Commencement

It's funny how all of a sudden you can feel so overwhelmingly lonely. It's funny how it's been nearly two years since I've moved away from that little spot nearly hidden away from the rest of the world, nestled between the redwoods and the sea, and yet if I spend just a little too long remembering it, I get this pain in my chest. Humboldt State University was one of the best things that has ever happened to me, and like many of the best things in life, its effects on me were both devastating and permanent.

I chose to attend Humboldt on an impulse. I chose it because it was as far away from home as my parents were willing to send me. It was the only college I applied to because I knew I would get in. And I did. It was immature of me to go. It was irresponsible of me to go. And yet there was nothing I was ever more sure of in my life.

Looking back, I should have fought harder to stay there. I've had it easy growing up, and it was easy to rely on my parent's generosity. It was selfish of me to get angry when the budget got tight. I should have stayed and made my own way, proved that I could be independent and make something of myself on my own. Maybe it's because I didn't think that I could though, or maybe it was because it was easier to make myself a victim. At the time I really felt like I didn't have choice. I know better now, that there is always a choice. But, regardless, I moved back to the sun and the smog of Southern California. I left the trees and the rain, and the people that hid in them.

I say hid because you don't go to a place like Humboldt unless you are trying to get away from some place else. I didn't realize it then, but that's the truth of the matter. It's easy to hide yourself there. Things move slower there. They are quieter there. You can be exactly who you want, as strange or as dirty or opinionated or unopinionated as you please. No one minds much of anything up there. It was the most welcoming place I'd ever seen. It was a safe place. It was easy to stop for a visit and stay forever. It's the kind of place that traps you like that, and you don't even mind.

I'm graduating now from California State University Los Angeles, I'll have my Bachelors and I'm struggling to find excitement in the accomplishment. Nearly two years at this school and I've yet to form a single sentimental attachment to it. The closer I come to the end, the more I look back to where I started and the stranger it all seems to me.

I went back to Humboldt last year for a visit, and it all seemed changed. I realized though that it hadn't. It was me. I couldn't fit back into the place that I'd left. I didn't fit anymore. Maybe that's what makes me so lonely when I think about it. I sit and reminisce about the people I love there, about the rain and the trees, and I realize I can never really go back. Not really, because what I miss is a time, and that time is over.

I don't regret anything. I think it was important for me to leave when I did, as much as it broke my heart. It's easy to get stuck anywhere if you stay for too long, and good things came of my leaving. Knowing that though, doesn't make you miss it any less. I think that the older we get, the more we lose pieces of ourselves along the way. We scatter them across the places and the people that we meet. We make room for new pieces, but we never fit back together quite the same.

Lost Dogs

A little over a year ago, maybe more, I can't remember exactly, but for narration's sake we'll say a year...

A little over a year ago my town became plastered over and completely covered up by Lost Dog posters for a little Chihuahua named Minnie. On every available lamp post, stoplight, bulletin board and penny saver was the same picture of little Minnie. She had tan fur, big eyes, and lay submissively on her back, paws resting gently on her chest, as if patiently awaiting a nice belly rub. There was a $5,000 dollar reward for Minnie's safe return. Clearly, she was very, very missed.

 Being an avid dog lover, and possessing what some might call an unnatural attachment to my own dog, I thought nothing strange in the behavior of Minnie's family. However, when I was driving down the road and saw a sign-waver standing on a street corner shaking a poster board with Minnie's missing ad printed on it, I was a little overwhelmed, and even more so when on another day I saw a truck driving down the street with a billboard of Minnie's lost poster sitting in the back of it. Maybe, just maybe I thought, this was a bit much. Time went on, and still the sign shaker could be found standing on that street corner, a little less enthusiastic every day. The lost dog signs on the lamp posts and stop lights had all faded or been weathered away completely, and all the community bulletin boards had taken Minnie down completely.


I tend to be a person of faith. Not strictly or souly in a religious sense, just in a hopeful, optimistic sort of way. At first I was hopeful that Minnie would find her family again. She had to be the most recognizable Chihuahua Simi Valley had ever seen. But she was a little dog, lost in a town filled with speeding cars and lots of people, smack in the middle of the hills which are home to hungry hungry coyotes and the occasional mountain lion. As time went on, my faith in Minnie's safe return extinguished quite entirely. Her family must have lost faith too, or so it seemed, because one day, the sign-waver wasn't on that street corner anymore.



