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Fuck. FUuuuuuck fucking fuck. fuck goddamn shit fuck.

I get the feeling I wouldn't like me if I met me
-Less Than Jake

So I told her I loved her
And she told me she loved me
And I mostly believed her
And she mostly believed me
-Pedro the Lion

If I lost you

And I don't know what I'd do if I lost you


What is LOVE?

To be honest, I don't know. But I'm going to hazard a guess. Love is feeling comfortable with someone. Love is knowing you'd be diminished without that person in your life. Love is wanting to be near that person (even though you are used to being comfortable by yourself). Love is this fucked up state where you see people who are objectively more physically attractive but you are all like 'No...this is the one'...and then it is true. Love is compromise. Love is flowers unexpectedly. Love is just holding. Love is this weird emotion where you put others before yourself. Love is when you decide that maybe you want to make someone smile. And that when they smile, that will make you smile. And when they are sad, you're sad. And you don't know why you feel this way, but you do. And Love is. Love is. Love is knowing that there are people outside of yourself, and your actions affect them, and you change yourself because of that. Not because they ask you to. But because you feel something for them and you don't want to hurt them because of what you do.

We live as fast as we can

If we all should die tonight
We will have no regrets

If this night should take my life
(We cant go back we cant go)

What to write.? Other than, I listen to this song, and I want to write a semi-autobiographical novel based on my life. On all the paths I didn't take. Starting when I was 19 and I danced with a girl at the Kill Hannah winterhometown concert and never talked to her. What if I had? What if we had a tragic love affair?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tmgq3CUIhVY

She had stars drawn around her eyes. She was young, insecure, and shy. We moved together. And it was beautiful. As Kill Hannah sang "New Heart for Xmas" and the snow fell around us, we moved as one. Stars in eyes.

This blog has almost exclusively become the deep rooted relationship I have with music. How music can stir up such strong emotions with me (you, us, anyone?).

Sometimes, I have a hard time expressing how I feel. Maybe that is why I have such an affinity for bands whose songs are such sprawling, vast, and far flung works. (but that is most likely the English Major in me reading far too much into things)

But sometimes, what you need to say (what you feel, think, want to scream out) can only be expressed in restraint. In building. In the empty spaces.

Sometimes it is what you don't say that reveals who you really are.



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RBmBDc3TVcY

This music video of supreme simplicity, both in visual and audio...yet it evokes so much. The tension, the building. The vastness. I feel like I could scream, and the song would swallow the sound up (that I could scream at any point in the song and it would fit).

And that is how I feel. Vast, empty, full of tension, restraint, terror, sprawling, and on and on...

We live as fast as we can

Do you know who you are? Really, deep down? Because I sure as hell don't. I could write more...but I won't.



Do what you do and you say what you say
You can wear what you want
But we still look the same

Do you even know who you are?
Do you even know who you are?
Do you really know who you are?

A Modern Day Augustine

It is interesting (funny, humourous, sad, overwhelming?) to think about people from the past who we now venerate and esteem. St. Augustine was once a man, not a literary, religious figure. He lived. He wrote down his experiences, and due to happenstance (God, fate, design), those experiences were preserved and now we hold him as an exemplar of Christianity. He shows us the path from darkness to light.

A modern day Augustine would have no idea of his importance. He would simply write and live his life as best he thought. He only becomes St. Augustine centuries later, when history reclaims his words and deems them worthy of remembering. Until then, he is just Augustine. If his words are deemed not noteworthy enough for the modern age and he is relegated to the forgotten depths of history...his life is no less important, just less remembered by a different age. Augustine still lived, he still loved, he still tried, he still had impact, even if future generations didn't deem him worthy to remember.

The voice that speaks these words
Gives them wings to fly
(Where they fly one will never know
Though one can hope)

How I was, How I am

I've strayed away from this blog for awhile because I've been writing in my paper journal. But sometimes you need to write fast, and I can't do that with a pen-and-paper journal. My hand doesn't keep up with my thoughts. There is no 'Delete' button.

A friend of mine recently talked about alcohol/alcoholism so art of me wants to talk about that...but not really. It is a great subject...but not for tonight.


I'm getting older.

Statement. I'm almost 23. I'm out of college, in a "real job" internship, thinking about Law School (if I go to Law School, that is another 3 years worth of school...I'll be 27 basically when I'm done), marriage has been tossed around a bit. Fuck, I'm getting old.

And the thing is...I know I'm getting older because in years past, I would have just run away from these sorts of issues. I would've packed bags, headed out West and been done with the problems of trying to sort out my life.

But here I am...nearly 23, loving my "real job" internship, applying to Law School (soon), entertaining the thought of marriage, realizing that a lot of my friends from highschool have spouses and kids.

