27 years, 5 months, 28 days......

Sometimes I dream, before I sleep

Sometimes I talk, before I speak

Sometimes I see, before I know

Things I may not, want to know

About 27 years, 5 months, and 28 days ago a little girl cried. Because she wasn’t aware of her surroundings, she didn’t recognize the new faces, the strange smells, the bright lights. She would cry so so many more times as she grew up. But this is when she made her first observation about the world she had been born into. She decided to create her own world, and she is still trying to. No matter the obstacles, the losses or the sadness……she is in awe of the true beauty that life holds, the pureness of music, the lines of art, the interesting faces of strangers and the untold stories of people she has yet to meet…..but will.

Life is about decisions, and relationships with the people and things around us. It’s about the choices we make, and the ones we prolong. The one big thing that changes as you get older is that you become more definitive about the things you want in your life, the people you choose to share it with, and the places you hope to find yourself.

The twenties are great years. They are playful, fun, flirty; naïve but they are also dramatic, climatic, and problematic and character building. You meet people that affect you; you’re affected by these people dramatically. Your character changes a lot through these years, and you find yourself very different than you may have been when you were 18. Things that may have hurt you easily seem to roll over your skin and dissipate; you may become more callous to romance and only really take in what you truly believe to be a real connection.
Some of your closest friends may become strangers, and people that stood in the background for so long show their true colors and earn a place in your heart. You find more importance in people’s mental perception of life than the length of years you may have known them. You tend to find what it is that you are truly passionate about, and some how the world places people in your life with similar passions or museful people that push you to follow your heart.

You may become close friends quickly, and you enjoy the little things in life much more. It’s an aging, it a bettering I believe. You become more quick witted, and intelligent, and wise if you’re lucky. And sometimes you become more and more delusional, misinformed and beaten. I have my days; we can all be on the opposite side of the fence. We are all broken at points, and we are all a bit delusional. But if we can manage to pick up the pieces, and move along life tends to place beneficial obstacles in our paths and we are able to walk away stronger and smarter.

There are opportunities for change everywhere. There are opportunities for adventure everywhere. It amazes me the amount of struggle people endure to fit into spaces that weren’t carved out for them. It amazes me the amount of disappointment people can handle when they don’t follow their dreams, and do what they think is the right thing to do in the eyes of others. But I am also surprised at the amount of selflessness that exists in any given environment. People letting their own dreams go for the ones they love, people moving to places that affect them negatively in order to take care of their own, people that give up a lifestyle that comforts them for the sake of a job they feel will earn them more respect.

Out of all creatures, we posses thought, action, and choice. Yet we are not so different from the kingdoms that surround us.

I lost friends this year, I lost an important character building stranger, I lost my favorite pair of shoes, I lost a bit of my identity, and I gained some, and I made some new friends, and I earned a new perspective on the familiarity of strangers. I realized growing up is about being able to let things go, let people go, let places go that create negativity. I used to think earned relationships, whether they were good or bad, were earned and you had to carry them around. Even if they got to heavy, you could never really take it upon yourself to clip the strings because that’d be irresponsible and reckless. But in truth, that’s part of growing up. Being strong enough to know when to say goodbye, when to say sorry, when to say I was too late, and when to say if I could do it all over again. And I also learned part of growing up is learning to trust….the right people, the right places, the right judgments and the right opportunities. You can’t go around being afraid to step on any toes, you have to be able to get yourself to the point that you can always leap if you wish to. And the people that may have not always been there, and the people that are truly meant to be there, will be there to catch you. And if they aren’t you have to trust that you’ll be strong enough to endure certain adventures, and downfalls, and up falls on your own. Just never ever be a person that is afraid to move, to speak, to feel or to fall.

The new year is approaching, and it serves as a catylst for change. Not that any one date, or time of the year should serve as a static catylst. But nevertheless, its an oppurtunity to do things differently, to say things differently or just say them period, its clean, its fresh, its new.

Sometimes I dream, before I sleep

Sometimes I talk, before I speak

Sometimes I see, before I know

Things I may not, want to know

.Sidewalks.

I think. I rebuild every couple of weeks. I constantly break. I constantly break down. I constantly trip myself. I constantly stand.

