| (no subject) |
[Apr. 3rd, 2007|11:18 pm] |
and just like that, you've thrust your finger into the fastforward button
instead of fretting about grades, you're pulling hair off your head, asking:
how the hell am i going to pay all these bills?
not to mention loan repayments?
or hell . . . groceries?
you fill out application after application, but nobody seems to be hiring.
the only job you're able to get is the one you always deemed a last resort.
wake up at seven in the morning, take the bus and drink lots of coffee.
and then come home too tired to think and drink lots of beer.
welcome to adulthood. |
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| (no subject) |
[Mar. 28th, 2007|04:53 pm] |
it's probably not a good sign when your dentist:
is nervously trembling as she lowers jagged drilling tools into your mouth
can't remember which step of the root canal comes next and has to ask her assistant
my tongue is plump full of novocaine,
paralysis of the jaw.
consonants that were once distinct slur into a single, incoherent cow noise
making things all the pleasanter, the dentist's office was a mile away
after several minutes of marching through gusts of rain, every saturated article of clothing -- including my socks and underwear -- clung to my dewy skin.
i need galoshes. and an umbrella that doesn't snap apart.
bitch bitch grumble grumble |
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| (no subject) |
[Mar. 27th, 2007|04:55 pm] |
death to lip ring!
my face feels so organic and symmetrical now.
i like it.
in other news, i am having this much success in my quest for a job: zilch!
there are crows pacing the grass outside and the sky is saying "thunder" |
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| (no subject) |
[Mar. 26th, 2007|10:09 pm] |
i wake up to:
the sight of embryonic red buds erupting out of tree bark.
a never-ending supply of mucus flooding my respiratory passages. allergy wrath.
and the sound of birds chirping off their little feathered faces.
i'm amongst the living again.
and damn does it feel good. |
|
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| (no subject) |
[Mar. 17th, 2007|12:14 am] |
you and i: cheers escape from our chapped lips. the apathetic clink of glass, we sip.
except even when i'm not by myself, i'm never really with anyone.
there's a filter sitting spread-eagle across my face.
i watch everything take place miles away.
there are so many gravitational pulls on my mind,
pulls that shouldn't be there
and nobody really gets it and i myself don't get it.
how do i tear the filter off?
i want to be down on earth, where everyone else is. |
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| (no subject) |
[Feb. 28th, 2007|01:16 am] |
| [ | body |
| | wilco, "hell is chrome" | ] |
there's tightness in my abdomen, anxiety in the palms of my hands, a hint of panic
and i get so i can't even think.
the days aren't really days when you wake up post-mortem.
7:20 and the sun is gone and it won't be coming back for a long time.
i slept for sixteen and a half hours. and i could have easily slept more.
it feels really comforting to wrap myself up in polyester blankets. like a sleeping bag, or like a full body hug.
i really don't like going to bed, but i like sleeping. i get nervous about the transition, the in-between. from a state of being awake to being asleep.
i don't know why.
but i also know that i'm not afraid of death, only dying.
after i woke up tonight, i biked into town. the cold felt really good on my face and there was still snow stuck up in the tree branches.
my dad's birthday is in a few days, so i bought him the latest johnny cash album and a kurt vonnegut book.
when i left the store, there was mist in the air. i broke down for a minute or two in the parking lot. i think i even started to cry.
or maybe something was in my eye. i don't know. i haven't cried in almost ten years and i don't really remember what it feels like.
whatever it was, it made me feel alive. |
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| (no subject) |
[Feb. 9th, 2007|12:04 am] |
| [ | body |
| | the magnetic fields, "i wish i had an evil twin" | ] |
i think i just turned the big 2-1.
i've been drinking alcohol for almost six years, but now my intoxication is officially legal and acceptable. and this is as young of an adult as i'll ever be.
i don’t feel my age. i can’t remember the last time i did. maybe there are just too many societal expectations about the way things should be. christmas never feels like christmas.
instead, i feel 10. and i feel 40. i have grown old too young, and simultaneously, i am far more immature than is ideal.
it's like this: i'm starting to find the occasional white hair on my head already. but i can’t yet grow a nice, thick beard on my face. is it normal for a single individual to be such a dichotomous, fragmented mess? i think it might be.
