A New Beginning, Part Deux

So here we are, at the end of something and the beginning of something new. But aren't we always there, really?

This will be the last entry in this wonderful blog. I have decided to move over to Livejournal, because it's easier and there's more features. I hope you'll take the time to rebookmark me; I would hate to lose anyone in this move.

That said, I hope this is for the better. My new home is listed right down below:

http://www.livejournal.com/users/candres/

See you all on the flip side!!

Chas R. Andres
Ex-Proprietor, This Blog



- posted by Chas @ 10:24 PM

 
The Easy Way Out

I said 'no' that morning; just out of the shower while you were waiting to go to your aunt's house. You were a nervous wreck - I could feel you shaking, your pale hands on the keyboard as you looked intently ahead at the screen. Your family waited for you - in the car, even - as our carefully thought out reasoning shot back and forth over the cable that seperates our towns.

I said no because I thought I knew you. What did I know? Not much, truly. I thought you were malleable, naive. I thought you were just seeing the world open before you, spreading its colors to your rapidly changing irises. I could have turned you into my vision - I could have corrupted you for my own neurotic way of loving. I was more scared of that than anything, really. I saw a blank canvas, but I also saw a good friend. That morning, I cared more about you than I did about my own lonliness. I didn't want you to exist as a spectre of my embodyment. I was scared you would lose yourself in me.

I don't claim to understand you now, but I now know more than I ever thought I could have on that frost-laden night when I drove you home. You are far from an empty canvas. You transformed in my eyes like stars in the night sky; suddenly changing, forming patters, shimmering with life. I can honestly say, now, that you are one of the strongest people that I know. My fantasies would have crashed off you like waves on a ship's bow - you would have survived and I would have been the emotional disaster.

Could I have loved you for who you are and nothing more? I don't know. In my heart, I know it isn't right to try. There are moments when every bone in my body is telling me to run to you, to just hold you in my arms and end the lonliness right now - it would be so easy, so fulfilling. But it would be wrong. I would hurt you and I would hurt myself. I don't know how - but I know it's true. I'm sorry that I couldn't be there by your side - it pains me, perhaps as much as it pains you.

This isn't me being neurotic, or me wanting to fulfull some desire to martyr myself to lonliness or unrequited love. I want nothing more than to find someone to compliment me, someone who can drive me away from my predestined fantasy and into the beauty and spontinaety that reality can offer. Yet, I have mistakes to make before that will happen for me, before I can make that happen with anyone. I have things to learn, people to seek, love to give and recieve.

You know what? I care too much about you to let you become one of my mistakes.




- posted by Chas @ 11:13 PM

 
Personification

How easy it would be, to personify my desires and affections on a person. I've done it before and I could do it again. I am remarkably adept at making myself fall for someone.

How simple it would be, to take someone aside and turn them into a vision of pure beauty. I would give them a poetic soul and a pedestal of platinum wrought with gold. I would build it high and place my amethyst on top. She would be the sun and the moon and a soul to guide me, the magic to light up my life. I would dream about her nightly until my subconcious fell deeper in love with her than I would have ever thought possible.

How joyful it would be, to have someone in my life that I could lean on perpetually. Someone who understood me, because she was more a part of me than anyone could ever be. A woman so unreal that she was everything I needed her to be. An Angel, no, more than that...an etherial blinding light that would outglow any angel born in the mind of a mortal artist. A muse, the true dream of my spirit and essence.

All I need is a warm canvas and I can paint this vision - all of this can be mine for the low price of choosing fantasy over reality. I can forsake a soul for the sake of my own mad creation. I can fall desperately in love with someone who I refuse to even see by the light of our own reality.

But is that love? Is that true love, what I've been desperately seeking? No, it can't be. And so I remain alone. The vision remains locked forever inside of my head where it can harm no one. And so, I walk slowly toward the setting sun, always looking for the only person in the world who I don't want to paint on even in the slightest.



- posted by Chas @ 9:25 PM

 
More thoughts that may or may not matter

The fact of the matter is that I'm a filmmaker because I can't be a musician.

I never could get the hang of playing an instrument. I picked up the trumpet in 4th grade, as I was required to play something in the band and I failed the test that would have let me play the drums. Once I finally was about to get beyond playing the simple stuff, I was accepted to Fenn and decided that band would be too much on top of all the added work I was going to be getting. I didn't pick up another instrument until 8th grade, when I played the saxophone for a year with little to no success. Neither instrument reached out to me, and I had no desire to play music. At that point, I barely listened to music.

When I was very young, I didn't understand music. I have vivid memories of being asked the question "What kind of music do you like?" at five years old, and replying "I don't really like music." to the surprise of nearly everyone. I had no interest in it - hell, I barely had interest in visuals. I read books, and that was about it.

My filmmaker thing started in 6th grade, and it wasn't about self expression. It was about magic, I suppose. The magic of being able to convey ideas through a visual medium, the ability to fabricate situations that wouldn't exist otherwise. I could transfer ideas in my mind to others using this magical technique. If humans were telephathic, I wouldn't have ever picked up a camera.

Right Now, what is important to me is conveying raw emotion. I want to go up on stage and bare myself to the world, and I truly admire those who do. Perhaps it's why my better friends tend to be either musicians or actors.

It's not to say I don't love making films - I do. But it's a less pure method of conveying yourself. In a solo, it's just you up there, totally naked to the audience. Every spot of emotion flies out as fast as it can be conveyed through keys or strings or wind. The wall is broken - it's just you and the entire world.

Films are rehashed, over and over until logic takes the place of emotion. They are slick, professional, complex, multilayered. Beautiful yes, but they lack even the personal qualities of theatre, much less of live music.

Perhaps one day I make a film that is the equivalent of a guitar solo...

- posted by Chas @ 6:10 PM

 
3:02 PM Radio

Senior spring is already getting to me - or maybe it's just winter. I haven't done any real homework for over a week, only enough to keep up in my various classes. I have a good 6 hours of physics work due on Tuesday, and I haven't started and can't bring myself to start. Work aside from my various Film jobs has lost all meaning to me - and even my film class work is lacking. I just don't care. I want to just read science fiction, listen to Pink Floyd, and be with friends that I care about. All my brainwork is currently being devoted to working out things I consider more important than Statistics or English or even making a movie...

