Monday, May 18, 2009
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
Day three(day two may come later):
I just got in, in a surprisingly good mood. Happy I won against MARTA, submerged in a pond of nicotine. Been thinking about faith recently and what it means in the context of my life. I consider myself a fairly devout agnostic, inasmuch as I've dabbled in many religions and found none of them spiritually satisfying. I am not sure if I believe in the concept of a spirit or soul to begin with. I think we live in existentially terrifying times and the human mind is more than capable of finding "outs" or ways of coping outside the framework of visible life. That is not to say that I think God is a human created notion but, rather, the mythology and importance we attach to the notion of a creator is. A way to escape the seeming boredom and pointlessness of life. I too need such "outs" but I am not sure if I capable of such an act of self-deception as to believe blindly in a loving, giving creator.
I just got in, in a surprisingly good mood. Happy I won against MARTA, submerged in a pond of nicotine. Been thinking about faith recently and what it means in the context of my life. I consider myself a fairly devout agnostic, inasmuch as I've dabbled in many religions and found none of them spiritually satisfying. I am not sure if I believe in the concept of a spirit or soul to begin with. I think we live in existentially terrifying times and the human mind is more than capable of finding "outs" or ways of coping outside the framework of visible life. That is not to say that I think God is a human created notion but, rather, the mythology and importance we attach to the notion of a creator is. A way to escape the seeming boredom and pointlessness of life. I too need such "outs" but I am not sure if I capable of such an act of self-deception as to believe blindly in a loving, giving creator.
a life unobserved is not worth living
I've taken to writing a page a day at work, usually on the back of a customer complaint card. Here they are, so far:
Day One:
This is the worst job I've ever had. I wonder if I can keep it long enough to not go broke, seems like it could go either way at this point. I feel okay about the work, it's just terrifically mind-numbing. I just stand here all day, saying the same thing over and over. I feel like i might never leave and, it will turn out, I am in hell. While this possibility seems unlikely, it is also very possible so I stay vigiliant. Perhaps that would be fitting punishment for my extended unemployment, endless unpaid overtime. Boss is gone. Hope drug test doesn't fuck me, cause it's not too bad to sit here, watch cars leave, smile and wave. Two young girls came in, flirted a little. Asked me if they could get free parking on their birthday. I was so inclined but wasn't sure of the logistics. By the time I had, they had gone and my chances for cheap sex fled with them. I suppose "parking attendant" is not the sexiest job title ever, but, one works with one what one has. Otherwise, life is ceaselessly frustrating, it is a life with little joy and no satisfaction. Not a life worth living in other words
Day One:
This is the worst job I've ever had. I wonder if I can keep it long enough to not go broke, seems like it could go either way at this point. I feel okay about the work, it's just terrifically mind-numbing. I just stand here all day, saying the same thing over and over. I feel like i might never leave and, it will turn out, I am in hell. While this possibility seems unlikely, it is also very possible so I stay vigiliant. Perhaps that would be fitting punishment for my extended unemployment, endless unpaid overtime. Boss is gone. Hope drug test doesn't fuck me, cause it's not too bad to sit here, watch cars leave, smile and wave. Two young girls came in, flirted a little. Asked me if they could get free parking on their birthday. I was so inclined but wasn't sure of the logistics. By the time I had, they had gone and my chances for cheap sex fled with them. I suppose "parking attendant" is not the sexiest job title ever, but, one works with one what one has. Otherwise, life is ceaselessly frustrating, it is a life with little joy and no satisfaction. Not a life worth living in other words
Friday, May 1, 2009
clean and well-lit
The clean, well-lit room is the barren, empty cave of the soul. Lord, save me from them. Give me ill-lit, give me smoke-filled, give me long-legged women not giving me the time of night, give me meager gambling wins to keep the Jamieson full, give me uncomfortable stools and high-backed chairs. Give me man's misery and alienation, give me a pen and a cheap legal pad. Give me a girl who loves me just enough to leave me alone, give me cheap sex that breaks me like straw. Give me a life that fits me like a secondhand suit, give me friends that barely tolerate me but still invite me to places I don't want to be. Give me weak lungs and strong legs, give me a weakness for whiskey and a hatred for vodka. Give me young girls who don't know well enough and old women that know far too well.
