Wasted

Here I am again for granted. Taken for a ride to hell and back. Where I know I should be damning I end up damned, damned and dirtied and weakened and shamed. All for nothing, for some fragile thing that verges on fiction. This toxic tale that I am above but refuse to rise above. That should not even have begun. A story reeking of futility, where I am reduced to a grovelling quivering mass, scattered thin by the feet at which I scrabble and kiss. Scattered by their kicks. Only for kicks. Objectified, used and wasted. Ground paper thin and made to be this flimsy excuse of a being. To be taken in unforgiving fists and waved and tossed and torn and scattered like the garbage I've become. Nothing more than a tattered scrap. Reduced through my intercourse with mediocrity, which I embrace and devour as if it is the only option. To accept a half-life, riddled with fractured pieces which never amount to a whole. Although I often feel so full and substantial with things I am and things I love and things I want to share, with caring and emotion and goodness. But it becomes nothing through ignorance, through apathy. Voided by the indiference I am shown. Left only with a longing and sorrow so full and mature, so repetitious, I feel it could be deemed ancient by now. A million years for every meagre minute it has prevailed in my young life. Always left wanting. Always the fool, a jester to the world, condemned, doomed to forever entertain this false monarchy. Will you lend me your empty applause, my ingracious hosts? Deepen my wounds with falsification and have no fear. I will not feel appreciation, and I will not find love.

"it does not do to dwell in dreams and forget to live" - Dumbledore

Sometimes I have to tear myself out of bed in the morning. Tear myself away from dreams whose nonsensical events, so pregnant and robust, serve as comfort to my thin sliver of a life. Sometimes I can almost feel the pain of it, wrenching myself out of images and actions that aren’t, because things that are not cannot hurt me. To raise myself out of those hazy dreamscapes seems almost akin to an icy plunge. A million jagged edges. Oh, to live in the not and never be wounded.

Then to awake and realize that life is so much lighter than dreams, so much simpler. But for some reason this is no comfort. For some reason, this is a weight. Attached to this weight is the dreaded pain, the ache in the chest that has become a constant side affect of consciousness. The ache and the weight. Reminders and products of everything that is lacking. All the failures and flaws that are so agonizingly apparent. Everyone must see them. Everyone must know. But in dreams you are perfect, in dreams these holes in you do not exist. The jagged edges are softened. Oh, to lower myself into this unconscious sanctuary where all things are beautiful and comfortable. I crave it like a drug.

But, like a high, it is not real.
And, after all, nothing truly exists but reality.
And in the end, it does not do to dwell in dreams and forget to live.

The Heart Wrenches....

....When you miss someone so intensely, who never fully existed in reality

....When you're asked to give someone a second, third, fourth chance at your heart. You have to say no or risk being fooled again, the most plausible outcome. Because how many times can you let someone fool you before you become completely made up of nothing but foolishness? And in that eventuality how would you live with yourself? Its hard enough already. But your heart is screaming at your head to say yes, you deserve that chance, here, have it. Have me and use me up and leave me here to wither away when you're brief moment of substance-induced interest has passed. Because your foolish and hopeful heart somehow truly believes that they do deserve another chance to destroy you again, and it somehow believes beyond all logical reason that perhaps this time you could be made happy for a while, and not scorned and defeated and a left a fool. It doesn't consider that this brief and shining moment in time will certainly leave you as a smoldering pile of ashes, as it has before. A pile of foolish ashes on the barren plain of all the other chances you gave with hope.
....When your head takes over, when logic and reason exercise their strength. A strength that comes from some place you can't even believe exists, because even in this moment of strength you feel so defeatingly weak.
....When you know you've done the right thing, but you wish more than anything you hadn't. Because you're heart is still ashes, and you only have your head to blame.
....When what you yearn for now is that brief moment of foolishness and stupidity that you passed up in attempt to save yourself from the ashes, from the fool you would become.
But all you want now is to be the fool.

On Love, go figure....

What is love? Such a cliché question, but one that has undoubtedly been asked by trillions of people over these human decades. Who is love, how is love, when is love, WHERE is love? Sometimes you absolutely ache for love, other times you behold it, feel it, sense wish it, want it. Some days all you want is to make love (and I’m certain this occurs more frequently for some than others). Sometimes, you resent it. Most often I feel you should cherish it. No matter what form it comes in. Some days the smile of a friend is enough love to burst your heart. Other times love is enough to crush and ruin your very existence. And still other days you long hungrily for the proverbial sensation of being “in love”. I personally sometimes feel like I’m in love with everyone. Everyone! I try to dig love out of every nook and cranny I can possibly fathom. Sometimes, more often than I care to admit, I invent love where love could not probably exist. I long for it every agonizing minute of every average day of my life. And I fear I will forever. I know I have it, I feel it and I see it, but will it ever be enough? Can one ever have enough of this stuff we deem to be love? I feel like I must experience every facet of this emotion. It fills my every thought, my every menial second. Sometimes I think I love someone, sometimes I know I do, sometimes I dream about loving someone to my own complete and total destruction. Sometimes I think someone might be okay to love, or to feign love with, for a while. But only a while, because forever is too large a concept in this day and age. Life, to me, has two certainties: death and love. And isn’t it the ideal, the absolute necessity for most, that at the very tail end of this life you have lived, at the end of your eternity that love is with you? And that it has been with you for the entirety of your days prior to this moment? I feel like everyone deserves this. I feel like this is absolutely achievable and existent to most people on this faltering earth. Unless of course you’re Voldemort....although I’m sure he was loved in some way by those Death Eaters of his. If you think about it, even Hitler had a mistress. I’m sure she loved him. So you see, even the more horrid people you could dream of have, will have or have had love in some way shape or form. And even though it may not always be enough, it certainly matters. Love controls us; it shapes us; it moves us; it devastates us to our very cores; it makes us crazy; it consumes us; it wounds us; it makes us soar, it makes us crash; it makes us ridiculously and soul-crushingly hopeful, and also fully and completely hopeless; it fills every facet of our relationships with people. Whether we love them, or absolutely do not love them, it is all still a matter of love. Love is above all pure agony, and yet it is the driving force behind every human interaction. And what would life be without these things? What would life be like if not for love? Perhaps simple, but more likely dull and grey.