A strange thing happened to me today. I was sitting in front of my computer listening to a mix CD through headphones and reading about baseball. The news was that John Burkett - a pitcher I never really liked - had announced his retirement. I was glancing through pages on a message board thread about it, when all of a sudden the song "Midnight Radio" came on through my headphones. It was the last song on that mix, because it's beautiful for driving around to late at night. I don't really have any connections with that song, it's never really meant anything to me. Yet, this time, it hit me. All of a sudden, I just broke down and started crying.

I don't do this - I can't even remember the last time I cried. Probably over a year ago at any rate. The song just...overwhelmed me. That's all there was to it. I don't know why I cried, and I don't even know what I was sad about. It just happened.

I wish I could say that I feel better now, but I really don't. I had a wonderful time last night, but that doesn't matter to me right now. It's all I can do to write this message. I don't feel like I've been depressed - this has probably been one of the best terms I've ever had, in terms of enjoyment. But perhaps I am regardless. I don't even know if finding love would help.

- posted by Chas @ 2:50 PM

 
Truth isn't always Beauty

In physics class today, my teacher spent a few minutes delving into the meaning of scientific truth. What we came up with was the precarious definition that scientific truth is something that hasn't failed yet, and has been tried enough times that it isn't likely to fail. Basically, it's an experiment that can be reduced down to a set of known values and an equation. Our concept of scientific truth, whether or not it is simple for a human to understand, is simplicity itself in the eyes of the universe.

He then went on to say that the problem with dogmatic religion is that it cannot adapt to new findings. Whereas in science we are always proving and disproving facts, you aren't allowed to rewrite the bible. I agree with his statement, but I am also scared of the human desire to reduce the entire spectrum of universal existence down to one equation, one mathmatical truism. The end result of the pursuit of this scientific truth is that everything will not add up nice and neat. It can't the universe is too complecated.

I don't think it ever will for humans. We can't percieve enough of the universe, or even what's directly around us. We simply aren't capable of understanding much of what we see. Like two-dimensional creatures trying to wrap their minds around a third dimension, there are added complexities in the universe beyond what little we know.

Not that it isn't good to try - we won't get anywhere without trying. But isn't it time for science to look beyond the physical realm? Science has often left the philosophy to the philosophers, and focused on the tangible. But it's all one great big jumble, really. It's like trying to solve a puzzle with half the pieces. So much of the metaphysical is ignored by both science and religion. Science, for none of it can be proven by conventional means. Religion because it conflicts with dogma and bureaucratic law. In many ways, we haven't come much closer to understanding life's mysteries since we first gained conciousness so many years ago. In other ways, it feels like we're just about to open the door and stare at the harsh light of the fabric of the universe itself.

- posted by Chas @ 10:14 PM

 
The Long and Winding Road


I pulled out of the parking lot and into the night. My left hand numbingly fiddled with the heat and stereo while the right held the wheel fast. I put on my newest favorite night driving CD, Teitur's Poetry and Airplanes , and set off toward home.

Have you ever been in that mood where nothing can cheer you up more than a sad, heartbreaking song? I mean, I wasn't in a sad mood, nor was I just taking joy out of the pain released in the music. I was resonating with the music at a skewed, oblique angle. It becomes an anthem of defiance, of pride. I sang along to the chorus, stifiling back proud laughter. I understood the song, I had overcome it, I was more powerful than it.

I still sleep with the lights on
I still stay up late alone...

I pulled into the rotary as the contents of the car careened from seat to seat behind me. I like that feeling - it makes me feel like I can control physics. Like somehow the world inside of this car, this reference frame, is my own to dictate. I wouldn't want to be in control of the world - that's a task for no man or woman. Yet this small space, this insignificant black particle speeding through the black New England night. It's something, it's tangible, it's mine.

Yeah I'm tired of postcards
Especially the ones with cute dogs and cupids
I'm tired of calling you and missing you
And dreaming that I've slept with you
Don't get me wrong I still desperately love you
Inside this weary head
I just want us to love, just instead...

Odd, that. I still do desperately love her. But I'm tired of it all. I'm tired of the games, the unknown, the what-ifs. I'm tired of devoting my heart and soul to her, only to have it ripped away again. It's not her fault, really. She never asked for my heart and soul. But the real problem is that I relied on her for everything these past few months (years?). She's been the snow under my boots, so to speak. I've relied on her for all of my confidence. I mustn't do that anymore. I must find confidence within myself...

I've taken over the fast lane now. I just blew through a yellow light and I've gotten ahead of everyone in front of me. It's me and the road and the black - the road goes ever, on and on. West. At this moment, I do have confidence. All the confidence I could ever want. It's perfectly natural.

I’m fire - you’re the ocean
I’m energy - you’re the rhythm
Love is somewhere in between
What you believe and what you dream
I’m just trying to make you mine...

I've found another car now. It came upon me in the slow lane, blew by me, and cut me off. A third one, now, compicates things further. The first car slides back to the slow lane, and I gain on him again. We are engaged in this rythmic dance, now, at 70 miles an hour. back and forth. Trancelike. I miss my exit, the one that takes me home faster, out of distraction. I chalk it up to fate, and keep speeding. Off west. For a second, I don't want to get off in Harvard, either. I want to keep driving , keep going until fire and ocean meet in California. Despite what Eric says about it, California holds a lot of magic for me. I ache to taste it again, and I know it'll happen soon. I'll get into Cal Arts - I know I will. It's certainty now. Destiny. I'll be back to the land where the mountains meet the sea - but I'll be there alone. Back in my vision of the artist. This time, I'll have that confidence I lacked. This time, I know I can handle it. I ache to handle it, to experience it. Freedom. I slowly tap the accelerator down a little more. The other car is gone. I am rushing off toward my future.


I Tend to fall asleep in the fast lane
Sometimes sinking low in the high life
No more happy songs of heartbreak
Or playing white knight misunderstood...

The moment is shattered as I see my exit, and I glide over to get off the freeway. My exit says "Harvard/Worcester". I've never noticed this before - I usually don't go home this way, and Worcester is about 25 minutes from Harvard. The clock says 9:30, and I contemplate going to visit Mink for a second. We've gotten to be very good friends in an incredibly short amount of time, and I know she's lonely and she needs someone to make her feel...validated? No, just to listen to her. I know that feeling. It's worse, sometimes, when you have love in your life and they're just far away. You get used to that wonderous feeling of having someone, and when they aren't there it's worse than when you're used to the lonliness. My mom would never let me go see her now, though. Too late at night to be going somewhere. The fact that I don't know the way to her dorm sealed the deal.