I try to stand for something. I try to learn something. I try to teach myself something. I try to do something I respect. Not always respected by others. But that is never the point.

I try to like who I am. I try to understand who I am. I try to greet the skin I am in with a smile. I try to forgive myself for imperfections. I try to capture my flaws.

I try to understand subjective perception, and I try to negate it. I try to deflect it. I try to wave it away. And sometimes it is the subjection that trips me. So  I try to refute. And I try to fight it. And I drain energy within. So I re surge and I refill.

And I stand and I walk.

And I wake and I talk.

And I see and I create.

A space I respect.

A place I don't have to dissect.

A place I know.

A place. A world I respect. And a world I see. See myself being part of.

And I live. And I like and I sometimes love. But most of all I create something better. Something stronger. And I imagine. And I reflect. And I see. Something different. And I think. And I hope. And I watch. For others.

For others that fall. And that stand. And that rebuild. And relate. And we walk. Hand in hand. Ear to ear. Voice to voice. And we talk. And reflect. And watch. And subject. And object. And recline.

And at a point we part. And we take with us a new idea. And we smile. And we see that apart. We are all still together.

And our eyes may be set outward. But our thoughts are still inward. And that with imaginations our conversations never end. And our distances are never as far as the topographical map may imply. But collectively we create.

Something intangible, but perfect. Something beautiful, but conceptual. Something irrational, but possible. And we are able to stand taller alone, because we are never really alone.

So, now I walk not alone. But I walk behind an idea. I walk beside a shadow. And I walk in front of an army. An army of unfinished conversations. Of lingering affinities. Of lost gazes. Misunderstood punch lines. Fountain pennies. Falling stars. Of Lucky numbers. Of unsettled dreams. Of unmailed post cards.

I like to walk the sidewalks at night. On rainy nights I don't have to share. On cold rainy nights. I smile. Because the roads are mine. And my thoughts are mine. And my ideas are mine. But are shared. With others that walk alone. But not really. Because they are there. And I am here. And we walk together. And we think. And we watch. And we imagine. And we create.

'

Goodnight Mom.

I have been a bit out of it. Had a bit of writers block the last couple of months. Not many entries. But I think it’s time to release.

I lost a part of me this month. I watched life slowly slip away from someone that I found myself very quickly close to again. A part of me that was always in the background. A part of me that I pushed away so so long ago. A part of me that I convinced myself was unnecessarily heartbreaking. I walked away….hell I ran away and never looked back. I wanted nothing to do with it, and had everything to do with it without really knowing. My life so to say has been difficult, it’s been painful, but it’s also been quite extraordinary and beautiful. We are all faced with our own afflictions, and the way we face them defines who we are.

Momma Myra.

Mom and Randy :)

Found daddys hat :)

I think I placed all negative aspects of that life on one person, as if their existence was the sole meaning for my malfunction. In reality my mother, wasn’t the bane of my existence. She wasn’t the catalyst for depression or insecurity. She created me to be stronger person. She forced me to face the world earlier than I would have hoped, but what do I really know.

She looked so happy :)

What her wrongs taught me, were what my rights were. My right to get away, my right to make a better life, my right to write myself into another kind of story and to recreate myself. And I did. A very long time ago. And I did so with no appreciation given to her. If it weren’t for the obstacles that she placed in front of me, and the pain that she may have caused me I would have left on my journey to the real world a bit delusional. For that I thank her. She gave up a life that she had created in so many of her dreams. She gave up her dream, and instead lived a smaller life, in a smaller town, with a much smaller me. She was larger than that town. She didn’t belong there, she wasn’t happy there, and she was misunderstood. She was an artist, passionate, intense, and strong. She lived a life that was created for someone else, she was trapped, and I didn’t really understand that until today.

 Looking through my old house, through her old photos and journals. I realize now more than ever I left her so long ago. I was a child completely unaware of the cruel realities of the world, and what they can do to ones faith and temper. I didn't understand her breakdowns, I didn't understand what I had done to make her treat me the way she did. She may have been wrong in the way she executed that misunderstanding, but either way she was my mother and I wasn’t there.

