Today is my thirty-fifth birthday. I’m sitting on the balcony of the Mutiny Hotel looking out onto the ocean. O.J. Simpson is staying here. Mary Alice’s Uncle Brian struck up a conversation with him down at the bar earlier today. There have also been sightings of little people, lesbians, Cubans, –a real change of pace from white-bread Lexington. Lucinda’s and Chris’s wedding was nice, and I enjoy Mary Alice’s family very much. Grandfather Scott gave a hilarious toast last night, something about bumble bees and birth control and sons of b’s. He truly amazes me. Such a dignified man. I hope he can be with us in May for our wedding. Maybe it’s because it’s my birthday, or perhaps it’s the tropical breeze blowing through, but I can feel the current of my life flowing ever onward. This evening it’s back to Lexington, then back to work, then back to New York for a visit, then the wedding in May, always forward, always onward. Frequent change of perspective is healthy for me, I think. Is there really so far to go before I can just be here?
Archive for November, 2005
Friday afternoon and I’m spent from an extra-long jam session. Just me, sitting and strumming in this very chair in front of this very desk, but a jam session just the same. I’ll be making an unscheduled appearance at work this evening, taking over for Larry for a few hours while he watches his daughter perform in a dance recital. I couldn’t refuse such a request, although I did leave no stone unturned attempting to find some other sucker to do it. Whenever I have a thought like, “Shit I have to go back into work already” I get a sick feeling in my guts and I want to scream like all holy hell. The clock and the calendar are nothing but handcuffs and shackles to me. It’s a pickle I’ve never been able to wiggle out of. Reminds me of playing “run the bases” in the side lot as kid. I used to put myself in a “pickle” intentionally, just to make the game more interesting. I was usually the oldest one of the bunch and athletic to boot, and no matter how severely I handicapped myself I never could fully contain my drive to come out on top. I would always win at everything. Even in competition with others my own age, I was a natural winner. The fastest, the smartest, the best. The major exception being, of course, the one thing that mattered most to me–the realm of romance. I never held a hand, stole a kiss, much less got a handful until I was nineteen and in college. Even then I was an awkward, anxious sac of self-consciousness void of confidence. Only now, ten days shy of my thirty-fifth birthday, am I beginning to feel truly confident and comfortable with the opposite sex. Looking back at the course of my development, it strikes me as highly significant that I was continually frustrated in my efforts to attain that which I most yearned for. Moreover, I felt paralyzed really, to do anything about it. The more a prayed for the zits to go away, the more numerous and hideous they’d become. When my time finally came and Ann-Marie whispered in my ear “do you want to feel inside me?”–well, I was so overwhelmed with joy I’d do anything to stay inside. These days I’m discovering what seekers of all stripes stumble upon if they’re fortunate enough–that getting what you want does not extinguish the flames of discontent for long. I yearn as achingly as ever, only now I’m not sure exactly what for or how to go about getting it. Enlightenment? Peace of mind? I’m not even sure what these things mean.
[Addendum: I was involved in a car accident on my way to work on this night. Traffic stopped suddenly on Richmond Road. I was barely able to stop short of the car in front of me. I was slammed from the rear, which whip-lashed me pretty hard. Mary Alice's car was totaled.]
Walking around the neighborhood yesterday my mind became open and receptive in a peculiar way, creating a state in which my imagination sparked, caught fire and spread in all directions. Once again “the book” began to write itself in my head and I cursed myself for not having a recorder handy. It’s been a long while since I’ve been graced with such an experience. As my mind began to contract in its typical compulsive fashion, grasping to hold on to the content of my thoughts, I reminded myself that the thread is always there, right beneath my feet, and the specific thoughts and images aren’t really important to remember. The feel, the vibe of the moment, is the thing to be impressed and remembered. After a day of work and a fitful night’s sleep, it’s all a forgotten dream. Fuck! The taste of strong coffee mingles with my sour morning breath and I’m listening to the rain rattle and the computer buzz and I’m straining to feel that creative pulse move the juices on down the line. Yesterday the sun was shining and the leaves were falling and who wouldn’t be cracked open and left dizzy floating in the wonder of it all. There was something about catching that first leaf that put me into a realignment of sorts. A shift in my attention that allowed me to see something I’d been ignoring for months now. Life, Goddammit! If I’m going to forget something all the time why can’t it be the inevitability of death, or the hopeless state of the world? Why is it I can’t remember all those profound and wonderful thoughts from yesterday’s walk, but the theme song to “Friends” (which I hate!) can echo around in my skull for days. Anyway, the thread. Right here under my feet, eh? Wait! No, that was just a piece of the coffee mug I dropped on the floor the other day. I should have swept more thoroughly.
Spent a lot of time reorganizing my old emails and word files these past few days. I’m not sure why I’m so hung up on preserving and reliving the past. I know I’m a nostalgic son of a gun and it may be I’m reacting to that ugly sense of being “35.” Then again, I’ve intended for a long time now to get my files in order so that I might pick up that red thread again and maybe run with it a little this time. I don’t know. Called my brother yesterday to wish him a happy birthday. As usual there was a sense of awkwardness. He seems pretty burned out, and I heard a touch of shame in his voice, as if he knows I know he knows he’s burned out. Of course, I’m no better off. I keep reminding myself how wonderful it is to be here with Mary Alice — and it is truly wonderful. I somehow managed to get just what I always hoped for in a relationship, and if not for that fact I’d no doubt be spending every ounce of energy trying to find it somewhere. So now what? Well, who the fuck knows. I know that I will go to work tomorrow afternoon and do my best to stay awake and aware and to help the kids and all that. I’m also trying to get back into some healthful habits, like writing and dancing. I keep going round and round in some sort of cycle, learning the same lessons again and again and then forgetting them. Maybe there’s a spiraling upward, some sort of progress on some level. Time passes and memories get stretched out and fuzzy at the edges. The forgetful periods seem to be getting longer, the epiphanies more fleeting and less intense. I keep getting the sense that I’m letting things slip away too far from my grasp. I just never seem to follow through in a way that’s called for during those periods of clarity. Well fuck, I’m not gonna figure all this shit out tonight. A little Tropic of Capricorn maybe and then the bed.
Yesterday I ran around the park trying to catch falling leaves, and people seemed to think I was out of my mind. I fucking laid out with a fully extended dive to catch my first leaf, and I instantly felt better than I have in weeks.
At the moment, this is how I understand my life:
What I’m aware of and how I respond to that awareness are both shaped and conditioned by social conventions. Every now and again my awareness expands beyond my conditioning and inspires a response that will take me further into unknown territory. To the extent that I inhibit these spontaneous responses, I stay locked within the confines of the status quo and my conditioning. I cease to grow and my sense of vitality is dulled. When I allow myself to move into new spaces and pay attention to what happens, I feel increasingly more alive. When I feel like I’m growing and changing, life seems worth the rocky ride. When I recoil in fear and cling to the familiar, the price I pay is my vitality, my sense of life itself.