I’m lost in my head
Been thinking all around
Gotta find the off-ramp to my heart
Stop-lights in a row
When all I want is “go”
Drop into first and I’ll get home
It’s ok, I’m alright
I’m just a little rough around the edges of this life
Play it cool, you can always follow
Breadcrumbs in a line when you are lost…

I'm flying though Harvard now, gaining speed even though I'm off the freeway. There is something sublime, something zen about roaring through the town of my youth at top speed. The trees and houses fly by on fastforward. I know the roads better than the halls of my school, so I'm almost on autopilot, just switching the high beams on and off depending on traffic. It's all going to fade into the darkness soon. I've said how much I've hated Harvard for years, but I'm growing to like it just as I'm about to leave it. I can never go back, not really. I can visit the physical place again, but never the metaphysical here and now. It will only live on in my mind. As I get to the center of town, I slow down. I don't really want to get home. I want to enjoy the world tonight. Passing back into the darkness again, something tells me not to speed up again. I trust it, and the next car that passes me is a police cruiser. Intuition is a wonderful thing if you use it right.

Once your name was but a whisper
A simple wish upon my tongue
Staring at your shadow
Was like staring at the sun
In this dark, dark hour
You still illuminate a room
Oh God give us the power
Gotta keep ourselves in tune
Let’s go dancing
Waltz around the rumour mill
In your faded dress with the daffodils
Let’s go dancing
Let time stand still


I want to find that person. I want love. But it won't come easy, I know this.

I pull into my garage as the haunting song reaches it's conclusion. Perfect timing. I snap off the stereo, and get out of my car. For a second, the moment becomes deja vu. I will be here again - not in Harvard, and not in that car. Perhaps not even listening to that song.

When I am next here, my Love will be waiting for me inside my house, cozy and warm.

I will get there.

But I have to speed through the darkness first.


- posted by Chas @ 10:20 PM

 
Happy Birthday!

I took a day off from school today to try and recenter myself both physically and emotionally. I've been fighting a sickness for probably two and a half weeks, and I wanted to kick it for good. I also think much of my roller coaster emotional state has been tied to that as well. I slept for 15 hours straight, and I don't regret it.

I was awoken by some of my friends calling me from school. It was 1 in the afternoon, I just woke up, and they sang me "happy birthday" (it certainly isn't my birthday, for all of you slow readers)

I mean, things that awesome make life so much more fun. I'm in a much better mood now.



- posted by Chas @ 11:22 PM

 
Too much Aimee Mann, not enough Beatles

I haven't been writing in here as much as I've wanted to, or as much as I should have. It isn't for lack of things happening to me - in fact, it is quite the opposite. Too much has happened to me in the past week to gain sense of it. It's gone by too quickly, like a film on extreme fast forward.

Sunday morning, before all of this started, Alex Fishman asked me how life was. "Highest highs and lowest lows, man" I replied. That turned out to be more prophetic than reactive. Literally, in the past...it's only been 3 days? I've been riding the roller coaster at top speed, flipping back and forth from one extreme to another at the whim of those around me. I have felt like I was a part of something bigger than ever before, and I've also felt at my most alone. It's been quite a ride. And it's not even close to over.

Something Kati told me: I am a man of extremes. It's a safety mechanism, really. I can't deal with uncertianty in anything. Everything for me has to be all or nothing, positive or negative, sure or unsure. Confident. When I don't know what to do, I'm too vulnerable. I end up feeling cold and alone and confused. Sure, I enjoy spontinaety...but even that has to be certain. If I'm feeling spontaneous and someone plans something, then I'm not certain anymore. It ruins the illusion that I'm not quite as fucked up as I really am, that I can't deal with the fact that no one knows what's going to happen next. It scares me too much.

I'm getting verbally shot at online at school, and I can't take it right now.

See, the administration put up these posters in the middle of the cafeteria, hanging off the ceiling in bright annoying colors. They're full of sillouette drawings of people engrossed in happy activities, and they're emblazoned with words like "DIVERSITY" "FREEDOM" and "HARD WORK". It looks like a cross between my elementary school and nazi germany. I can't describe how much I hate these banners. So does everyone else, it seems. A petition was circulated to take them down, but it was shot down. I'm the only person now arguing that they are wrong, that the message of "WE WILL FORCE THIS BULLSHIT DOWN YOUR THROAT" is counterintuitive to the message the posters are supposed to have. People have not accused me of not caring about the world, not being indealistic enough, being too critical of art, and being 'not a nice person'. The only advice I got was to use the energy that's getting me so worked up over this to go help people who need it. Good advice. But it just made me feel guilty because I'm so woefully apathetic when it comes to "real" causes and so righteous when it comes to stupid ones. Hooray for alienation redux.

On an unrelated note

Where the fuck do I get off? Where the fuck do I get off? You've caused me so much pain over the past howevermany units of time I can't count anymore.e You've been everything for me, and that's not a good thing. I've relied on your for confidence so much that I don't know where to turn now. Inside of myself? Eventually. I'm not ready for that yet. I needed you, but a conflict of ideals and some stubbornness came between us. Rationally, you were right. You're always right. Emotionally, screw you. I needed you and you weren't there for me. You sugar coat everything for me? Fine. You were right - I needed that. I can't look myself in the mirror and see everything yet. I expected too much of you even in friendship, I suppose. Or maybe I'm just not ready to have a friend as honest as I wanted you to be with me. I'm not sure yet. Get over me. Please. I need to learn who I am without you constantly at my side.

What a funny thing for me to say to a girl who I've never seen.

I know I have lots of good friends, and they'll be here for me, etc. etc. I don't fucking care right now. This is my moment of utter desparation. The happiness will follow, and then this again, and fuck I want off this ride. I won't escape with my sanity. Sanity? Insanity. Whatever.



- posted by Chas @ 6:44 PM

 
My Cryptic-less Entry


Kati is not the one for me.

I thought she was because she played a bigger role in my life than anyone through high school.

But she is not the one.

I still love her to death

But she is not the one.