She fought harder than anyone I know, she had battles of epic proportion within her own mind and soul, and she was a misunderstood woman. I do feel like maybe in a different time, if I had been able to transport myself into the old photos I found of her I may have gotten to know a softer side of her. She looked so happy. She smiled, she was beautiful, and she had lightness to her. The people that surrounded her seemed so happy and so free spirited. I didn’t get to experience that with her, because by the time I came into her life she'd already suffered so much. She’d already experienced too much loss and too much heartbreak …..So that’s what I felt........ that’s what she had projected on me. And I hated her for it, for so long.

People are misunderstood, and they retreat, and they withdrawal and this dis-include themselves. That’s what my mother did. And that is what I did. There was a part of her that was so beautiful, and natural, and creative. Her words were so smooth, the way she wrote, the way she created characters on paper and brought them to life. The way she studied her dreams, and depicted them through stories and sketches. She was brilliant with ink, and lead. She inspired me in that way, I do remember that.

Me and Uncle Joe.

I think this is the best way to remember her. And if I were to continue to blame, and withdrawal I would have learned nothing from this entire experience. And that’s what life is, it’s an experience. The good and the bad. Not all of it can be explained, and not all is meant to be understood. But this is my life, and my family has been a mess, and I left it. But I can’t do that anymore. Because my mother’s death would have all been in vain. There was a part of her that was very very very much beautiful, and I think we all forgot that. Only in her last days was she able to soften her layers, and let the barriers down.

 But she did. And we talked, and we told stories, and we remembered things from a different life that we shared so long ago. And she became my mother all over again. She wasn’t herself, she wasn’t strong anymore, and she wasn’t stubborn. She was just scared. She was scared to leave the world in the way she was going too. She wanted change. And things did change. A lot of things. So she wasn’t too late. She was so much more than the choices she made.

In all honesty I am very very much like her, although she may be gone, and although she may not have a voice of her own anymore….a large part of her lives in me, whether I have tried to deny it for years or not. I am my mother’s daughter, and her story isn’t over yet……it's just taken on a new protagonist.

Me and Cousin Gracey.

The Old Porch :)

Daddy's Project.....Our Treehouse

Gran  Ella, and Gramp Mel

Rest in Peace Mama, one day we will get a chance to read that story together again. In a new place. A pure place. A peaceful place.

Just like you I write to release. Your free now, and I am happy to remember you in a different light. I hope your happy wherever you may be. Say hello to grandma, and grandpa, and daddy, and Uncle Jay for me. We will miss you.

Love.

Echo Giesel ;)

In Loving Memory of Michelle Fillip. Died Oct. 14th 2011.

Out of Boredom comes Chaos.

In a structured and calm world we create chaos, in order to feed our imagination and in order to create an environment we find less boring than the present.

In order to create chaos, artists create colors they can't find in their everyday lives. Writers create characters with passion that could never survive the real world. Plots are developed that would never unfold in actual tangible affairs.

Artists burn on to create a world they see only in thoughts and dreams, the burn to create a reality more intense and beautiful than the one that surrounds them. And the common public, pushed to take on a droning daily schedule, working for people so high up the chain that they will never actually see their faces, become filled with dissatisfaction and wonder. They burn to experience true sensation. True sensation that they imagine true because of photos they once saw in a decorative table assortment of magazines on travel or art, they may have nosed through them on the way to one of their daily office meetings.

Each type of person burning, burning from a contradiction that some other type has set up accidentally through their own portrayed view of a world they’d like to see.

If you truly play forward with your own hypotheses about life you will find many of your own internal contradictions. On any given day rain or shine, we question things. Some days we feel lost for the pure fact they we have found no stability financially. But we are hanging on the satisfaction that we are playing out our dream of pursuing various unique talents. Other days we will questions our talents. Sometimes we feel ‘different’; we think we are special so to say. We think our life is going to be different; it's going to matter, leave its mark or in some way shed light on some new way of thought.

But the truth. We are all creatures of self doubt and unduly unsatisfied. Never enough. We will always want more; we will always question ourselves and our peers. We will criticize populations for closed mindness even in the midst of our own self deprivation. We will jab stereotypes at passerby’s who will undoubtedly be doing the same. Everyone thinks there different; everyone thinks they have something to offer. But maybe if there were fewer thinkers and more doers’ things would be different.