The ravaging of Time

It's coming on fast, I can feel it. This adulthood is steadily racing towards me. Towards all of us. The end of eras are approaching, and it's terrifying, but also exhilirating. Everything is changing, slowly, but soon we'll be standing in a completely different place and thinking "when did this happen?". It will just creep up, rotating slowly, so slowly that we'll hardly notice at all. The only indications we'll glean of such change will be the vivid instances that command our focus. Marriages and relocations and children and career opportunities (real ones). And for a moment we'll hesitate in awe of how our worlds are changing, evolving, and maturing. Then the moment will fade and we'll fall back softly into oblivion, with our lives and the Time continuously moving and changing around us. Again, we'll be none the wiser. Until one day we once more stop and realize how things have changed, moved on around us. We'll note the evolution of life just for a moment, before falling again into ignorance.
In that moment, will I stand alone?
While everyone moves and settles down into their comfortable existences and finds someone to share this comfort with, will I remain, a lone entity in a companionate world? I can sorowfully forsee this in my mind's eye, altough I do not wish it. I can see it as if it were tragically destined. Alone in a wasteland of memories, experiences, aspirations, and my faded hopes and dreams. Perhaps. A vision of myself-calm and forlorn (perhaps defeated), eyes sagging with sadness. With the weight of pity and a thousand lost dreams. Of so many radiant and sorrowful years gone by, and coming out of them alone. Lines like pathways of the past creasing my face, displaying memories of an almost full and happy existence. Leading spectators down the roads of my life, to where they have deposited me now. A map on my face, a memoir on my tongue, and sadness in my eyes. Perhaps I will bear it stoicly, this alone-ness, proudly and with contentment. Perhaps I will appear a statue, independent, strong, but withered and faded with age. Softened and quieted. Perhaps if you were to gaze into those eyes, you would see a deep but contented sorrow that comes from good things lost and faded away in time. And perhaps you would find me lonely. Perhaps I would be.

Sunny thoughts for a bleary day

Today is an extraordinary day. My mind is free from the confines of education (for one night at least), andso I've been letting it run a bit amok in the last few hours. I've had some thoughts.
Something exceptional occurred in my ordinary day today, something out of the ordinary. I was waiting for the bus at school, and a man started talking to me. Without rhyme or reason, just because. He asked how I was and I asked him the same. He told me that he thinks people don't talk to each other very much anymore, and that we as people are losing communication. Coincidentally enough this is something I have been thinking about a bit in the last little while. Just last Sunday I was sitting out in the hazy new spring warmth with a few of my very good friends, listening to music, drinking beers and watching and waving to people going by. Pure Sunday perfection. While doing this, my friend Will observed the large amount of people wearing headphones, and commented shrewdly "No one talks to each other anymore". That stcuk with me, and ever since I've thought about it every time I ride the bus or walk down the street (usually wearing my own set of headphones, I will admit).
So today this man picked the right girl to strike up a conversation with. He pointed out to me that everyone is afraid of people attacking them, hurting them, thiings like this, so they keep to themselves and avoid contact with the strangers around them. Why do we do this? Why do we fear so much? I suppose I can understand the reasoning behind it, being a young girl and having shamefully weak defenses. The possibility of harm is always lurking. But you take that risk every time you step out your front door. Am I wrong? Is it so perilous to strike up a conversation with the person who is sitting right beside you, so close that they are touching you? Or is it a fear of small talk that begets this aversion to strager-contact? Admittedly, it is awkward. Perhaps its a fear of rejection, something which I have struggled with for years. This I can also uderstand. But I also am becoming to understand that we are becoming a society based on fear. This is not to say that a certain level of apprehension is unecessary. Especially in a large(er) type of city. But why should we fear the fellow student sitting beside us on the crowded 61 bus? Why should we fear the girl next door? Why should we fear the middle-aged african man waiting with us at the bus stop? I think that apprehension is robbing us of some of the greatest and most beautiful nuances that life has to offer. People are all around us! They surround us all the time in a city like this! People who could be wonderful, who could turn into fabulous friends, astounding acquaintences, or even just entertaining encounters if we gave it the chance.
Subsequently, this man who took the time to stop and chat with me is from Zimbabwe, and currently teaches African History and the university. His major is in agriculture, and he has an avid interest in all things farming. So, again, he was talking to the right girl! He asked if I could think of any way he could get connected with the rural Manitoba agricultural community, so I took his information and passed it on to my father, who I'm sure will revel in his interest. And I'm sure I will talk to him again in the near future. We both made new and interesting friends today. All because of a bus stop.