- posted by Chas @ 10:26 PM

 
Contrast

It was a beautiful day today, the kind that reminds me how much I love New England. It was fourty degrees and sunny, but after a month where it barely hit thirty at the high and once hit -45 with the windchill, this was as good as spring. I skipped between classes, as opposed to the normal speed-shuffle with my hands buried as deep as I can squeeze them in my jacket pockets.

This is the kind of weather you can't appreciate anywhere else in the world. In temperate climes, each day is just about as good as the next so you never truly appeciate what you've got. Even in the far north, I can imagine the climate change to be much more gradual. I don't know if there's ever a day in such sharp contrast to the weather of the previous month. It's brilliant, really. It's as if the entire region's energy over the Patriots Super Bowl win warmed us up by ten degrees. I wouldn't be surprised if someone told me that's what happened. It's truly a wonderful thing, to be a New Englander after something like that. We all care so much about our Patriots and Red Sox, the entire mood of the state shifts depending on the outcome of a game. I'll miss that if I move out west.

My dad drives a 1994 Cadillac. It's one of those forest-green jobs with the slick lines and huge leather seats. It's a cross between pimp and old man, the last gasp of youth mixed with the first acceptance of old age. He bought the car when I was in seventh grade, putting the year at...1998 or early 1999. I think. It's done quite well since then. It burned through oil when he bought it, but as long as you keep refilling it nothing goes wrong. My mom nags at him over this, but it would cost over a grand to fix it, and even then there's no guarantee. So it eats oil.

The passenger side window doesn't work either. It won't open - just refuses to budge. We could fix that too, but again it would cost too much. Nothing upsets my mom more than that window. When she was a child, her parents refused to open the window at all in their car and chain smoked all the time. She has a mental response to it now, claiming she can't breathe if her window isn't open. In the dead of winter. When we drive together as a family, which isn't often, she has to open up the sunroof and try to 'suck' air from out of the top of the car. Usually it ends up bathing my sister and I in a sixty mile an hour breeze - no small discomfort in this climate.

Just this week, my mom borrowed my dad's car while he was away in California, letting me use her car. He doesn't trust me with his. My mom somehow managed to smash the passenger side rear view mirror, but she "doesn't remember how". Apparently I was supposed to notice this and pity her, and since I didn't (I wasn't driving that car, and don't usually prowl around the garage seeing what's up with the mirrors) I was in trouble. The oil leak is worse than ever, and the shocks - the greatest feature in the car when we bought it - are about to die. The inspection sticker is 3 months out of date, and it couldn't pass inspection as it is now even with a hefty bribe.

My dad still won't fix the car. Truth be told, I don't think he's ever going to fix the car. But he won't sell it. He refuses to let it go.

"I can't get a car anywhere near this good for what I could sell this one for. It makes no sense to sell it. No sense at all."

As much as I want him to give up, to either fix the car or get a new one, I fear he'll just drive it until it explodes...



- posted by Chas @ 5:10 PM

 
The DMV One

It's only 8:30, but I'm tired as anything. I almost skipped school on Wednesday to recover, but I couldn't really justify it to myself so I dragged myself there anyway. I've been working on this play, directing it. It goes up Saturday night - one show only!

The play is called "The DMV One", and it's by a playwright named Nick Zagone. It's a ten minute play that parodies the cycle of a relationship (and really all relationships) through questions asked by a clerk at the DMV. It's a very clever little play - the pacing and rhythm carries it beautifully. I fell in love with it when I first read it, and knew I'd have to direct it one day. I just didn't really think it would be so soon.

In fact, I almost didn't get to direct it at all. I found out 24 hours before the script submission deadline that every play needed to have between four and six actors, yet still not exceed 10 minutes. After hours of fruitless searches for other plays, even something that fit those requirements loosely, I simply rewrote "The DMV One" to include two more parts. Sonali, the theatre director in charge of approving scripts, never noticed.

Two days later, we were given our Freshman cast. No audtions, nothing. The way this project works is that we had to make due with what we got. Since there's only one male part and we got only one male actor, half our major casting choices were made for us. The first real problem arose when none of the three girls wanted to play the other lead role. (mostly because the role involves having an orgasm, which no one wanted to do in front of the entire school). The only girl with experience had such a busy after school schedule we couldn't cast her, and that left us with two leads that had no previous acting experience whatsoever and a bad case of the giggles. Great.

Max, the lead actor, said he "has problems with emotion". What this means, apparently, is that he likes to mumble and pace with his hands in his pockets and look down at the floor. He also has a hard time with intensity and volume.

Also named Sonali, our lead actress is scared out of her mind. She is a meek young thing, innocent, and completely over her head with the content of the play. She didn't want the lead role, but we didn't really have any other choice.

We had two weeks for rehersal, and I can't say enough about how well it's all come together. It may not be loud, and there may not be enough intensity, and they may forget some of their lines, but by god they're real actors now. Max has more confidence, better poise and volume. He may never be "good with emotions", but he's learning how to act them. Little Sonali has also deveolped more confidence and volume. Her innocence is still there, but she can handle the script now. Some of the things she's done with the part have suprised her, but I think that's a good thing.

So come see my play on Saturday at 7:30 if you're nearby. It won't be amazing, it won't blow you out of the water, and it sure won't be the highlight of the theatre year. But it will show how far you can come with an idea and some presperation.


- posted by Chas @ 8:27 PM

 
Dust

So when does the dream end?

When I was younger, I had this wonderful vision of what college would be like. First, it was going to be me standing in the middle of New York city, going to someplace like NYU or Columbia; the whole big apple in my grasp. Then it was me on a hill in Valencia, gazing out over the adobe-colored houses into the high desert. There would be a wind in my face, blue clouds in the sky, and a hawk or five riding the thermals over the valley. There was even a brief vision of me in Boston, looking out over the snow-covered common and dreaming about frequent visits to Fenway park and strolls on Newbury street.

In all of the visions, I am standing alone.

This was my dream, right? The solitary artist, the visionary, champion of self expression. Taking on the world with wit and dreams and a winning personality. I mean, you might as well have the cheezy music in the background to exemplify the impossibility of it all. Frank Sinatra or something.

I don't want that anymore. At least, I think I don't want it. While I've given up on the dream of having all my friends with me, I don't want to face the fact that I might actually be alone. I don't want to slip off the crystal sphere I have so carefully balanced under my feet and have to try and climb back up again. I don't want to face the world without someone by my side. I don't want to go into Mordor alone, I don't want to start again.