I watch my friends sit on their talents, I watch color fade, I watch songs go unheard, I watch art become hidden in backrooms of art garages, I watch people shoot for the skyline instead of the stars, I watch people give up before they have even given in. I watch myself do this sometimes. We are taught to create a strong stable plan and work hard at fulfilling it. We aren’t taught so much to adapt to a changing plan as we become more of who we are. I change each day, I change each time I read, or paint, or take a photo. My life isn’t motionless. It wasn’t meant to be, but that’s what most of our generation has become. Things mature to quickly, people change hobbies to often without a mild second thought. We are all guilty. It’s a fast-forwarded but motionless generation. Things come too easily, so they go just as easily. We are taught to not hang out to much. We are taught to settle. Fuck that.

I understand the validity. I do. I get it. There is a point. I mean, there will always be someone who will attest to accept. Someone will always find a better plot, a better color scheme, a more portraying climax, a finer pitch, a better remix, and a higher way of thought. There will always be something better. But that doesn’t mean that we just give up. We don’t just lose of individuality in fear of a more original concept. It’s cowardly, isn’t it? I meant what’s the point?

I mean every day I look into unknown mediums for advice. For an idea, for a catalyst. I find a lot of imagination in philosophy. But then again philosophers of the past were clearly just unhappy people. They were unhappy with their present, and turned their portrayal of their generation’s contradictions, into our present acceptance of thought. We choose our favorites, we all relate to some sort of philosophy: Socrates, Kant, Marx, and Thoreau. We hastily adopt their way of thinking instead of creating our own.

Past and present, history and current affairs are all contradictions to one another. Life is moving. Nothing stands immobile, nothing congeals. It's all ever moving and modified. Trying to use the past novelty on today's doubts is like trying to use a type writer to play your favorite record.

If you can grasp that notion that you’re not meant to understand. That you are meant to ask questions. That that means your living, your breathing. And if you are able to accept that you must accept. Then life wouldn't seem so bleak. Advice, although comforting is only useful if you’re apt enough to create your own thought process. We aren’t meant to just adopt words like a sponge. There has to be some kind of filter. Without that we are all just living organisms of the past, with better technology and tighter clothes. I can’t accept that. I’d like to believe common day thought is a little more advanced than that.

 

Mental.

When you try and tell me who I am.

I watch and draw a blank.

You think your mind is cunning,

But please keep mine off your plank.

Your words are taken in, I assure you my facility to hear.

But your objections to my projections are simply subjections of your own fear.

Don't ask me to bestow you with my problems, in order to numb your own mind.

I understand your animosity towards confusion; we are one in the same kind.

Why do people think they know.

What's not theirs to really know.

When did creatures become so curious.

About reflections that were created to come and go.

My image is just an illusion, of what I've allowed you to see.

How sensless of you to think that you've experienced what it is that composes, me.

You touch, but you do not see.

You see, but very shallowly.

You know very little.

But think your analysis is coming from.....understanding.

I appreciate the time you feel you've spent looking ...Looking, within.

But rest assure you I am still looking, looking to ascend.

Ascend some answer, coming.

Arriving much too late.

Because you see my minds been churning.

I've been racing to meet my fate.

Racing to ask it questions, racing for just a taste.

Not ever a step ahead, always caustiously a few behind.

In fear that catching it's face, my mystery would be defined.

You see I search for nothing,

Because I truly wish not to know.

I search for empty promises,

I search for a chance to flow.

Flow freely through this journey

It's not mine to own.

It was given to me, I know not why.

But I can appreciate the subtle undertone.

So return the stich and string, that you've so carefully sown.

My mind is not your rightful play toy, it is not yours to own.

I'm standing here in front of you, confessing that I am to blame.

For taking away your time, in search of something that's not yours to rearrange.

Take it as you may, or

Take it not at all.

We are not here to find an answer.

We are purely made to fall.

This is just a segment, in a far superior frame.

Take it all too gravely, and it will all be in vain.

So lets flow freely through this journey.

It's not ours to own.

It was given to us, I know not why.

But lets appreciate the subtle undertone.