each year, i undergo a lot of drastic changes. maybe this isn't twenty-one. maybe, instead, this is just a new day. maybe today is no more of a "birth" day than any other. |
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| (no subject) |
[Jan. 10th, 2007|02:08 am] |
| [ | soul |
| | there's whiskey in my belly | ] |
| [ | body |
| | the arcade fire, "this must be the place (naive melody)" | ] |
my eyelashes are growing quicker than my fingernails
and my head is dripping with dew
january the tenth
and sunlight deprivation is striking, full force
i've tried popping, but vitamin d don't do shit
homework, credit card payments, phone calls: none of them feel like life
so i continue to ignore them, shoving into peripheral vision |
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| anything for now |
[Dec. 21st, 2006|07:05 pm] |
| [ | body |
| | beirut, "scenic world" | ] |
i have been on a writing binge since seven this morning. plucking the notes of the keyboard, smearing graphite to paper. my head throbs incessantly with each formation of alphabet soup. my brain resists my efforts to turn it into machine.
but wow. words cannot describe how relieving it is to finally show signs of productivity.
i might end up failing a class, for the first time ever.
i might end up switching majors. in mid-junior year, which would be crazy.
tell myself that recuperation awaits. lick my wounds. make myself feel whole again. |
|
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| (no subject) |
[Dec. 15th, 2006|07:37 am] |
| [ | body |
| | liars, "it fit when i was a kid" | ] |
forty milligrams of ritalin and it can not be coincidence that summer is dawning
but the hair is a grease monkey and the breath is stagnant (honorable mention goes to blemished skin)
i would like to dip and swirl my fingers in red paint and sit underneath a tree with you
and create and create and create and
this week was accentuated by despondency day in day out
right now it is clear that negative energy can be redirected but i need to discover a method that is not contingent on stimulants and flower essences and sweet coconut thai tea
atoms. cells. tissue.: is this me and what does it mean? if we break ourselves up into the barest components then are we all superfluous? if so, is this comforting? |
|
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| destroy all dreamers |
[Oct. 29th, 2006|08:33 pm] |
| [ | soul |
| | eventually | ] |
| [ | body |
| | The Mountain Goats, "Get Lonely" | ] |
I want to eat Halloween candy until my mouth forgets how to chew
And rake up a pillow of leaves and dive into it face first.
And then my friends will come over and we'll paint the walls with our emotions
One will be smoldering embers and one will be plaster green.
And then we'll look at each other nodding when one of us says "This is what life is about."
But instead I must try to clean up what others perceive as "a mess",
Like the homework I never turned in
And the career I've neglected to discover.
These others say, "No. This is what life is about;
You have it all wrong because you're still very much a child."
"Maybe," I reply, "but at least I'm not a boring ole sonuvabitch." |
|
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| (no subject) |
[Oct. 18th, 2006|11:25 pm] |
| [ | body |
| | Sigur Rós, "Svo Hljótt" | ] |
Cleaning up one's own vomit is a thoroughly cathartic experience;
I whole-heartedly recommend it to everyone.
In all seriousness, I'm starting to feel a new appreciation for mistakes (both whiskey-induced and otherwise).
These past few weeks have been saturated in self-destructive tendencies;
I think sometimes I just need to sink to the absolute bottom so that I can pick myself up off of my sorry ass and give life another shot.
And anyway, regret is pointless. The past is over and done with.
No regrets. |
|
|
| neverevereverdid |
[Oct. 11th, 2006|01:28 am] |
| [ | soul |
| | lemon poppyseed | ] |
| [ | body |
| | Mice Parade, "Obrigado Saudade" | ] |
To further avoid my creative writing assignment, I am writing a blog (creatively?).
Logic's never been my strong suit.
Not sure how these things come to be, but I discovered a folded piece of paper crammed into the ridge of one of my walls.
As I tried to fork it out, my imagination ran wild with wolves. The anticipation caused my fingers to grow more clammy and oafish following each failed attempt.
What could it be?
An intimate page of someone's diary, brutal and heart-wrenching in its sincerity?
Century-old dialogue between two star-cross'd lovers?
A solution? The solution?
I tried using a pencil. Then a pair of scissors. And then the tiny metal swords from my incense burner.
This is not me being responsible. This is me being silly, and I know it.
I should be writing that memoir, due tonight. I should be defining my life, telling them what I'm all about.
What am I all about?
My eyes feel sunken in. And static flows through my head. Because it's sleep that is always sacrificed in these pointless endeavors.
I feel like a post-Halloween pumpkin, all rind and no seeds.
Maybe that's what I'm all about.