"You will make new friends" everyone tells me. They're right, I'm sure. But facing that lonliness is going to be the hardest thing I'm going to ever do. It's not so much a push out of the nest of childhood but a blind leap off a cliff that I'm assured has pizza at the bottom. Watch yourself, that first step is a doozy.

Lonliness. It's my biggest fear in life, and I don't know why that is. I've never experienced lonliness in the way that many other people have. I never wandered the streets alone and abandoned as a child. I've never really been lost, and I've never truly been without anyone to turn to. Usually I just don't want to turn to the only people that will listen. But, there you go. I am more scared of being lonely than anything else. I can stomach death, as long as someone is by my side. Going through life alone...that scares me right to the deepest part of my soul.

So I will take this step, over the bridge and into the unknown. But unlike Lyra, I won't have a Daemon at my side.


- posted by Chas @ 9:27 PM

 
Waiting

My life feels like the calm before the storm.

I keep waiting for the explosion of work that renders any sort of fun I'm having totally useless and bogs me back down in a mire of toil and drugery. My school is like that - one day you can be having the time of your life, and the next you realize you have enough physics homework to keep an army of MIT grads busy for a week. Things sneak up on you and tackle your from behind. It's coming -- I just don't know when.

I keep waiting to be deserted. I keep waiting for about half of my friends to find someone better, less troublesome, less annoying. Someone more like them, maybe. Or maybe someone less like them. I keep waiting to become a ghost again, to fade back into the peeling paint and graffitti. I keep waiting for the scoff, the look of disinterest, the shoulder shrug, the pitiful smile.

Mostly, though, I keep waiting for a girlfriend. I mean so much in the life of so many people now it scares me. I still don't have a wide range of friends, and I still don't have a clique of friends. But I do have quite a few people who I would be proud to call my best friend. Many of you are female, and I am involved with none of you in a relationship. This has to be some sort of record for me. It can't last. I'm waiting for that sense of obligation, that second-guessing, that pleasure and pain that comes with having another soul so deeply entwined with mine.

Yet, I'm not waiting in anticipation.

A girlfriend means less of those late night phone calls, less whistful talking about our future and robots and waffle house. It means less codfish whacks, less poetry, less of you. A girlfriend means less magic games, less talking about jellyfish, less singing along to music, less late-night rides home. Less of you. A girlfriend means less time for this journal, less time for Boot Hat, less time for whacky movie ideas, less time for reading apocalyptic science fiction. It means less greetings in the halls, less time to myself, less night driving alone. Less of Me.

Yet it means love, and affection, and happiness...It means hugs and kisses and feeling completed...

As wonderful as that will all be, I don't think I would mind it if things stayed like this. I won't mind if my future girlfriend doesn't find me...

...Just Quite Yet

- posted by Chas @ 8:45 PM

 
My Yearbook Page!

For those of you who might never see my yearbook, or if you just want to see it a few months early, this is my page. Enjoy!



- posted by Chas @ 5:40 PM

 
So Epic A Thing

Life is a beautiful thing.

Many of you who read this journal, or know me, don't think that I believe this.

I dream in grand scales - it is a tragic flaw of mine. My visions of the future and idealizations of the past are too epic for their own good. I dream in always and forever, I think in absolutes in the most magnificent way possible. I am in search of the true future with peace and hope and love; my ideal soulmate; the true meaning of Life and Love.

My downswings are grandiose as well. The enormity of the world situation at times just washes over me in a torrent of fear. Not fear for myself - but fear for the entire world. I don't think about just one issue; just about Bush or just about the environment or just about population. It all processes at once, and I am stuck cowering in a corner with my hands over my ears trying to make it stop. No one can take on the negative energy of the world all at once - certainly not I.

Because of this, people say I take the world too seriously. I spend too much time miserable, too much time wanting or fearing or hating or hopelessly loving. While I have been known to do all of those things, probably more than is healthy for me, I do really love life. I love living, and nothing is more wonderful than just sitting back and taking in the simplicity and beauty of people, of emotion, of nature, and of what is truly good in the world.


If happy little bluebirds fly
Over the rainbow
Why can't you and I?
~Adapted By Pete Seeger


- posted by Chas @ 11:52 PM

 
Push On 'Til the Day

Nothing is coming to me as I sit here. My mind seems devoid of original thought. Trey Anastatsio is singing about "Pushing on until the day" in the background. Maybe I'll write about that.

Day. Day means light and light means knowledge. Things are uncovered in the daytime, revealed, shown for their true colors. You can look at something mundane and not question what it might be, or what might be lurking in the blackest part of the darkness just behind it. Day means shadow too, for you cannot have shadow without light. Day means contrast; the neverending war between light and dark. As the day goes on, the shadows gain more and more ground until the sun threatens to tip below the horizon. In that last fleeing moment of day, the great enemies come together and dance their eerie dance. The sun unleashes one last blast of beauty before succumbing to the darkness once more.

Night. Night is dark, night is stealth, night is truth. Night is the equivocator; everything is folded away in shadow without prejudice. Night is when true knowledge is revealed. Without the beating yellow light, all the wonders of the universe slowly twinkle into view. All that ever was and all that ever will be spins around you, daring you to challenge it or at least just gape in awed wonder. Under the cover of shadow and under the pale light of a trillion stars is where the beauty of the world is revealed, if only we would look. If only. If only. If only...

We are such a blind species. We have the most beautiful damn planet we could ever want, and we can't even see that. We have a beautiful view of the whole universe, and we never look up. Have you ever looked out across the sea at night? I could spend half a lifetime doing that.

But we choke the skies and poison the seas. We don't deserve all of this beauty. No one species does, especially not one that takes it for granted.

Maybe if everyone looked out at the stars across the sea, just once, this world would be a better place.

- posted by Chas @ 7:33 PM

 
Sleeping Like Only the Lonely Can

I met Kati online the summer before I was about to go into high school. I had just finished up four years at an all-boys middle school, and just came out of my first two 'relationships'. Those involved 3 dates in total, all with the minimum amount of communication possible. At first, I felt on top of the world because someone liked me. I was on the bottom when they dumped me because it meant no one liked me. It was all so simple and clear-cut. It didn't matter that neither of them knew me. Hell, I didn't know me, really.

