been awhile since it's been dark

Dear Diary,
Fuck you. Needed to get some thoughts out. LA is burning and the summer is coming to a close. A vacation of sorts while still working. Not to say that I haven't been working as hard as usual. Relationships give a kind of break to the monotony of day to day life and somehow that makes it better. It takes your mind, or rather my mind, off the incessant bombardment of the things I just can't forget. Those stupid things that shape our lives into the rat race. Trying to find work you enjoy. Having to find money to pay rent. All of that and so it goes... I'm sitting here waiting to go out. As she is getting ready above my head. Today feels like a good day although I have difficulty in realizing what a good day really is and have for some time. Sounds like whining to say that and yes I do realize it. I don't know how someone could read what I write and not tell me to snap the fuck out of it. I know this isn't going to change and it never will. Fuck it. That's what makes me who I am. Another thing is that I have a blatant disregard for what anyone things when all is said and done. Bored with what I've been doing for years. Over skateboarding for just that reason. Been there. I have realized that I won't ever sacrifice my ideals although they get distorted at times. After a bit, I snap out of it and question what I'm doing. Damn the money and the consequences. If you give those things up, you begin to die. Your life begins to pass you by in a way you can't even imagine. It's difficult enough to be pleased with your life chasing your dreams and we all know the chase never ends. Your desire isn't going to one day turn to contentment. Oh, I'm happy now and I don't need anything else. If it does, you are not being truthful with yourself. So you persevere and push on as you always will.

Anti-Racist

It's usually so clear. What is right and wrong. What you do and don't do. Right now, it's not so clear. My neighbor, yes, he is Mexican. Hanging out at the pool with his children. I know he is a good father. I see him coming home from work at 6 AM. I see how his kids look at him and how they will grow up to be amazing people. How this man is the epicenter of so many lives. How the failure sister comes to stay over at 3am on so many occasions. How all his friends and all of their children depend on him for support. To recognize an amazing man is a seldom occurrence. He is my neighbor. We say hello from time to time. I wonder how he can have children and live here. But today I get it. I pictured myself exactly within his life. What an amazing life it is really. His children are safe. We have our petty bullshit but it's far from any necessity. He is a man. I really respect him although it is so far from my ideal situation. Providing a life for so many. I get angry because it intrudes on my pretty picture but I am happy to have my picture altered. At least for him. Because he is one of the good ones. The one who deserves it. And I recognize that. I wish I wouldn't be tainted by the ones who don't because he is the one who suffers.

It's a lonely life and then you accept that

The ebb and flow is so painful some days. The downs always, and I mean always, outweigh the ups. As we grow older, we distance ourselves from those we love. We move away from our families. We cut the chord. I'm burying myself and I see that. I seldom meet someone I value. I'm beginning to think it's me. I'm starting to believe that I really am alone. That I am somehow more broken than everyone else. People seem happy. Why can't I be like that? This underlying sadness consumes me. Even my happiest moments are barely covering what is underneath. I really don't know how I function. Every day, I wake up and I ask myself how I'm going to fucking do it. I pick myself up and shower. Waking transient thoughts of the worst fashion. My to-do plate picks up where it left off when I drifted into slumber. I almost never remember my dreams and I'm pretty sure most are nightmares from how I awake. A constant beating on my soul. My smile that is always a mask. I really miss my family. I miss the people who just fucking care about me. I'm not a commodity that is sitting in their phone book. When I get flooded by 15 calls that is how I feel. It's not all like that....but it really feels that way sometimes. We are just all so busy. I need a breath where I can just spend some time enjoying myself. I think photography will actually be a good outlet. I'm not that good at it and I think that's a good thing. It's not work. It's enjoyment. I have no idea where this is going so I'll stop writing. I'm just flooded and need some rest.

where I am

You just fucked someone you shouldn't have. You're thinking about someone moving away. You're trying to figure out how to interview the president because truthfully it could happen if you wanted it bad enough. You're about to turn 33. You've come so far and yet moved so far from what you believe in. You fell in love. You had your heart broken. You no longer believe that skateboarding is the end all and in most cases it seems passe. Your focus in on point. Your work is on point. You have to to meld those two and not take bullshit anymore. Money be damned as usual as it has never mattered and it will never matter.

fucking life

It's my Grandfather's birthday today. I called him to wish him a happy birthday. My grandma has bad circulation and had her leg amputated this year. I'm pretty much weeping right now. I'm talking to him and understanding how he feels. It's his birthday. He's been dealing with so much. He's fought cancer over the last year. Lost his hair and been so weak. He's an amazing...AMAZING MAN! I want him to understand how strongly I feel for him. How I cannot relate that fact because that is not him as a man. FUCK!!!!!!! And this is life. This is the strength of people we care about. And this is why I am crying right now.

wake up and scream!