Perspective shifts when you get older. When it happens, I'll never know.
But (as I always do), let me quote a song. This song puts it better than any other I've ever heard.

The Mighty Mighty Bosstones - "Howwhywyz Howwhyam"

Am i getting older?
Are things getting harder?
I used to never cry when I would think about my father.
The years went by so goddamn fast,
You know, I've left a lot behind.
My devil may care attitude, you know, I just can't seem to find.
Once upon a time I never minded very much.
I never let it knock me down or grind me out of touch.
Once I had an outlook different than it is.
Full of dreams and schemes, it seems they just do not exist.
Once I told myself he will not be missed.
I never thought I'd see the day I'd ever feel like this.

I've never been a poet
Mostly I copy and paste the words of others as a substitute for how I feel
But when we are lying on your couch
Wrapped in you boot-wearing cat blanket
And every bit of you is covered
(excepted for your head)
And you're fast asleep
You can't see me smile

I'm currently job hunting. And it sucks, but listening to Agalloch's newest album Marrow of the Spirit helps get me through.
I've always loved their lyrics. A lot of naturalistic imagery. The music itself evokes images of wild, primal nature - vast, untamed forests; windswept, snow covered mountains....

They escaped the weight of darkness
to forge a path into the marrow of the spirit
They chose to drown in a deeper vacancy
an emptiness that quells the null
a pool for the forgotten

They escaped the weight of darkness
to drown in another...

Maybe no one knows what to do

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_U-N9m9Hm0

I had so much to say...but suddenly all words escape me.

But this is how I feel

A Wilhelm Scream - "The Horse"


It's another day of fucking up a race horse.
Water mains will rinse off the mud.
Burn away the image, pull the blinders down.
And with hope a sound will mean the end.

I wouldn't consider myself a "religious" person. I try to "keep an open mind" (whatever that means) when it comes to those sorts of things. But as of lately, I've realized that I am wasting my life away - and that "wasting" cannot be ascribed to my genetic disposition or inherent calling for something else. Still, I hesitate to call this "wasting" as a 'wasting' of my "God given talents"...that feels like a cop out to me.

Rather, there is something else here. It's not a waste of my naturally given talents. Nor is it me wasting my God given talents.

Are people destined for certain things? I believe that maybe they are. Are people gifted with certain talents? Yes, they probably are.

Growing up, I was always taught that you had a specific calling in life, a Calling From God. I was taught that This Calling was something from the Divine.
It wasn't something that had to do with the talents you had.


But what if, for one second, we all forgot about what other people thought "God's intention" was for us. (Because, let's be honest...a lot of how you define yourself, at least in a Christian environment, is via what other people think of you and think what you will be). What if we all of the sudden synthesized our own lives - like Eric Liddell. What if we are called somewhere, but first we have to say, "I believe God made me for a purpose, but he also made me fast."

I once had a Religion prof. tell us a story - he was choosing between two jobs. A well paying and visible position as head pastor of a mega-church, or the two year teaching position to fill in for a different professor. (Theoretically, it shouldn't be that hard - stability and better money vs. two years of worse pay and then lets find a new job). But this man was in a quandary, and he turned to some friends who asked him, "Well, have you asked God for His plan?"

And do you know what my Prof. replied?

He said, "I have...and to be honest, it doesn't seem like it makes a big difference to Him. Both sides have their merits, both sides have their cons. God will be able to use me in either position, but I wanted your help to narrow it down."

The Protomen

I've been listening to The Protomen all day. A rock-opera based on Megaman? Yes please. I never really played Megaman or watched the cartoon show, but I love the whole concept behind these albums - very human and moving, not cheesy at all.

A mix of 1984, betrayal, romance, action - all set to this awesome mix of Sergio Leone/80's synth-punk.

My goal in life is to bring this to the stage.


"The State vs. Thomas Light" - the main character, Thomas Light, has been framed for the murder of his girlfriend by his best friend and co-creator of the robots, Albert Wily, and is being sentenced .
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=72dNF9LEhDE&feature=related

"Light Up the Night" - Light and the hopeful youth, Joe, make plans to retake the city from Wily's control.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gkLvpt9Z3fA


There are the embers of a fire that's gone out,
But I can still feel the heat on my skin.
This mess where in, well you and I,
maybe you and I can
Light up the night

I doubt all the time. I doubt some of the most basic things in my life. But I am trying to put that behind me. To reclaim faith and trust. It is hard...but it is necessary.



Forget your fears,
and want no more.

At first light, lay proud foundations.
Sense the greatness, of that before you unfolds.
Seek no more, for hollow answers.
Answers that lay within you all along.