Kati and I hit it off immediately. Her quirky sense of humor and artistic persona meshed well with my budding interests and dreams. Her poetry captivated me and her mind entranced me. I didn't fall in love with her then - I hadn't yet learned what love was. I tried to love her, though, when she told me that she was falling in love with me (I later found out that she was as uncertain as I was). We had what I can best describe as a relationship based solely on images in our minds. Both of us are blessed with vivid imaginations, and our mental embraces were almost as vivid as reality. It was brilliant.

Almost.

There are intangibles in a relationship that you simply cannot translate via telephone signals or digital data. We knew this, of course, but we believed we were beyond it. Day by day the aching grew worse; the aching for a human touch to back up our deep emotions. Aching to look each other in the eye, to feel breath on our face. Kati knew my mind better than anyone else up to that point in my life, and indeed she shaped the person I have become more than anyone else. Yet, we could not make it work. As good as humans have become at developing long distance communications, it isn't good enough. It's achingly close to the real thing, but so very far away...

I met Damiana a few weeks later, and that adventure lasted for the next year of my life. When I emerged lonely, confused, and directionless, Kati was there for me. She gave me the confidence I needed to rediscover everything I had previously known. She gave me hope when all seemed lost, and because of that I have become a person who isn't afraid to share how I feel; someone who isn't a slave to cliche and facade. She became my best friend, and ever since then we have been there for each other through many many hard times, as well as some glorious ones.

It wasn't until this fall that I admitted to myself how much I actually love her. This time, it was real; even despite our distance apart. I slowly began calling her more often, and that evolved into the nearly every single night we talk now. We tried another relationship briefly, hoping against hope that we could make it work this time. Again, it failed. Not due to arguments, or lessening of our feelings, or even miscommunication. It was just...I am here and she is there. 768.14 miles away in North Carolina.

I understand more about love now, if only an infantesimally small part of the true nature of that emotion. Yet I understand enough to know that the love between myself and Kati is as real as anything. I miss her more than anything even though I've never seen her face or seen her eyes flash radiant blue as they slowly meet with mine. It's almost as real as love can be. Almost. Almost.

In seven weeks I will be driving down to North Carolina with my Dad on a road trip. One of our first stops is going to involve our meeting, face to face, for the first time. I am scared shitless, and I think she is too. After all of this longing, after all of these dreams, can anything live up to the perfect portrayals in our mind? It's the nagging feeling that's plagued us since the first day we met and it will all be shattered in one moment, for better or for worse.

In one moment this March, the walls surrounding a large part of my mind will come tumbling down in a shower of understanding and recognition. I'm going to embrace it head on.

As scared as I am, I am convinced it will turn out beautifully.


- posted by Chas @ 5:11 PM

 
BOOT HAT!

This may be kind of a lame update, but Eric and I are doing a webcomic. There's no telling how long it will last, and you may not think it is funny, but the point is this - If you're me, you think it's really funny!

http://www.e-pix.com/boothat/

It's called Boot Hat, and the main character is a boot that sits on the heads of various celebrities and plots to take over the world. All hail Boot Hat.

(real meaningful update coming tomorrow, I promise!)

- posted by Chas @ 10:19 PM

 
If Every Week Of My Life Were In A Playoff Against Each Other, This One Would At Least Make The Final Four

Wow, it's been a crazy week. For the past ten days, it really feels like I've been doing nothing but going on madcap adventures and having fun. School's been cancelled twice, once for "Saint Boiler's Day" and once for "All Popsicle's Eve". (Monday was cancelled because the boiler blew up, and Friday was cancelled because the windchill reached 45 below zero) It was Eric's last week home from college, and every single day I've gone out adventuring with some combination of him, Marc, Emily, and various other amazing people. It was like last spring all over again, except in with all the good parts at once and very little of the bad. It was brillant. As this is my first update in days, a trend that I hope will lift fairly soon, I want to share some of the reasons why this past week was so much fun. (I also have an irrational love of awesome lists)

- There are few things as satisfying as night driving. Some of my infatuation may just be because I'm still new to the whole 'freedom' bit, but I don't think I'll ever get tired of it. Sliding through the backroads of New England with your lights illuminating the woods on either side of the road. No one around for miles, you have total control. You can speed up and slow down depending on your mood or even the song you're listening to. Sing along too, no one cares. It's just you and the world. Slide back in your seat and watch the car slip through the darkness. A light snow flurry makes it even more beautiful.

- I have said it before, but it bears repeating. There are few things more satisfying in this world than friends who want to be with you based on actually knowing you rather than knowing a popular facade. I complain about being alone a lot, probably more than I should. I do need romantic love in my life, and love is as important to me as ever, but I wouldn't give up my friends for it. I don't know if I could have said that before, but I'm glad I can say it now. Maybe it's just the prespective of being in my last term of high school, or maybe it's just because I've had a good week. No matter. I may not have as many friends as many of the people in school, and I don't have a clique, but the friends I do have are the best I could ask for. You all win.

(Please link me back to this in, oh, Febuary when I'm depressed out of my mind)

- Everyone has different musical tastes, and even when they overlap it's rare that two people are listening to a song with the same intensity. I binge on music by different artists, and appreciate every song differently every time I hear it. A song that gave me chills last Autumn may do nothing for me now, and a song I've been neutral about for years may suddenly rear its head and I'll fall in love with it. The best moments, though, are when you're in a car with friends and you're all on the same wavelength, and you're all listening to the same song in the same sort of way, and the combined power of that just permeates into your soul. I love that.

- I need to start listening to my intuitions more. So often I'll pick up my cell phone because I'll know that someone is thinking about calling me, but they aren't because it's a weird time or they think I'm busy. Then I'll second guess myself and forget about it. I'll talk to them later, and find out they wanted badly to talk to me, but never dialed the phone. I need to just call next time I feel that way. At the same time as I feel bad about it, it means that I'm becoming more in tune with the energies of the world. My blinding shield of personal instability is slowly lifting, and I'm finally becoming more balanced by myself again. I'm starting to notice things more, to feel things more. The static is slowly dissipating. Slowly indeed, but surely.

- The bravest actions can come from the most unexpected people. That's one of the things I love about life, how that works. Way to stand up for yourself. You have no idea how proud I am of you.

