The Blood
(flows)
Life - on the whole - is going well.
Maybe that's why I haven't written. Pigeon in the Sun's greatest fault is her inability to write anything when things are well. This is different than being unable to write something happy; it's just that if the overall situation is good, you can expect shockingly longer wait times for posts, shorter posts when they are written, and generally a lack of the kind of molten power that suffuses some of her work. Hey, they can't all be bombshells. But the trend persists.
Maybe that's what's happening here.
It's odd - I feel strangely... disconnected. This is how I felt when my grandpa died. This is also how I felt - often - when my Aunt Linda died. Strangely disconnected, like everything that I lived and watched and saw was a play, a dress rehearsal for the real thing. This didn't matter. It wasn't real. I don't know what that says about me. A coping mechanism, I believe. That makes sense; but then, what am I coping with now?
When confused about my own internal motivations, I have always been able to count on my dreams to lead the way. They lead me down paths that wind and trail, through sea road overloooks and red-gold forests so thick with unwanted memories that they pile around you like the snows of a decade past. But they all eventually lead me to my heart.
I wrote down one of my dreams in detail here once. The result was so terrifying I've never done it again. For someone who occasionally prides himself on the strength of his creativity and innovation, it is terrifying to see what it can do in a realm where it is the sole master, and is not bound by the realms of my conscious or subject to its overarcing authority. My dreams are much more real, for that reason; the unvarnished truth, whether I like it or not.
I dream of people.
I dream of everyone, eventually; why I have a constant track of dreams that involve others that I know in my life, I do not know. Perhaps the storyteller in my muse perfers vivid characters to tell its story, like an artist would prefer the best paints for her canvas.
For an optimistic person, my dreams are amazingly equal in tone. 50% of my dreams are what one would call 'good'. Things generally happen to the benefit of the characters involved; tough times are usually overcome or an acceptable part of a better situation. Of those 50%, 5% of those dreams are fantastic dreams, ones that I actually hurt when I realize that it is not real. These can be easy, and often reaffirm the realities I could pull out of my conscious mind, with a little effort. A dream of resting in front of the fire at Chautauqua, with different friends all cozied up on the couches, equates to how special I feel moments (and history, ambience, and happiness) are to a friendship. A dream of dying and rising to Heaven, to see the land and know that more lay ahead, equates to my fervent (faith? hope?) of an afterlife.
The other 50% are not so good. And the 5% of this group are the epic ones, the terrible ones I will always remember.
The death of my brother, and how empty the family dinner table felt, and the terrible realization that I would never wrestle with him again or throw the frisbee or watch him grow to be his own man, woke me up in a dead sweat that left me sad that I sleep alone. Some time ago, waking up from choosing to let Margaret die had me over my own toilet, head swimming, trying (failing) to get the images out of my head: her sad face, the sight of her injured body, her lack of cries. I'll never know whether 4:43 was five minutes after I was in that bathroom or five hours. Time had left a long time ago.
That dream (and its compatriot two days later, a joyous one of saving her from an onrushing bus) did some good, letting me know that there was an imbalance in myself I had to correct, something that I had to do myself. That is good. But at the time... they were very hard. Very real.
Why do I bring this up now? I don't know. Maybe because at times like that, I've never felt more connected to reality.
It's good to remember those times now.
Life is very good now. I have some money, and a great family. I work at a good job and cheer on my favorite teams. I think often of an artist in Alexandria, a firelass in New York, and a long-found friend in California. My role models are nursing in Chicago, too busy to give me the time of day in New York, and working until 11:30 in Pittsburgh and none of them know what I think of them. I know a girl who likes me that I don't care for, I like a girl who doesn't care for me, and one girl has been shooting me smiles and I have no idea what each other are reading.
That is life.
Since my heart, I've often thought of how important it was to really, truly enjoy. To cast off the reservations of society and others; to stop, even unconsciously, thinking about what others think about you; to look up into the rain and laugh and not care. Just enjoy. Just experience life.
A watched pot never boils. A life enjoyed flows slowly through the hourglass. And blood flows more slowly through the veins.
Everyone's in a headlong rush to get ahead. Silly. No matter what, all roads lead to death.
I don't mind not winning that race.
Life - on the whole - is going well.