No time to do laundry. Pile of clothes in the corner. One grey sock and one short white one. Ran through the last resort nice clothes. Button up shirts to mask a tired face. So surprising how one can look good on those days. Store to get beer and I know I shouldn't. The short walk to the store is the only time I have to reflect. Get some perspective on things that are happening at the current moment. The redhead in line in front of me and the loneliness on her face. The contrived smile masking discontent. Successful and yet so lacking in any life satisfaction. So apparent in the inquisitive glance in my direction. Some partial lustful desire joined with her mouth turning downward as she realizes that thought is as fleeting as her youth. The biological clock within coming to it's final hour. As her focus turns to her work, something dies in her. We're all passing one another and not seeing anything. When I'm listening to someone, I only really hear half of what they say to me. I hear it and am present, but lack the strength to give them my complete focus. I get tired of hearing myself speak because I know it's falling upon deaf ears. People waiting for something of real worth to them to actually listen. When their eyes lose the glaze and you see their face appear as their interest is keyed. This is Los Angeles in the faces of successful people. Autonomous. Distinct. I am very much one of these people right now. I am fearful what people will think of me for the first time in my life. The problem is, the people I fear don't live here.

Particles

We operate on two different wavelengths. Shooting in different directions and by chance oscillating together for a time. Coinciding in our vibrations and touching for those brief moments while emitting brilliant light between one another. Then we part, and the distance grows. The attraction pulls at us and yet our own driving force propels us along the same path. Memories fade. The doubt grows. Different schools of thought and different methods of approach. Commonality being vulnerability and the absence of stability. Questioning our validity to the other. Questioning the reciprocity of our inner feelings. When the only true fact is an apparent end. The hopes that once were, now only fleeting and becoming repressed to once again surface with someone else. When paths one again align and the light will shine oh so brightly for a short time.

Slut, Cunt, Bitch, Whore, Liar!

moving forward

I'm discontented with my current situation. I'm pushing for something that seems like it will never arrive. The long hard road becomes longer and the light seems to dim in the distance. I reflect on what I've left behind and I wonder whether the light will ever return. Time is passing quickly and each day seems like a notch in something I cannot see nor reflect upon. My cryptic verse never seems to do it justice. Neither do my unoriginal sayings as they spew from an uninspired brain. It disgusts me. I know I am a different person from who I was just a short time ago. My focus is transformed as are my intentions. I am overwhelmed by those fleeting moments of kindness that used to fill my entire soul. Perhaps this is me growing up. As Christopher Robin ceases to be the child. His childhood friends of make believe disappearing into the abyss of the human condition. Still feeling the same and overwhelmed by a naivete bombarded and then crushed under the pressures of the world. What a sad thought. Seems to make sense at the present time.

and then

Fuck. It's late. Another 16 hour day. Living in what seems to be a state of perpetual limbo. Kind of redundant I know. The ebb and flow of life through changes but the constant factors are important. Those are what take your time. Relationshit. Focusing on stupid things. I can't get it out of my head. I'm sick of it. I just want to stop thinking about it. It's fucking over. Fuck.

Devout

Our animal instinct. Our behavior and desire. The inherent willingness. Self-disgust and loathing. Shame and discontent. Projected focus on physical desire and lust. A manifestation of a commonality. A Jungian fulfillment. Verbose and stifling. Or stifling because it's verbose. A sickness within the human animal. The monkey in the corner. The junkie in the street. The darkness that simply takes over and fails to return to the light. Happenstance fed and shoulder weight embraced. Emotional waves of vanity hurled into the sickened unknown. Without name nor face, but simple focus. Disgust. For all and for self.