That's enough for that list. Wow am I in an optimistic mood today. I love it. This is the best I've felt since, well...two summers ago. Damn.


- posted by Chas @ 1:56 PM

 
Xtreem! (ghosts)

Last thursday, I was wandering around school like I usually do. Except this time, it was different.

You see, normally I slip through the halls like a ghost, passing by people without so much as a glance or a nod. I often feel like I'm haunting CA, like somehow I have become permanently bound to high school, and my only purpose is to become the spectre of lonliness or something. I live in the empty senior room, with a stereo and my journal and a science fiction book. People walk in and out, but they walk right through my gaze.

Last thursday I solidified.

Suddenly, everyone had something to say to me. Instead of staring at rows of filled tables and eating upstairs alone, I was invited to sit down, nay, share a seat with someone. I said my normal jokes, and everyone laughed. They paid attention. I walked around talking and joking and saying 'we' instead of 'I'. People cared about me. It was like suddenly a switch flipped on in everyone's mind, and suddenly I was 'well-liked'. I haven't really been that since middle school.

This weekend and the beginning of this week were a whirlwind of adventures and joyrides. Granted a lot of that was due to Eric being home from college, but it was still wonderfully nice. It's almost thursday again and I'm getting behind on my homework and this journal. It's not due to apathy like usual, but just lack of time. I've been doing stuff with friends almost every moment of the day.

If this keeps up, High School might not be so bad after all.






- posted by Chas @ 8:58 PM

 
They Made Me Do It

Over the weekend at my school, a water pipe burst in the math and arts building, and then it all froze in the subzero New England winter. Everyone frantically moved all of the classes from that building into the main schoolhouse, and then the boiler in that building burst. So school got cancelled. I feel like I'm in one of those moral-driven stories in the early eighties where the lazy teen who forgot to study for their math test faked sick to skip school, only to have the boiler burst. Or perhaps I'm in Donnie Darko. Either way, it's the most random day off from school ever and I'm grateful for it.

I made my first grown-up logical decision in an emotional matter this weekend. I'm kind of proud of myself.

I'm not good at being single, I know that. I love the security of a relationship, of having someone committed to me and being comitted to them. People who can casually date multiple people drive me insane, and I usually say it's because I don't believe you can do that and still give either person all the love that they deserve. I believe that, sure, but another reason why it upsets me is that, quite simply, I'm jealous. I wish I felt happy enough just being myself that I don't feel I need another person to 'complete me'. I wish I didn't have bouts of lonliness and insecurity, but hey, who doesn't have those?

I thought for sure that if someone, anyone, showed interest in me, I would reciprocate no matter what. I thought that I was looking for companionship so hard that I would take whomever I could find, damn the consequences. This weekend, a close friend of mine told me that they really liked me. It was just what I was waiting for, and the part of myself that's been lonely for so long leapt at the chance to be close to someone again. Except something happened.

I drove home through the dark roads of Harvard as the clock hit midnight that night after I dropped her off. I was thinking in the way that I think best - blasting a Johanthan Larson musical as loud as I can while subliminally singing along. I slowly sped up as I got back to roads that I know like the back of my hand, going on autopilot as my brights illuminated the frozen air. I took a deep breath between songs, and I realized that, startilingly, the part of myself that knew the relationship would never ever work had grown larger than the part of myself that's so lonely.

I talked to some of my friends, the people who know me best, as my subconious hoped one of them would tell me to go for it, to shed off my logic and embrace something more tangible. They all agreed with my decision. I had to tell her 'no'. It was probably one of the hardest decisions I've ever made, if only because this is the first time anyone has ever told me they had feelings for me without me doing the initiating...and the first time I've ever turned anyone away. It was very sad...but I know it was the right decision. Sometimes friendship is worth more than a doomed relationship, and I cared about this friendship too much.

Does this mean that I'm becoming less of a hopeless romantic? I don't think so.

Does it mean I'm finally developing some actual confidence in myself and my emotions? Yeah, maybe it does.



- posted by Chas @ 8:25 AM

 
Living the Dream

The chance was always small, but it was there. It was a tiny hope in the back of my mind for about a week and a half this October, before life rumbled in to have its say. Marc, Eric, Kati and I were all going to be at college in Los Angeles at the same time.

That would be quite a feat. The three people who I am probably closest to living together, only hours apart in the city I have named my promised land. I could have a road trip with Kati and Marc at the end of the summer, stopping to catch a Phish festival along the way. Hell, maybe Kati and I could even get our own appartment. Marc Eric and I could be a team once again, crusing the streets listening to music and talking about metaphysical philosophy and Strong Bad at the same time. It would be summer forever in the city of Angels.

First, Marc got rejected from Pomona. That really put an end to the dream, as you would probably go a good ten schools down Marc's list before you got to another one in LA. It was still possible, but very unlikely. Now, Kati isn't getting her scholarship to Scripps. She could still possibly get a scholarship from elsewhere and get money from somewhere, or even decide she wants it bad enough to take out (gulp) loans. But the dream is slowly being pushed away by reality. I still haven't even gotten into a school in Los Angeles, and could jsut as easily end up in Boston. Marc could end up in Minneapolis. Kati will probably be in New Orleans. That leaves only Eric in Los Angeles. We would be scattered to all four corners of the US. All I wanted was to take the good part of high school and cram it in alongside the good parts that will come in College. Is that too much to ask? Probably.

- posted by Chas @ 12:26 AM

 
Misunderestimation

Sometimes it's far too easy to judge people. I'm as guity of that as anyone, perhaps more so. While I am usually fine with changing my opinion on someone after getting to know them, my initial impression of someone usually is very important for how I treat them. People who I initially have a bad first impression of usually don't end up as my friends, and I wish I didn't do that to people. It's something I really need to work on, though I think some of it is just 'human nature' if such a thing exists.

Anyway, every day my school lunch is always the same. You get in the pasta line, or you get in the sandwich line. The pasta line is usually manned by this kindly old woman named Jackie who has worked in the kitchen at my school for an amazingly long time. She always has a kind word for everyone, and most people will actually ask her how her day is going. Even though it stops the line, no one ever complains. It makes me happy that someone who comes to work every morning in her late 60's to serve pasta to high schoolers might actually be able to look forward to her job.