And a year or so passed.


And then, for whatever reason, he was back. The sign-waver on the corner. Standing there with Minnie's picture and offering the $5,000 reward for her safe return. And rather than being happy that they, unlike myself, still had the impossible notion of hope, I became furious. I thought them stupid, and insane, and I'm ashamed to admit, a bit pathetic. Alone in my car I yelled out loud, "Give it up! Minnie is Dead. And if by some miracle some other family has her, and she's not dead, they sure as hell aren't giving her back."


In my deepest heart of hearts I believe that Minnie is a lost cause. And I don't have faith that they will find her. But I marvel at the notion that there are people out there that believe in anything so strongly that they will continue to do everything within their power to see it through. I've always been a bit of a quitter. I've never had that kind of perseverance, and I envy it a little, although I still think they're crazy. But a little crazy isn't always a bad thing. And regardless of how stupid I think spending all that money on their lost dog is, it just goes to show how deeply certain things certain people certain pets, Can burrow their way past all of our guards and all of our defenses and into our hearts, leaving us irrevocably changed just by knowing them.

Even though the windows were rolled up and they didn't hear me, I'm sorry, Minnie Sign Waver guy. I am sorry for my lack of faith. I look at lost dog signs differently now. I pay a little more attention. I think of the family that worries over them, and wonder about them. And I wonder if any of them are found ever, or if their families are always waiting for them to come home. Maybe next to finding Minnie, the most important thing for this family is that they prove through all of this, that they haven't forgotten her. Because forgetting something, and losing something can in someways be just as painful.

I know it seems like this is just about some random person's lost dog, but its not. Its about more than that. Its the principle behinde famiy, and loving someone, and that's that you don't give up on them, and you can't forget them, because they become a part of you. And I know, I know, its a little dog, and some of you won't understand that.

 And we don't necessarily care about Minnie because she's not Our family. But clearly she was family to someone. And that makes her important. That little lost Chihuahua from a year ago is still important to someone. So remember that the next time you are questioning your own self worth. Chances are, you're probably important to someone too, and even when your faith is waivering in yourself, chances are there is someone out there, who hasn't forgotten you, and to them you are worth remembering.

I'd forgotten how much I loved to write. I'd let myself get so caught up in life and the momentum of it all, that I'd neglected to take time out and just write. New Years Resolutions: 1. set aside time for my family more 2. set aside time for myself sometimes 3. remember the things that I love, and do them. This year has taught me one thing above all else, and in more ways than one. This year has taught me that time will constantly keep you guessing. We are never caught up to it. We never know how much we have. I can't tell if its going by fast or slow or which way is up. SO I resolve to enjoy as much of it as I can. Doing what I love. Spending it with the ones I love. I have also given up soda, but that isn't as poetically significant.

Stagnant Living

I am victim of a terrible habit that try as I might, refuses to be broken. That habit is this; I am constantly, persistently, and impatiently waiting for the rest of my life to start. The unfortunate thing about it all is that I'm perfectly aware that it has already started and that the only thing holding me back is myself. I know that I am not alone in this curse. I know that I am not the only one sitting idly by, twiddling their thumbs, and waiting. The only thing preventing us from living the life we want to be living is our own determination. We are all victims of circumstance. No one is exempt from misfortune, it simply manifests itself in different ways. I am to blame for the stagnancy of my life. I am to blame for the wasted minutes, hours, days. We are forever finding excuses for ourselves. "I'm waiting till I know for sure." "I'm waiting until the right moment." I hate to be the barer of bad news but, that moment is never coming. Never. Its not. What separates those who have and those who have not, is that they didn't miss their moment waiting around for a better one. As of right now, I'm sitting comfortably in mediocrity and half content here. I'm waiting until the fall because that's when I told myself my life would turn itself around. Only thing is, I know that I'm lying to myself. Life doesn't turn itself around. We turn our lives around. We sit up high on our pedestals, in our ivory towers, waiting for something to happen to us because since we were children we were told to "hang on a minute!" or to "just be patient." or "we're almost there just wait!" Enough. I say, enough. We are capable of creating our own agency. We are capable of creating and shaping the lives we wish we were living, if only we stop waiting for someone else to come along and do it for us.