Von suggests bending a coathanger, and so a coathanger I try.
And I'm not sure how these things come to be, but it works.
The revolutionary secrets, preserved for so long in my wall, are revealed.
I hold my breath. Unfold.
I suppose it is a love letter of sorts, but not the type I was hoping for.
Coated like a magazine cover, with a coupon at the bottom.
It tells of the many varieties of Smart Care Supplements -- from Protegra Antioxidant to Stresstabs Menopause.
Hailing their effectiveness. Their vitality.
All I say is "Oh" and I'd be lying if I said I didn't expect this. I wonder if I should have just left the relic in the wall.
I could put it back.
Or maybe instead, I could write this all down, fold it up, and stick it in that lonely ridge.
Maybe this is what I'm all about. |
|
|
| you're quite a quiet domino, bury me now |
[Sep. 29th, 2006|10:24 pm] |
| [ | soul |
| | could be anything | ] |
| [ | body |
| | Wilco, "Yankee Hotel Foxtrot" | ] |
twenty one hundred hours and counting
Waiting for commencement of the hullabaloo.
spitfire and sour mash, you know the routine
My bicycle is dying, I fear
a death most gruesome.
Pedaling elicits the sound of robot lovers on ecstasy.
breathe, goddamn you, breathe
Um. Let's talk about the weather,
the way that strangers in replicated awkwardness do
It's cold but not arctic
the leaves are crisping and red and yellow
and school's not great But I'm glad the summer's over;
that shit was a little too much to handle.
exhibit A: isolation from friends
exhibit B: getting kicked in the schnoz by a bipolar nine year-old
C? my parents finding the journal I kept freshman year of college and (without consent) reading it
and last but not least, exhibit D: a man and his chainsaw fraternizing with my site of employment
(I kid you not but he wore no mask)
good riddance departure |
|
|
| nothing but green lights |
[Sep. 25th, 2006|03:18 am] |
| [ | body |
| | grizzly bear, "horn of plenty" | ] |
The boy was tracing the cracks in the pavement with his bicycle tires.
"I don't want to build around this mediocrity anymore," he said.
He watched the stars stare back silently in that noncommittal way of theirs.
In actuality, several of the stars did answer back. But the artificial luminescence of the city hid them from sight, and as a result, their words of wisdom went unnoticed by the boy.
After circling around a deserted Target parking lot round number seven, he pedaled to an apartment complex.
Thirty stories high. Maybe even more.
Everything so quantitative.
Two dozen windows still aflame, even at this time of hour.
In his mind, he tried to picture the occupants of those rooms. What they were doing. What they had done.
And then he waited. The boy wasn't sure what for; perhaps he was waiting to be swept off his feet (or in this case, his bicycle). Metaphorically. Literally. He was open to either or.
His hands curled up in the sleeves of his sweatshirt as he watched one of the windows go dark.
And then the boy and his bicycle, feeling like phantoms of the night, drove back home. |
|
|
| I am Jack's complete lack of surprise |
[Feb. 1st, 2006|02:49 am] |
| [ | soul |
| | thirsting for a forty | ] |
My biological clock has been scrambled, fried, souffléd.
I have become accustomed to the foolish belief that "sunlight" is equivalent to "intimate bonding time with pillow."
Tomorrow morning will be painful. Oh yes indeed. The kind of pain one feels while pissing on an electric fence, the kind of pain that is entirely attributed to one's own idiocy.
The time has come for Grindstone's return.
Together we will tackle the new semester, hand in hand (or nose in rock).
The hodgepodge of a lineup includes:
*Modern Philosophy: From Descartes to Kant
*Creative Writing
*Seminar in Buddhism
*Biodiversity and Conservation Biology
This list of random classes further verify the fact that I have absolutely not a clue what I'm doing with my life.
As a child, I was thoroughly (albeit naively) convinced that I could achieve anything. I could be a doctor. A successful writer. A goddamn acrobat.
And now I'm not sure I can be anything at all.
I've explored field after field, looking for "something that fits", looking for something that accurately defines who I am as a person. First it was Psychology. Then it was Global Studies. The most recent is English.
But let's not kid ourselves. I am not the next Kurt Vonnegut, not the next E. E. Cummings. English is not for me.
I am a hybrid (half-man half-boy) who is lost, confused, and obligated to declare a major within the next few months.
I'm tempted to do something rash and impulsive, such as move to India or retreat into the forest. But then what?