Maybe that's why I haven't written. Pigeon in the Sun's greatest fault is her inability to write anything when things are well. This is different than being unable to write something happy; it's just that if the overall situation is good, you can expect shockingly longer wait times for posts, shorter posts when they are written, and generally a lack of the kind of molten power that suffuses some of her work. Hey, they can't all be bombshells. But the trend persists.
Maybe that's what's happening here.
It's odd - I feel strangely... disconnected. This is how I felt when my grandpa died. This is also how I felt - often - when my Aunt Linda died. Strangely disconnected, like everything that I lived and watched and saw was a play, a dress rehearsal for the real thing. This didn't matter. It wasn't real. I don't know what that says about me. A coping mechanism, I believe. That makes sense; but then, what am I coping with now?
When confused about my own internal motivations, I have always been able to count on my dreams to lead the way. They lead me down paths that wind and trail, through sea road overloooks and red-gold forests so thick with unwanted memories that they pile around you like the snows of a decade past. But they all eventually lead me to my heart.
I wrote down one of my dreams in detail here once. The result was so terrifying I've never done it again. For someone who occasionally prides himself on the strength of his creativity and innovation, it is terrifying to see what it can do in a realm where it is the sole master, and is not bound by the realms of my conscious or subject to its overarcing authority. My dreams are much more real, for that reason; the unvarnished truth, whether I like it or not.
I dream of people.
I dream of everyone, eventually; why I have a constant track of dreams that involve others that I know in my life, I do not know. Perhaps the storyteller in my muse perfers vivid characters to tell its story, like an artist would prefer the best paints for her canvas.
For an optimistic person, my dreams are amazingly equal in tone. 50% of my dreams are what one would call 'good'. Things generally happen to the benefit of the characters involved; tough times are usually overcome or an acceptable part of a better situation. Of those 50%, 5% of those dreams are fantastic dreams, ones that I actually hurt when I realize that it is not real. These can be easy, and often reaffirm the realities I could pull out of my conscious mind, with a little effort. A dream of resting in front of the fire at Chautauqua, with different friends all cozied up on the couches, equates to how special I feel moments (and history, ambience, and happiness) are to a friendship. A dream of dying and rising to Heaven, to see the land and know that more lay ahead, equates to my fervent (faith? hope?) of an afterlife.
The other 50% are not so good. And the 5% of this group are the epic ones, the terrible ones I will always remember.
The death of my brother, and how empty the family dinner table felt, and the terrible realization that I would never wrestle with him again or throw the frisbee or watch him grow to be his own man, woke me up in a dead sweat that left me sad that I sleep alone. Some time ago, waking up from choosing to let Margaret die had me over my own toilet, head swimming, trying (failing) to get the images out of my head: her sad face, the sight of her injured body, her lack of cries. I'll never know whether 4:43 was five minutes after I was in that bathroom or five hours. Time had left a long time ago.
That dream (and its compatriot two days later, a joyous one of saving her from an onrushing bus) did some good, letting me know that there was an imbalance in myself I had to correct, something that I had to do myself. That is good. But at the time... they were very hard. Very real.
Why do I bring this up now? I don't know. Maybe because at times like that, I've never felt more connected to reality.
It's good to remember those times now.
Life is very good now. I have some money, and a great family. I work at a good job and cheer on my favorite teams. I think often of an artist in Alexandria, a firelass in New York, and a long-found friend in California. My role models are nursing in Chicago, too busy to give me the time of day in New York, and working until 11:30 in Pittsburgh and none of them know what I think of them. I know a girl who likes me that I don't care for, I like a girl who doesn't care for me, and one girl has been shooting me smiles and I have no idea what each other are reading.
That is life.
Since my heart, I've often thought of how important it was to really, truly enjoy. To cast off the reservations of society and others; to stop, even unconsciously, thinking about what others think about you; to look up into the rain and laugh and not care. Just enjoy. Just experience life.
A watched pot never boils. A life enjoyed flows slowly through the hourglass. And blood flows more slowly through the veins.
Everyone's in a headlong rush to get ahead. Silly. No matter what, all roads lead to death.
I don't mind not winning that race.
Labels: Caissa, Forest Not Trees, Friendship, Reminiscing, Those Of The Feminine Persuasion
posted by Mat | 2:22 AM
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