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
that was it all for the best?
She turns to him and he sighs and smiles, reaches for the camera at his hip. Whirrrrrr-click. The Nikon flashes in her face and her look of surprise is permanent now, a part of the record. He only sees the world after it's gone, after the camera has captured it. I guess he's just a few seconds behind the rest of us, like any good historian, and his entire persona captures it. He dresses stylishly, but, with a certain sense of dilation, like he bought all his clothes year ago, all on one day, so it's not out of date but just a bit faded. His smile and laughs and gestures all come half-a-second too late and are always preceded by the whirrrr-click. She pulls at a forelock and wonders what this must look like to him.
She in white, him in grey. A beautiful couple, they all said, even the bitter last-minute-invite, with his scuffed loafers and tried-to-quit-but-not-really cigarettes. The bride sat with this sad man for a few minutes outside of her tents, appropriating his bad habits. He smiled and tapped the cylinder against his slacks. They didn't say anything, but when he was done, he stood and extended his hand. She grabbed it and made as it to get up, but instead, he shook her hand and walked off towards the beach. She watched as he walked off and turned a corner and she only felt the urge to follow him a little bit. When people would tell stories later, they said he probably went to the bar at the end of the pier and probably got too drunk to even remember their was a ceremony, but, she imagined he took off his loafers. Stretched his calves. And dissolved into the sand.
Him in black, she in white. The man made his triumphant return from the earth and the husband looked tight and sad. They stood next to each other, before the casket, and the loss tied them together inextricably, feeling it like no-one else in the pavillion did, because they both lost her before their time. They had just picked out a nice place together, a dog. They were whispers of children even. For the man, they barely exchanged feelers. He was scared, then, and ran and ran. They called it a foolish prelude, when they called it anything. But the man and the husband knew different, because they could both stand there before her and feel equally in the right, that they both deserved their post to watch over her.
Him in dark red, the man in black. He slipped out of his seat, patting his mother slightly on the shoulder. He died in a car crash, coming back from Connecticut. His brother was being ordained in the Church and they were both driving back to the ancestral home in New Hampshire when a semi-truck turned into them and killed him instantly. The brother survived, "miraculously" some would say afterward. The man just happened to be in New England at the time and heard of his death through a friend that knew them all, that even knew them when the man and she were briefly in the same picture. She told him to go, to show support. No-one there knew him, but, he knew the person he was supporting was lone gone anyway. She died from a fall. The top of a cliff in Argentine, she lost her footing and tumbled. Her body was found floating, hair astray, in a clear pool of snow runoff basin, 2000 feet below. The man was in Boston at the time, but, heard the news almost immediately. When his friends would talk about that night, because he never told them, they would say he left abruptly. The strangers that knew him briefly after that would say he came abruptly and was a sturdy drinker, a lover of people and a genuinely hearty spirit. No man would ever say that about the man again.
She in white, him in grey. A beautiful couple, they all said, even the bitter last-minute-invite, with his scuffed loafers and tried-to-quit-but-not-really cigarettes. The bride sat with this sad man for a few minutes outside of her tents, appropriating his bad habits. He smiled and tapped the cylinder against his slacks. They didn't say anything, but when he was done, he stood and extended his hand. She grabbed it and made as it to get up, but instead, he shook her hand and walked off towards the beach. She watched as he walked off and turned a corner and she only felt the urge to follow him a little bit. When people would tell stories later, they said he probably went to the bar at the end of the pier and probably got too drunk to even remember their was a ceremony, but, she imagined he took off his loafers. Stretched his calves. And dissolved into the sand.