Holding me back

I needed to make a list of things holding me back and write it down. I figure here is as good place so I can be reminded of these things.

1. Alcohol - This one is a given. When I'm not drinking, I feel better and I have no excuse to let things slide. That's why I'm putting this one in check and have been doing so for quite some time now.
2. Undeserved Favors - I'm sick of people taking advantage of me. There are some people who deserve and reciprocate both my kindness and ability. I need to cast aside all the others. This is not in the superficial "LA" way, but in my way. I don't need someone to be able to give me something in return to help them. I do need them to want to do so. I also need them to understand and appreciate what I do for them.
3. Focus and Analyze - I need to analyze an idea completely before I just dive the fuck in. I also need to evaluate what I'm doing as things progress. If it's going nowhere, dump it. I have like 4 of these right now. They are on the way out.
4. Motivation and Movement - I need to start doing things and going place to develop the habit. I get excited about going to shoot something by myself and I don't out of laziness. This is an easy fix. Once the habit is there, the question fails to exist. I just go because that is the only option.

THE DAYS WHEN YOU FEEL ARTISTIC

CLICK ME DAMMIT!

A Poem Before Bedtime

The distant sound of rain echoing on Earth
With a soundboard gutter in the foreground
bringing focus
A swimming pool reaching capacity.
Flooding over.
Oxygen rising as everything becomes clean
Memories
False and true prophecies of the future
Flashes of light and dark
Peaceful

This one just has to come out...

All I do is think. From the time I wake until the last thought when I drift into sleep. We all do this. We never stop. We veer our focus. Distract ourselves. Drink coffee and look at passersby. Somehow, when we feel lonely, our world truly becomes our own. It's like a movie passing before our eyes. Somehow, we aren't really involved. Our relationships seem shallow and our conversations diluted. A stagnation that infiltrates every aspect of our lives. It overwhelms us and lays footing in hallowed ground. Our mortality faces us and our short time here becomes a reality for just these times. It's one of those nights when I could write for 12 hours. I won't expose you to that. At least not in this setting. I'll put that to paper. That one is coming back soon. And this is my training. Relearning my grammar and thought processes. Bringing back an education, which has been on hiatus for quite some time now. Wait, what the fuck! I was thinking about why I was heading on my current path. I realized that this is nothing new. Somehow, I've solidified this thought tonight. The downward spiral. And understanding of others through the perseverance of dire straits. A focus on how deep you can get. The Hunter S. Thompson approach. The only ones who know are the ones who have come to the line and crossed it. The problem is...they don't come back. That's the price. How many cliches do you want? Ignorance is bliss. I feel like I always write varying degrees of the same subjects and I definitely do so. It all goes back to wanting to be a child again. To disregard all this bullshit and just be happy for a little while because existence is just very sad and lonely. Most of the time. The human condition. I know that someday this will change for me. At least I hope I will be given that chance again. I am such a realist that I won't accept anything but what I see in my mind. Not the fairy tale dream but the reality of what I want. I am not looking for the perfect girl. The perfect job. The perfect anything. I am looking for what is perfect to me. That perfect thing is mostly work but all happiness. This is where I am. Seriously, I need to write more. I have 50 subjects in my mind all screaming to get out. I used to write an hour a day. Meditate for an hour a day. Where will I find those two hours these days? I'm finding the time now. This song, playing now, marked the end of one my relationships. And now I reflect. This is not the picture if you were thinking that. Just the motivation. This picture points out so many things about me you don't even know. That's why it's there right? This experience was like a solemn end filled with emotion to a passing of something that should not pass. Forever lasting and still ending. We both knew that. This is like all things. They all end. This one was at my discretion and my stupid actions to amplify pain as I have always done. My asshole part coming out because of all those things that I remember and store in my mind. My pain vindicated in some childish manner. That's enough for now.

