Bengali

I think I've paid my dues. I hope I have. First world problems aside, they're all I've known so I'm comfortable in saying that.

I'm feeling strange tonight. My skin doesn't fit quite right. I know why and yet I want to say I don't know why.

I don't know what to make of this thing called "life". It's bizarre. It's a bit unsettling. I'm aware that the ever changing rules cannot apply and yet I try my best to apply them.

Sometimes I feel like the goldfish that you took out of the bowl. You didn't do it to watch it struggle, you just did it to watch it live. You had no idea that the act of taking it out of that bowl doomed it.

I just don't know what my bowl is. For the life of me, I don't know who took me out of the one I had.

Maybe it was Me.

I can betroth my experiences in this life to you but it will not change what you endure. It can only enhance your interpretation of endurance by way of what your old Man recalled at this moment in time, in this one place we inhabit.

People will forget what you said. They most certainly will eventually forget what you did. But I swear to you, above all, this one thing. They will never forget how you made them feel.

That's all they carry with them. That's every one's After.

This world is an inconvenient train station where we're all jostling for position on the platform. If I could give you any bit of sound advice it would be to not buy a ticket. Just hop the fence, blend in with the crowd & when no one is looking... hijack that son of a bitch.

Ride it to where the winds cannot recall your name. There you'll find freedom. There you'll find truth. There you'll find your own After. That's what we're all looking for... as it were.

And always Talk Hard.

Even in Bengali.

New Year

Today we slayed a dragon, sat upon his nose, scoffed at the bitter winds whipping our faces & smiled through it all just for spite.

It was a good way to send 2011 on its way.

Watch out, 2012. We're badasses.

This is not about Music

Life is a lot like a set list. You hammer it out with your friends, coming to grips with what you think will or won't sound good to those listening, and then you go out and do it.

Most of the time the first song is OK. There might be a few hiccups in the road but you muscle on through. You know you're not quite up to hitting those high notes or slamming that down beat hammer, but it's all good. You can fake your way through the hard parts. Sure enough, by the fifth tune, you're in your groove. You know exactly where this show is going to go.

Eventually you hit the intermission. Nobody ever wants to hit an intermission but we all expect it. People need a bit of a break, as it were.

When you start the second half of the set it all seems so foreign. Alien, even. The oscillation isn't quite oscillating as you intended. The waves are crashing more than they are flowing. It's a bitch.

You chalk it up to the fact that you're playing someone else's shit. If you were playing your own, well, you'd probably be just fine. That's how you rationalize it. It's uncomfortable. It's a bit annoying. It's embarrassing to say the least.

Then it hits you. You might be playing someone else's shit... but you're the one playing it. That makes it your shit for that brief moment in time. See, people don't really care who they see singing what they want to hear. They only care that what they hear sounds like who they want to see singing.

It's in that moment that you give every ounce of yourself to make it worthy of a smile. Ears fade. Thoughts fade. Smiles linger.

You just make sure you realize that when the stage goes dark and when all the pretty women & men have gone home, the only sibling left to the ringing in your ears is the gentle acceptance that for once, and possibly, the only time in your life... you played.

It's your show in the end. Make it a good one.

This is not about Music.

A Breath & A Memory

For the first 34 years of my life I was obsessed with Things. I wanted to acquire them. I wanted to own them. I wanted to present them to anyone who might want to question whether I had any Thing.

I worked so hard to make money so that I could spend that money and populate my life with the possessions that money bought me. I upgraded from a trailer to a small house and then to a bigger house. I put as many things as I could into each. I stuffed those homes full with all I could. I choked them.

When you two came along, I doubled my efforts. I acquired as much as I could. I put every toy available into your rooms. I put every color I could imagine on your walls. I put every article of clothing that was fashionable on your bodies.

"Fashionable". I'm so very ashamed of that now.

When the world turned to shit and I knew that my life had not only hit a speed bump, but that the speed bump I'd hit had indeed dislodged my ride from the road, I gave it all away.