Him in black, she in white. The man made his triumphant return from the earth and the husband looked tight and sad. They stood next to each other, before the casket, and the loss tied them together inextricably, feeling it like no-one else in the pavillion did, because they both lost her before their time. They had just picked out a nice place together, a dog. They were whispers of children even. For the man, they barely exchanged feelers. He was scared, then, and ran and ran. They called it a foolish prelude, when they called it anything. But the man and the husband knew different, because they could both stand there before her and feel equally in the right, that they both deserved their post to watch over her.
Him in dark red, the man in black. He slipped out of his seat, patting his mother slightly on the shoulder. He died in a car crash, coming back from Connecticut. His brother was being ordained in the Church and they were both driving back to the ancestral home in New Hampshire when a semi-truck turned into them and killed him instantly. The brother survived, "miraculously" some would say afterward. The man just happened to be in New England at the time and heard of his death through a friend that knew them all, that even knew them when the man and she were briefly in the same picture. She told him to go, to show support. No-one there knew him, but, he knew the person he was supporting was lone gone anyway. She died from a fall. The top of a cliff in Argentine, she lost her footing and tumbled. Her body was found floating, hair astray, in a clear pool of snow runoff basin, 2000 feet below. The man was in Boston at the time, but, heard the news almost immediately. When his friends would talk about that night, because he never told them, they would say he left abruptly. The strangers that knew him briefly after that would say he came abruptly and was a sturdy drinker, a lover of people and a genuinely hearty spirit. No man would ever say that about the man again.
if this is his domain
I've been looking at pictures of dinosaurs for hours and listening to Imogen Heap and I think my brain has developed a new neural channel that links pictures of t-rexes to an intimate but alien fear of the divine. I won't be able to look at their retarded little claws ever again without feeling an existential pang.
The days build on top of each other, I feel like they are building a path to the thing I've been feeling scraping out the inside of my chest, making a nest in my collapsed sternum, like a squatter in a tenement. Each day it rips at me more and more, demanding to be let out. I've been fighting equally hard to keep it contained, to keep my life the same humdrum mess of love and tradition it has been my whole life, but, I don't feel like I keep it up. Whether or not, I feel like my potential is taking over the reigns and no amount of push-back will keep it contained. Maybe this is just the sugary-sweet deception of springtime, but, I feel like it's more.
I wonder if she knows how much I miss her. Probably best to keep her in the dark, I feel like I've worn out my welcome. She seems distant now, cold, maybe even uncaring. That could be just a front, of course, I've hurt her many times but when I turn to her, I feel like she turns back. She talks about him alot, but, he's distant and I feel like she feels tricked and is looking for something that doesn't really exist. I can only hope I will not be banned from her life for my mistakes, prolific as they are. I've come to love her, maybe have loved her for longer than I knew, and I can't lose it.
The days build on top of each other, I feel like they are building a path to the thing I've been feeling scraping out the inside of my chest, making a nest in my collapsed sternum, like a squatter in a tenement. Each day it rips at me more and more, demanding to be let out. I've been fighting equally hard to keep it contained, to keep my life the same humdrum mess of love and tradition it has been my whole life, but, I don't feel like I keep it up. Whether or not, I feel like my potential is taking over the reigns and no amount of push-back will keep it contained. Maybe this is just the sugary-sweet deception of springtime, but, I feel like it's more.
I wonder if she knows how much I miss her. Probably best to keep her in the dark, I feel like I've worn out my welcome. She seems distant now, cold, maybe even uncaring. That could be just a front, of course, I've hurt her many times but when I turn to her, I feel like she turns back. She talks about him alot, but, he's distant and I feel like she feels tricked and is looking for something that doesn't really exist. I can only hope I will not be banned from her life for my mistakes, prolific as they are. I've come to love her, maybe have loved her for longer than I knew, and I can't lose it.
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