Farewell to dawns,
see through saddened eyes.
Farewell to pasts,
to sorrows chained.
Forget your fears,
and want no more.
You will be strong,
and want no more.
You'll be adored,
you will have everything.
You will be strong,
and want no more.
Forget your fears,
you will have everything.
And want no more...

VNV Nation - "Lastlight"

Anachronistic and impulsive.

The other day, I had a lucid dream.
Lucid dreams are both amazing and terrifying. In my dream (in which I was...not awake, but at least aware), there were extraterrestrial entities after me who wanted to control me via my dreams. They took the form of my family. They attacked me, and I had to kill them. I was forced to kill my family in my dreams.

It was terrible.


There is no underlying morality or message here. Other than...sometimes dreams are terrible things. Terrible, scary, fascinating, wonderful, horrible places.

Your dream world is a very scary place to be trapped inside
-Anathema

Eire's Day

A question - you pose a hypothetical/question. There is an underlying idea behind it. If you sharpen your hypothetical/question...does that underlying idea disappear/change?




One day I stood with my back to the wind
And the rain fell down
Raised my fist to the cobalt sky
And called to the Gods
...Where are you?

I stood in the stream with cold clear water
Rushing around me
Cold stone underfoot
And called again to the Gods
...Where are you?

I sat in the forest clearing
Surrounded by wood and leaf
A Raven watched my every move
I could feel my heartbeat Thundering
Deep within my veins

I set foot on foreign land
Held my brothers and sisters to me
And saw the same questions in them
Yet when I clasped their hands
I felt their Blood beneath mine
I had found my answer

Maybe love isn't

something that you can write down. Maybe Love is one of those things that poets and novelists and songwriters will forever talk about but never grasp fully.

But perhaps it is my faults and sins that prevent me from knowing what Love Truly is. Maybe my apostasy, my half-faith prevents me from knowing Love.

Maybe Love is giving up all of your Self. Maybe Love is absence of Self, subservience to Another.

I stopped believing, You start to move
(She was like wine turned to water then turned back to wine)
I stopped my leaving and the better man bloomed
(And you can pour us out and we won't mind)

Maybe love is...

I can tell you what Love isn't.

Love isn't physical. An aspect of it can be, but Love Itself is not physical. If anything, Love is the opposite of the Physical. It is the Emotional. It is the Spiritual. It is found most deeply in the moments when you hold each other and whisper things you find it hard to talk about. That's love.
And Love isn't thinking only about your own satisfaction. It keeps a constant eye on the other, and their emotions. And what they want.
In order to love, you need Two. And Both need to support each other. (I reject the notion of Love as "completing someone else"). You support, you nurture. You hold the other up when they are down, and be with them when they are up.

maybe that's what love is...

I've got a tiny little secret,
Something so far-fetched,
That you may not have known about me.
I control the sun and all the elements
I'll dry out the ocean just to be
Able to walk right up to your front door
as you open it up I'll pull you close
My breath is lost, this isn't folklore,
but it's all we have my darling...

-Houston Calls- "I Fancy Abroad"

There is a certain lady in my life that I am in love with. And this verse from a favorite band of mine sums up my love for her.

And maybe that's what love is...
...the thought that if you were ever apart, you would part oceans just to be with someone.

I would.

I'm not terribly romantic, but if it ever came to this, I would part oceans and walk the distance to be with her.

I'm better now (not behind the eyes)

Sometimes, you have so much to say, but no one to say it to. And sometimes, you feel you have a lot to say, but you aren't sure what exactly what it is you have to say. And you feel weighted down, and you just want to convey that fact to someone who will understand. And sometimes, you had someone like that in the past, and you wonder if they remember that, and if you would still be able to talk to them the same way. And you realize that this is a form of deep deep friendship, of love. Not physical romantic love, but something deeper. To be able to show your weaknesses to someone is a deep and powerful thing. Soul-mates, one might say. And that's love.
...But relationships change. And maybe life has separated you, and you've grown so much that it would be inappropriate to have that kind of relationship anymore. And deep down, you mourn that, but you can't let anyone know.
Because no one would understand.
Because they don't love you like this person did.






Go to your music-player and play your favorite sad song. Then go to Rainymood.com
I'm going between
Rilo Kiley's "The Good That Won't Come Out"
I think I'll go out and embarrass myself
By getting drunk and falling down in the street
You say I choose sadness
That it never once has chosen me
Maybe you're right

Kill Hannah's "Last Night Here"
if this is our last night here
on planet earth
then i'll give you my heart
cause it hurts too much
if this is our last night here
i won't change a thing
i'll just grab on to you
and i feel you breathe

and

Waking Ashland's "Hands on Deck" (still my favourite music video of all time)
Another day another worry
Breaks right through
And indecision bleeds me dry
She's turning pages I'm not making for her
She's painting pictures without me in mind