Voice Recorder

I need a voice recorder. I had to write it. I could put three pages into what will now take me 20 minutes of scrambled fumbling. Rethinking my spelling and grammar. Mazzy Star helps loads in my ears. We go through these phases. These cycles of human interaction. So many of us are distracted for the entirety of our lives. There is no quiet time for self reflection. We have a constant stimulus of people that remains our distraction. We visit these rare periods when we are alone. Alone for the duration. That spawns our thought and ideas of who we truly are. That really makes us who we are. It's the experience that we live but it's the coming home that lets us reflect on what we've learned. Without the reflection, we are simply pushing on and autonomous. The experience is never really incorporated. With too much reflection, like what I'm living now, and to be truthful how I always live, you become secluded. You lose the ability to relate to others. The sound of others seems somehow foreign. It seems abrasive. Children laughing becomes an annoyance. You are picturing the elderly in your mind at this moment. These people, disconnected from family and bitter from life, give up and fade away. Like the dependent spouse, who dies because her companion fails to exist anymore. I hate my focus on myself. I hate reverting back to this every time. When all you do is think in this manner, you can't help but relate to how you can grow from what you are presented with. I relate to everyone and every fucking experience. Vicarious living and a daydream. We age. We understand more. How heavy the weight on our shoulders if we get to that old age. What the fuck was I talking about? Yeah, seclusion. These artists that both you and I revere. Their lives were fucking horrific. That's what spawns creation. Pain. Loneliness. Inability to relate and a necessary escape to something that makes sense. Dropping off the deep end is the only thing that ever gets you there. If you're in the middle of interest rates and blah blah blah....you're not pushing anything. The abyss is the only place for creativity. The loss of thought and a real step out of anything you know. That's the only time I've ever been at my best. A delirium that only arrives after a 24 hour period of sleep deprived panic. I've hear this described as a scapegoat and an easy target for a foolish focus of an inferior mind. Somehow, this process became a failure. You wake up and take another look and it's not good anymore. This is not the truth. A statement presented to us through storytellers and not artists. With all we know, we have to discard most of it. It's presented to us as fact and really is bullshit. Look at a history book and talk to a scholar. That's our whole fucking life! In our time, this always brings up Putin as an example. A president, a murderer, a gangster, a world figure. This is the whole of our history. Diluted by politics and tainted by those who chose what would survive. This is continuing. Now it's flooded but all the same a hundred years from now. We will value those who tell us the truth and it will be a few within a lifetime. Do you know anyone who you can trust to tell you the truth about what is happening? Michael Moore? Still slanted...way slanted. Does anyone but me think about how our history is really becoming lost at an exponential state? Newspapers and books are being cast aside as a dictionary is established by anyone who wants to write. Add to it. No problem. Subscriptions are required for any legal knowledge and court cases affecting our every day life. I search for fact and I am presented with a flood of useless information that I can't trust. So what do I do? I entertain myself out of frustration and am pacified by the result. Instead of writing something worthwhile, I look at stupid photos. I really would like to quote a blog (hate that fucking word) in MLA format. Should I cite the date or the image header with the "that's what she said" picture from "The Office" professor? This is progression? I am really worried about the next decade. I said the same about the last and look what has happened. Our history is being lost and no one seems to give a fuck. Everyone is scrambling and fighting and all truth is just going away. You can't trust our government. You can't trust reliable sources (at all now) who have existed for over a century. And yet I'm complaining. I guess I should try and do something about it. I guess I can take over Newscorp right.

AND THEN?

This is part 2 to the one below. Had to go buy a bottle of Sanvgiovese. And then...back to it. The neighbors are fucking failures. It's like a life gone wrong in LA. That should be a show. Divorcees and unhappy couples just basically waiting to die. The decrepit prostitute from long ago who walks her arthritic dogs down the avenue. The recently rewarded trophy wife with the new Lexus who is content because she is quite simply free and rich. And yet she lives here. I guess this is her idea of "modest living." I think you might be getting the picture of how disgusted I am by the basic idea of life here. I'm talking about this entire city by the way. Like an alien life form trying to fit into a mold that undefined. Twisting and turning without reason. Race and ideals without any real definition. No unifying morality or religion. And yet, it's so damn interesting even though I can't relate in my wildest dreams. It's like a Niche experiment in how life can sustain with just one common ideal...survival. Everyone hates each other but things still somehow push on. An inept and somewhat homicidal police force to keep the peace. Better in the (insert rich white word here) areas. And this feeds a focus but yet brings about no real change. It simply continues. It makes no progress. Segregation by choice. Mexico exists here. Korea exists here. Armenia exists here. More Armenians here than in Armenia. That is the truth. The book is beginning. It is solidifying in my mind. I am going to buy a Holga this week. Video would never do it justice but will play it's part. A project, the one I've been thinking about since I was a child, will come to fruition soon. Spending years, as I do, just trying to make sense of it all. It's the idea at the end of the road that I'm trying to realize. I catch a glimpse in the beginning and spend years putting into some form that can be understood. That is my process. This one is a big one. Maybe the most meaningful of my life. While the fire is still intact. While my disgust still has angst and has yet to turn to sadness and apathy. This, what I've been writing about here, will be one chapter. It will also be an underlying theme to the entirety of this work. Maybe the main theme. I can't believe it's taken me this long to understand that fact. I really could write all night right now and maybe I will but not here.