I am going to take the opportunity here to use that as a segway into talking about my long established and dearly loved friends back home. A random memory of them has been popping into my head quite frequently of late, and it gets me thinking. The memory is of this video my friend Mel made for her media class in high school. It involves Mel's cat Sonny, my friend Cassie and I doing some very bad acting (at least on my part) trying to sell some kind of odour neutalizing spray. I do not know why the image of this keeps popping into my head! But it got my wheels turning. The video was filmed in Mel's house, which she rented by herself that year. I remember filming it, requiring more "takes" than it should have to film a two minute segment, and busting our guts in between each stupid screw-up. We were so happy just being together and being young and goofing around. And yet at that same time we were going through the most tumultuous times we'd ever faced, and probably will ever face. Events that were undoubtedly more dramatic and tragic than any young girls should have to experience. And yet, we look back at those times as some of the best times in our lives. Were we just too young, at the tender age of 16, to really feel and appreciate the perilous weight of those events? Was it mere naivite that made that year seem so great? Or was it that, with so much of our lives messed up and falling down around us, we had no choice but to pull together and love each other and brighten those dreary days? (Though if there was a choice, it undoubtedly would result in the same answer) I like to believe the latter. In fact, I know that to be true. I'm dead certain of it. And although I wouldn't wish such things on any young, blossoming girls, I wouldn't trade them for the world. No matter how painful, confusing or scarring they were, none of it compares to the unconditional, irreplacable, indescribable love that we found in one another. The laughter, support, happiness and tears we all shared and how we shaped each other and imprinted on each other's hearts and souls forever. The sheer amazement of this is undescribable, and if the blindingly, overwhelmingly bright light of love had to come from such dark places, then so be it. I wouldn't have it any other way. I love you all, through thick and thin, forever and always.

"I never learned to count my blessings, I choose instead to dwell in my disasters"

Meaningless mouths and arbitrary arms;
Talking without truth, caressing without compassion;
Holding but hindering, embracing but encumbering.
Truthfully, typical and trivial.
You-
Repulsed, repelled, but not resisting.
Inevitably impressible, calmly coerced.

And then thoughts turn to an invisible place
a place which you've striven so ardently,
so strongly
to prevent them from straying.
And maybe this place is trivial too.
But in this moment seems so meaningful,
for if it held no meaning
why would your thoughts now stray there?
(Why would it exist at all?)
Why? In an instance of such specific actions,
why the twinge of heart-strings?
Why the image of another,
of one who you've managed
so well thus far
to snuff out?
Why the saline excretions from night-blinded eyes,
now wetting substance-flushed cheeks?
Oh these embittered tears
that nullify the indifference which you hoped was passive.
Which you believed was real
but was, it seems, quite deliberate-
quite illusory.
Those salty streams
that give this convincedly trivial place meaning again.
That insist you be aware of its existence,
this place you've striven to ignore.
The feelings it creates and evokes
and the person who created it.

---------------------------------------------------------

You look at this immediate other and know, "I don't want this"
but let it occur nonetheless.
Let it all occur, always, every time.
And why?
Because it might mean you aren't feeling those confused things anymore?
Because it might mean you really don't care?
Because it might prove all of that which you've tried to convince yourself of?
Things about yourself (beautiful, sex-appealing, interesting)
Things about your feelings (indifference, freedom, contentment)
When all it really does is illustrate your inherent inability to not feel
To not want more than this
To not want something real
Someone real
To BE real.
All it really does is bring to light things striven to avoid.
Thoughts about yourself (objectified, morality)
Thoughts about feelings (shit, shit, shit)
And that need for realness, that you almost wish didn't exist, now screams louder than ever.
And how do you strive for this kind of realness, how do you find it other than to persue love?
That fucking abstraction you've come to resent, to resist, to avoid, to abhor.
That has always eluded you. Has always screwed you. Has taunted and pursued you.
Maybe luck will come one day
Or maybe time will tell
Maybe something will once be real
And you will be real.

***

"What is REAL?" asked the Rabbit... "Does it mean having things that buzz inside you and a stick-out handle?"

"Real isn't how you are made," said the Skin Horse. "It's a thing that happens to you. When a [child] loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you, then you become Real."

"Does it hurt?" asked the Rabbit.

"Sometimes," said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. "When you are Real you don't mind being hurt."

"Does it happen all at once, like being wound up," he asked, "or bit by bit?"

"It doesn't happen all at once," said the Skin Horse. "You become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand."
-The Velveteen Rabbit