Perspective is a frustrating notion to think about because although it can often be similar, perspective can never fully be understood. However impossible the act may be though, I think it is necessary to attempt to understand the perspective of one another, and attempt to shift your own. Those who are sedentary in their thinking blame others for not understanding them. It is their lack of perspective, or rather, the lack of effort toward trying to see what other's see, that leaves them feeling isolated. This is not to suggest that everyone should think the same thoughts, and see the world the same way. That's rather dull and depressing. Uniqueness should be embraced. It is what is different from ourselves that reveals what is also the same. Worlds exist with in and around us, but we are only given glimpses of them. There will always be a hidden piece that can only be shown to us by someone else, like catching your own reflection in someone else's eyes. Try to see yourself as other's see you, and if you don't like what you see, change it, but before you change it, attempt to understand it. There is no right or wrong. There is only different. Who you are, and who they think you are, are different fractions of the same whole, and you will never know yourself, until you can know others.

lock the door. shut off the lights.

i sit in a box of four walls. poorly constructed. and the air is always too hot and too cold at the same time.
i sit and i stare at these walls every day and i dream of a world that exists beyond them but for fear that my own legs are not strong enough to carry me
my arms too weak
my soul too fragile
i stay with in the confines of this room that i have grown to resent and yet seek refuge in.
there was a time when i used to be brave but the world scratched and scathed
my once unwavering, now faltering spirit
i used to walk in leaps and bounds eager and bright at the slightest glimmer of a promise
and now promises are silly notions i no longer believe in because someone once told me that that was naive, and i, in my naivety believed them.


belief in and of itself is a silly notion
i didn't always believe so
my beliefs were once handed down and spoon fed to me and i gobbled them up greedily as if starving for their guidance
but the words in my mouth that dripped down into my stomach didn't mix well with my conscience, which too sits in the pit of my belly
the two collided like oil and water.
there was no substance.
and i was starving.
emaciated and confused i spat them both up, and my gut collapsed in on itself with nothing inside of it to hold up its walls.
i couldn't stomach food for thought
or food for the soul
the idea of consuming anything from the world, one which no longer concurred with what was supposed to be and what was actuality
was nauseating.
and with out sustenance my legs and arms and soul grew weak
and i couldn't stand on my own two feet.
walking a block in the world became walking a mile
and the miles stretched on
and the days grew long
and my mouth grew dry
but there wasn't anything in the world which i dared to drink.
for the waters of the world no longer ran clear, they were murky and muddled with the waste of it all.
the waste of lives like my own, half lived.
the waste of potentials never actualized.
the waste of dreams awoken from before they could be remembered.
the waste of time spent chasing shadows.
the waste of words of wisdom falling on deaf ears
and the waste of beauty falling on blind eyes
the waste of the world because someone, somewhere
whispered doubt into the air, and it carried on the winds into unsuspecting minds. it found a vacant space previously carved out by one misfortune or another, of which we all posses.

the doubt rooted itself in that space, and allowed itself to grow there.
once a crack that we would eventually heal ourselves in time, as doubt grew and stretched it wide,it became a canyon with half our souls on each half of the divide.
and maybe we could cross it, and maybe we'd survive.
two halves reunited, courage reignited
and the strength once lost, regained, and the hope that now whole, this world is one we might just thrive in.


but i've yet to cross that trench that's gouged its way into myself, for fear that i have grown so frail that what is left of me would shatter with the slightest shift of gravel beneath my weight.
and so i wait in my four walled cell. blinds drawn tight to keep out the sunlight
that reminds me of days when i was brave. it reminds me of the world i thought i knew and reminds me of the shame i now carry for having hidden myself from it.
my company is the doubt that i have shared my bed with. and it is that doubt that has nursed my fevers and my fears. it is that doubt that has cradled me to sleep, in the darkest hours of my darkest hours. as i lay in bed, locked away from what was dangerous and unknown my doubt cooed and hushed and whispered me lullabies assuring me that this is what was right. singing to me "everything is going to be alright, i'll be here in the morning, sleep now. goodnight."

Burn.

My heart was not softened or warmed by your love,
It was engulfed by it.
Ravenous, all consuming, uncontainable; my heart
had become over run
For fear the flames would devour it, I tried in vain
to rid myself of you
To take back my heart, but in reaching for it
Your love spilled out
It ran like rivers through my blood
Polluting every vein.
With each contraction I pulsed with
Love for you.
My very being, maddened and tormented
By the ecstasy of you
No longer belonging to myself, transformed
By your love
Into a vessel to move
My love, to you.