All of the furniture, all of the clothing, all of the toys left behind. Even that big house. I gave it all Away.

Looking back, I could have made so much money by selling those things. I could have secured myself with a better foundation for the "beginning again" that I was to endure. Yes, I could have done that.

I'm so glad I did not.

I've never owned anything I wasn't willing to part with and not lose sleep over having done so, since then. The true irony though is that we never really own anything. It's all just fodder. It's all just placement. It's all just distraction. It's all a mirage.

The only things you truly own are a breath and memory. The last two possessions you'll ever hold in this Thing we call life.

The last two possessions worth having at all.

Lost

 
When I first moved to your hometown, I was an alien.

I didn't know where I was, where I was going, or where I might end up. But I did know who I was and what I could do.

It used to piss your Mom off so much, but long before you two were born I would talk her into taking rides with me every Saturday morning. Long rides into wherever we ended up. Journeys.

She always told me I was insane. She was probably right.

We would get in the truck and follow asphalt. It really didn't matter where it led nor where it intended to lead us. We would find roads, lanes, valleys, highways, anything really. We would just drive.

I especially loved it in the Fall. With the windows down and the early morning sun snaking its way across the road, it always felt like goodness. Seeing people living their lives in their front yards. Getting stuck behind an old farmer on his tractor who waved at you when you sped up to pass him on a straight stretch. These were, are still, and will forever be... good things.

I've always done that. I still do. I always will.

I'll tell you a secret that most folks would never admit... sometimes you have to get lost to figure out where in the hell you actually are.

Always go and find where you're going. Never wait for where you're going to come and find where you are.

It helps to be lost, actually. So get there.

My Eyes

I spent a lot of time being afraid of what might come. Far too much time, honestly. I masked that fear with a saying that I stole from a film. "So Be It". I owned it, used it, abused it, and eventually believed it.

Thank God that I did.

I am not old enough nor experienced enough to tell you everything you'll ever need to know. I am not wise enough nor patient enough to give you the insight you'll need to get by. But I pretend I am and I pretend I am. I think that's what matters.

Those things you'll end up worrying about, do not really matter. Those things you'll lose sleep over, do not really exist. They're all mechanisms we use within our own minds to make our lives seem worthwhile. They're tactics we employ to convince ourselves that we have something to figure out, to solve, to overcome. As if those solutions might somehow give us meaning.

They're tricks that we play upon ourselves to fill up our empty cups, when we have no water to pour.

You have to see the World as it truly is. You have to see it as a dysfunctional machine that somehow functions.

Suspend your disbelief only long enough to understand that what you believe cannot be suspended. Who you are cannot be replicated. Who you'll be has not yet been written.

You can only change your world once you realize that no one else could ever dare change it in spite of you.

It is all about perception. That is what "So Be It" means, as it were.

It is all about what you see.

And I know what you see. You may have gotten your Mother's hair, her stature & even her disposition. You may have inherited her religion, her mannerisms & even her apathy.

I see a world full of quiet people, hopeful people, people waiting to to find an answer that has already been answered. I see a world full of people that have all of the tools and abilities it will take to save themselves and everyone they rub elbows with. I see a world so full of wonder and beauty that even blindness has to blink.

I see a world that is rich and waiting. I see a world that you see.

You do have my eyes, as it were.

So be it.

Paint

The day I left home, the room I grew up within had walls painted white.

That was due to my having sullied them in my teenage endeavors.

When your old Man was a young Man, he made everyone who came into his room write something, anything, on his wall with permanent marker. The wall meant something. It was 1992... before facebook.

You see, everyone that I ever loved or cared about picked up the stick and wrote what they felt. They wrote what they wanted to say. Unabashed, unaltered, unending. They wrote what they desperately wanted the world to know they had to say.

It was beautiful.

When I left home I had to paint over it. I had to make it presentable again. It took 3 buckets of white paint.

But you know what?