Dinner For One

I made dinner tonight for just myself. I went to the store and shopped with my ipod. I hate the shopping experience. Children and shopping carts. People trying to maneuver in an environment while preoccupied by all the pretty sights. Staring at signs and looking for soap in the bread aisle. Running into each other on purpose. Looking for some contact. It's so much easier to dodge and choose the aisle with no one. I bought all my ingredients. My hand held cart became rather heavy as I failed to anticipate that I needed oil and balsamic along with other necessary household items. My pocketbook did the same. I forgot that my taste is expensive. When I got home, I realized that I would be doing a night alone with pasta. A good sauce takes a long time and it's a rather lonely experience. A good bottle of wine did help. White wine...blasphemy. Damn you, Brian! Penne Arrabbita. Oil and balsamic brought be back to a better time though. For some reason, cooking reminds me of my worth. It reminds of my past experiences and how warm life can be. I remember friends and discussions and a time of normality with people who are more intelligent and civilized than anyone I spend time with at the present time. There is no way I convey everything about what I miss in this journal. How these people are amazing, normal, completely abnormal, geniuses, and just plain amazing. They fuel everything I need on with my quest for the abnormal and yet support me with everything within their power. They are completely fucked up and I can trust them and rely on them. I think everything I write is about people. How I am so far from where I want to be. I meet one person per year I can even fucking hang with. Fuck you sentence ending with a preposition! There's a bunch. I walk by my neighbors, and quite frankly, they should just shoot themselves. It should be illegal to raise children in an apartment complex. Is this fucking normal! And then, you decide to have two more? I guess this is why my neighbor works nights. I'm sure he sees his children at their best and the rest of time he just doesn't have to deal with it. As he's a heavy sleeper with the cousin pounding at the door at 3am because there is no reason to make an extra key. I pass the elderly apartments with the doors open because they just wish they had something to stimulate them besides the television. Like the regular at the supermarket up the street who everyone knows by name. As he walks the aisles and stops the shoppers to tell them jokes. "You must have been such a player", the checker says. His jovial way brings about a discomfort as one can't just walk away because he's just lonely, and who knows, maybe that could be me one day. And I wonder just how much time he spends there. Is this man in every market? What happened to bring him to this? Was this a stroke or heart attack that made him get out again? Without anything to focus on so he just chose a place with a regular cycle of people that would laugh and smile at him? Fuck, that's sad. This is going to turn into a novel. I'm going for more alcohol for sure. (Laughs).

Get it out

Watched "Control" today about the story of Joy Division. There's a part that always rings strong with me regarding what he wrote about performing. About giving all that he had an how it exhausted him. I relate to that point. It's funny and sad at the same time how I relate and compare myself to people like this. I've been very self reflective lately and trying to decide where I want to focus the current direction of my life. How I'm really sick of being exploited and used. I walk softly but I don't really have a big stick that I'm carrying. Yes, I realize the sexual connotation of that statement. I constantly have to remind myself of who I am and that I don't want to change in many ways. I'm struggling with so much right now. The feelings that I hold onto for far longer than I should. This hope that just doesn't go away. It remains when my brain has moved on. It's those times when you wish you could cut your heart out for a spell and just breathe. Stop thinking. I hate this part. We all do I think. When you watch a distance build until any closeness is gone. What a sad statement.