced to fend for myself.

One of the things I enjoyed most about living abroad was the challenge of being unsure of my next destination. I'd wander around half confused because I couldn't understand 60% of what people were saying to me. I loved getting lost in the middle of the night, strolling down random dark alleys (albeit in a very safe city) and stumbling upon new, undiscovered places.

I like not knowing what tomorrow will bring, but, with the understanding that, ultimately, I'm taken care of. Of course, day after day of this gets draining, but spending energy on true adventure is much more rewarding than hoarding that energy for the mundane.

Two Minutes of Fight

Emerging from a dream state, I focus intently on shoving my mind from one side of reality to another. After exchanging the mayhem of weekday insanity for the liberation of a brisk breeze blowing through four open windows and the sun graciously casting its warmth through the roof of my recently waxed car, the futility of this exercise quickly makes itself apparent.

Rolling onto the runway, I await an okay from the air traffic controller. Nothing. The voice of my director is muted by the weight of heavy eyelids and a painful tingling in the back of my throat. The mere task of cracking my jaw open for the insertion of a toothbrush encounters opposition by the lack of mitochondrial activity in my facial muscles.

Two minutes. That's the time it takes to complete a full cycle of automatic brushing. Bzzzzz. I stare blankly at myself in the mirror - an act I later recall only as something I've physically performed, leaving nothing but a vague impression of the image before me.

Twenty-five seconds. My efforts are waning. The minute, high frequency tremor in my palm ceases abruptly. I am no further along in my task than I was the moment I reached for the window blinds that let the morning sun into my grog infested room.

I acquiesce, allowing the day to speak for itself.