Their words are still there. Buried beneath my whitewash. Hiding beneath the roller and hours and cussing. All of their words are still there. Their sentiments are still strong. Yes, they're buried beneath a couple of coats... but that doesn't render their message obsolete. That doesn't strip them of their intent.

It just means that sometimes you have to dig a little bit to understand what a room is trying to Say.

Life is a Room.

Don't paint over what it's trying to tell you.

Oh... by the way... The greatest quote someone once wrote on that wall was simple, crude, but incredibly to the point.

"You better live life wide ass open. If you don't... you'll end up living life wide ass open."

Paint can't cover up that truth.

That Star Still Works

I'm from the Star City of the South (Google it).

If you knew how many wishes I bestowed upon that poor piece of machinery, you'd laugh.

Still... there is a sneaking part of me that believes that quiet little whispers, whispered in quiet little moments, aren't just hovering around some random mountain while quietly waiting to find a forehead to kiss or an ear to whisper into.

There is a sneaking part of me that thinks life is a little bit bigger... and smaller than that.

There is a sneaking part of me that honestly believes...

That Star Still Works.

Breathing

I want to tell you something. Something you need to hear but won't enjoy learning.

When your Mom left, over the course of that year and a half where you were shuttled back and forth, every week, to spend seven days with Me and seven days with Her, I got lonely.

I've heard it said that the nights are the toughest but that wasn't the case for me. The nights were the easy part. The mornings were the misery.

When you wake up in a house that once was a home and the rooms sit vacant and apathetic to your gaze, your mind entertains itself with all sorts of fancy. What could I have done, what could She have done, what could We have done, etc.

There is nothing more emptying to see than a child's bed unoccupied and sounds of that child vacant throughout the house when a Father wakes in the morning. It's crushing. It's absolute.

During the weeks when you were gone I would pass my evenings drinking alcohol, as much as I could hold in. It made time vanish. It made me hope. False dreams built upon a very real catalyst. Eventually, I would bid the night adieu and find rest on the couch. I never slept in the bed after your Mom left. It felt foreign to my skin.

On particularly tough mornings I would listen to Kris Kristofferson's music while I prepared for the day and fantasize about what life would not be like if I were here. The 38 that my father gave me when I moved to Georgia became a constant companion. I always had it nearby. Just waiting for that moment of acceptance, I suppose. Waiting to wave goodbye to the walls.

Obviously that moment never arrived. It tried to, I think, but I always found a reason. Two, actually.

The funny thing about a gun, something I never really knew, is that if you hold a gun without intent... it's just like holding anything else. But if you hold a gun with intent... it gets so damn heavy in your hand.

I think that's because you're not just holding a weapon but you're holding your entire life.

I say all of this because I made a promise to myself when both of you were born that I would never, ever, lie to you about who I am. I have not. I will not.

I want you to know that sometimes it's OK to give up. Sometimes it's OK to lose.

Just make sure you're Breathing the entire time.

Only Truth

I want to tell you about the hardest thing there is to accept, learn, believe in, and trust.

I found out that your Mom is getting married. I'm happy for her. She sought out happiness and it looks like she's finding it. I hope that is The Truth. She deserves to be happy just like anyone else. It's the only god-given right we can grasp. Well, if you buy into the whole "god" thing. Regardless, she's doing what makes her happy, and I Hope, what she believes will make You happy.

The Truth is that no one can buy into that. It's a matter of faith. Just like breathing is. Just like sitting down in a chair is. It's all about faith. It's all about hope. It's all about belief, I suppose. Believing in those things that we can't see, trust, accept, or learn beforehand. Like sitting in that chair. Like breathing with those lungs.

The first woman I loved wasn't your Mom. I know... shocking! She wasn't. She was just One. At the time, I thought she was The One. That wasn't the case. The first woman your Daddy ever loved was a redhead from Franklin County, Va. You've never met her. Maybe one day you will.