Answer me this and I will owe you my life. |
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Oct. 22nd, 2005|09:21 pm] |
| [ | soul |
| |  wistful | ] |
| [ | body |
| | "S8er Boi" (profusely leaking out of Koome's headphones) | ] |
As it nears Halloween, I find myself feeling overwhelmingly nostalgic.
When I was a youngster, my parents (especially my mom) would always make a momentous occasion out the impending holiday.
We would stretch fake cobwebs from the house's adjacent brick walls;
In the days afterward, I would place the plastic spiders on my sister's bed (in an attempt to scare the shit out of her).
We also had life-sized wall decorations: sneering witches, looming Frankensteins, grinning ghosts.
When I was alone, I could feel their beady eyes penetrating my every move.
My mom made snacks out of our jack-o-lanterns' innards (pie and roasted pumpkin seeds)
And feverishly prepared costumes.
My sister always wanted to be a pink-attired princess (except for the year she was Pocahontas).
For my own garb, I liked a little more of a variety (ie. pirate, skeleton, space alien).
I remember how, on the 31st of October,
My mom would nickname grapes "eyeballs" and french fries "witches' fingers"
And she would play "The Monster Mash" on the loud-speakers.
And I remember the year I slammed my hand in the car door while trick-or-treating, too excited to even care.
Now
Halloween is just like every other day of the year.
If I went to class dressed like a scary monster, people would laugh.
I have to keep reminding myself that my childhood is long gone.
Still
I wish I was sipping on some warm apple cider
And watching creepy horror movies while cuddling next to a special someone,
A warm blanket wrapped around our legs.
Maybe, if I promise to avoid reminiscing about Christmas this year,
Baby Jesus or Santa Clause (have your pick) will grant me this wish |
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Oct. 22nd, 2005|10:35 am] |
| [ | body |
| | George Harrison, "My Sweet Lord" | ] |
Today brings with it many possibilities. I could . . .
Study Chinese with great fervor
Eat some brunch
Listen in on as people rehash their drunken Friday night escapades
Roll around in the crunchy Autumn leaves
Snap some photos, digital camera-style
Curl up in my bed and take a nap
Rock out to some good music
Or maybe I could do it all.
Who needs to be a speed junkie when you get an adequate amount of sleep?
(that being 17 hours; yesterday I went comatose at four in the afternoon)
This week was horrible. But it's Saturday, and none of that matters anymore. |
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Oct. 17th, 2005|07:23 pm] |
| [ | body |
| | Fiona Apple, "Not About Love" | ] |
When I roll my tongue over their enamel jaggedness
My teeth taste like coffee grounds
Today was characterized by many naps --
Four, to be exact.
And you know what, I might just take another one.
It feels wonderful to surrender one's self
To swirling abstraction.
Turns out that I scored three letter grades better
Than I thought I would on my Spanish test.
What a pleasant surprise, especially considering that
I was thoroughly convinced I would be seeing a large red F
Still
While admiringly ambitious, enrolling in Spanish and Chinese at the same time was a foolish decision.
Chinese, in particular, is swiftly kicking my ass
I have to memorize forty-one figures tonight;
Sounds like a job for Ritalin, my modern day superhero.
And
As crazy as it may seem, I'm looking into taking Hindi next semester.
I might be setting myself up for a nervous breakdown.
Time will tell.
A portly man in a gray checkered vest gave me a pamphlet today,
Entitled Are You Good Enough to go to Heaven?
It presented a self-test, and I failed on every single account.
Basically meaning that I have a "table for one" reserved in the land of fire.
I find it irritating that Christianity essentially views me as a hopeless case, hell-bound.
But I'm rapidly learning to accept it. |
|
|
| (no subject) |
[Sep. 25th, 2005|05:24 am] |
| [ | soul |
| |  amused | ] |
| [ | body |
| | Velvet Underground, "Stephanie Says" | ] |
The last 36 hours have been wonderfully fortuitous
Key events include:
An intense game of Capture the Flag
Unsuccessfully attempting to track down some salvia divinormum (a perfectly legal, psychoactive herb)
A late-night exploration of a dark and empty, supposedly-haunted church
Walking around the Walker sculpture garden, all the while being pummeled by the pouring rain
Warm apple cider at a downtown cafe
Chuckling at the endearing corniness of Batman (the old-school version)
I can honestly say that this has been one of my most enjoyable weekends at Hamline |
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soul_meets_body's journal