There were a few others that your Daddy loved between her and your Mom. I know... how can someone love that often? What the hell is love anyway? Well, it's human nature. It's what we think about when we think no one is wondering what we're thinking about and it's what we imagine when we think no one imagines what we day dream. But be certain, we all do it. And no one has a clue what love is. At least no one I've met. But they all know what it feels like and how to do it. That is how & why we can do it so often.

Loving someone is easy. It's the living with it that will kick your ass.

What I want you to understand from all of this is simple. I want you to see that people change, feelings change, hope changes, beliefs change, and ultimately your very own faith will change.

The Truth, though, it will always remain the same.

It's what you feel inside.

That thing that feels more right than wrong.

Babies, that is Truth. That's the only truth.

Make It Stick

 
When I was 14 years old I had my first real kiss.

Granted, I kissed Tammy on the cheek in 4th grade but I don't think that actually counts.

When I was 14, though, at a church retreat, Carolyn and I snuck behind a building and she shoved her tongue into my mouth.

Yea, it was as creepy as that last sentence. But it was also something more. It made my face flush, my legs quiver, and my fingers play air guitar. I'm quite serious, I think I may have played "Flight of the wounded bumble bee" right there next to the central air units.

I say all of this so you'll know that when all else fails, when your body doesn't quite do what you intend it to do, and when your intentions outweigh your reality, the one thing you will always be able to count on... is your Kiss.

Everything else may change, but that does not.

So make it stick.

Before & After & Matters & Maybe

 

One day this won't sound like gibberish.

There is a before of which you cannot conceive, not yet, anyway. So many things happened, happen, and will happen. There is also an after that hasn't yet to find it's way into being a before. It's trying though. It's trying with every breath.

Afters tend to do that to the befores. They hang around until they can be what they weren't, and ironically, what they're not yet. Until they are, of course.

That's what makes the in between so fragile.

Think of the moments before you were born. Better yet, before that perfect moment when the electrons in your freshly developed brain began firing off. Think back to your time in the womb and that moment before you recognized that you Were. Granted, you had no idea where you Were or what in the world You were doing, but you Were, and that mattered most of all. Now the big question... can you recall the moment before That occurred?

What if the after doesn't actually do anything to the before... other than learn from it?

Things change, then they change again, then they change once or twice more. That is the nature of those things in between the before and the after. They don't have a choice, like you do. They do so because they must. That is why they Are.

If you try, you might be able to collect the before in one hand and the after in the other hand.

If you can pull that off, then maybe, just maybe, you'll figure out how to hold on tight to that in between. Maybe, just maybe, you'll be able to stuff it in your pocket and carry it with you.

Find a way to do so and the Before & After won't end up mattering at all.

And that... Matters.

Maybe.

Water Remains

When I was young and full of intent I always found a way to find a way. Now that I'm waning in the sky of my life, I find I'm more inclined to let the way find me.

I can recall with vigor how voraciously I pursued the ideology that we are born and as such, begin to die. I can also recall with vigor countering that view with the fact that we live, alive, and continue to do so until we do not anymore.

On one hand the glass is half empty, on the other it is half full.

Frankly, at this point, I find all of that horseshit funny.

Perhaps the ultimate truth is simply that the water remains. One way or the other.

The glass is indifferent.

Tides

 
The moon finds me big and bold. Or, perhaps I find the moon as such.

This is my time of year. My awakening. My rebirth, if you will. I feel alive, prosperous, possible, and above all of these things... hopeful.

The wind has shrugged off its laziness and wrapped itself with intent. It has purpose now. It brings with it a change, temperature being the most innocent of those charges. It carries vigor. It pushes change. Frankly, it demands it.

I've had such a short life and yet I find myself halfway There.

The simplest of things move me often times. The passing shadow of a cloud, the vague adjustment of a scent, the faint hint of a memory, or a dream. They stir me to my core. I find myself giddy and abundant beneath the full sun above and yet so very shy beneath its bride at night.

Perhaps it's simply the tides that work there way into Me.