On the other side is the sandwich line. This woman who is usually in charge of the line is named Angela. She is a very nice woman, but she has a hard time understanding what people request. Her english is not terrible, but it certainly isn't great. I don't think I've ever gotten away with getting what I asked for the first time, and I usually have to make myself clearer as she picks ham up instead of roast beef, or swiss instead of cheddar. She is usually in a good mood, but she's usually not treated with nearly as much kindness as Jackie. The line crawls as she tries to figure out orders, and people mutter under their breath in frustration. I didn't have the best first impressions of her, not due to anything she said to me but just based on pure inconvenience to myself. It was shallow, but when I've just had 80 minutes of physics and math back-to-back deep thought is the last thing in my mind.

Today for the second time, I got to hear her sing at a faculty/administration talent show. She has the voice of a well-trained opera singer, and she can belt out music in fluent italian with perfection. She is amazing to watch, and very beautiful. Who knew the woman who can't get a sandwich right is an operetic virtuoso?

I think next time I judge someone too quickly I'll remind myself of that.

- posted by Chas @ 11:40 PM

 
I Walk the Line

There's a fine fine line
Between a lover and a friend
There's a fine fine line
Between reality and pretend
And you never know till you reach the top
if it was worth the uphill climb
there's a fine fine line
between love and a waste of time

~There's a Fine Fine Line

It's always worth the climb even if you have to go right back down again.




- posted by Chas @ 10:06 PM

 
Estelio Han, Estelio Veleth

I named this journal after an elvish phrase meaning Trust This, Trust Love. It amazes me how much I actually forget this philosophy, and how often I sit in the darkness and decide that spring will never come. One of the reasons I started this journal was to remind myself of this. Perhaps that is why the idealistic side of my personality has shown through here more often than not.

Anyway, the elves were a creation of J.R.R. Tolkein, and they never had their own language. It was all a creation in the mind of Tolkien, an amalgamation of Nordic and Celtic mythology and legend. The elves were the oldest race; wise, etherial, and wise. Important above all else to them were the cycles of life, the birth of spring and the death of autumn.

Love is as cyclical as the seasons, it is important to realize that and that is what I so often forget. There cannot be spring without winter, and winter will always come. Forever is an ideal, it is not a reality. If you trust in love, spring will come. It has to.

"Hey, Ferris, what comes after nuclear winter?"
"Nuclear Spring"

- posted by Chas @ 4:39 PM

 
Now THIS is a Love Story

I was bored today, so I decided to see what the Netscape news website thought was noteworthy enough to put on their front page. Usually, it's full of bogus romance tips like "10 things your lover doesn't want to hear in bed" and it's always "Number 8 - don't scream out your ex's name" or something else as mind-numbingly obvious. Ford Prefect was right when he said that humans love nothing more than stating the obvious. It comforts us, I think.

But I digress. While there usually isn't anything important on that site, today I found something truly beautiful. Apparently there was this Moroccan soldier who went to war in the Western Sahara in 1979. He was captured by Geurillas and thrown into jail deep in the desert. He became engaged to his fiancee a few days before he left for war, but he never came back. Well, not until now. 24 years later, the man was finally freed and was able to go home. His fiancee waited for him. I can barely fathom this.

For 24 years of not knowing if he was alive or dead except for the feeling in her heart, she waited for his return. He said that he never doubted her for a second, that the knowledge of her kept him going all those years. That kind of pure faith and devotion is precicely why I think love is the most powerful force in the universe. It also reminded me why I didn't really like the end of that movie "Cast Away". Wow, for once a real life love story is more magical, insanely beautiful, and improbably brillaint than the movies. Who would have ever thought?

Wow, and I think I'm idealistic...I can't imagine waiting for someone for 24 years of uncertainty...
- posted by Chas @ 8:59 PM

 
My Hero

My first-ever baseball hero was Jose Canseco.

I don't think I chose him because I identified with him, and I don't really think he meant that much to me. I lived in the bay area, I was six years old, and he was the big slugger on my favorite team, the Oakland A's. Every time I watched a game on television (I never actually saw them play in person) he seemed to do the impossible. He could take seemingly any pitch and send it 400 feet screaming into the stands. It was magic.

A year later the crosstown Giants signed Barry Bonds. I was seven years old, and suddenly even adults who I knew for a fact hated baseball were talking about Bonds. "Surely he must be godlike, even more than Canseco!" I thought. My friend Sam had gotten me collecting baseball cards even though I had to rely on him to read the numbers on the back of the cards to tell me if the guy was 'any good', and we both vowed to be the first person to get the new Barry Bonds card with him in a Giants uniform. I think I won, at least in my eyes. I ended up getting a card with Bonds in a practice jersey and a checklist on the back. I was elated.

Then my parents told me that we would be moving to New England, where the local team was named after a sock and they didn't have a Bonds OR a Canseco. On our last trip down to Disneyland in Anaheim, they took me to a baseball card store and bought me the entire team set of the Red Sox. I told them I would never betray my Oakland A's and root for the Sox. We moved, the A's weren't on TV, and for the next few years I forgot all about baseball.

One day I heard that Jose Canseco was traded to the Boston Red Sox. I had a reason to watch baseball again! My dad had been wanting to take me to Fenway for a long time, hoping some of the magic he experienced watching Fisk in '75 would rub off on me. I agreed to go, and one hot day that August we took the train into the city. It was an evening game against my old Oakland A's.

Before the game I told my dad that I was going to root for the A's no matter what. He told me that it wasn't a good idea to root against the Sox in Fenway, and I had better keep quiet. I agreed, but I still wouldn't wear the Sox hat he tried to give me. My only letdown of a game the Sox eventually won 5-3 was that Canseco was hurt and didn't play. (He did that a lot in Boston) Once I saw the field for the first time, my first real baseball game, I was transfixed. The Citgo sign in Kenmore Square flashed above the Green Monster, and 33 thousand fans lived and died with every pitch. It was more magical than I ever thought possible, and I wanted to be a part of it. Once you go to Fenway park and feel the energy in the air it's impossible not to get caught up in it. The Sox were My Team from that moment on.

The pitcher on the mound that night was an enigmatic knuckleballer named Tim Wakefield. He was unlike anyone I had ever seen before, heaving slow dipping and weaving balls toward the plate. My once-invincible A's were thoroughly baffled by him. They struck out in droves, and their only runs were on cheezy walks and bloop hits. For the rest of the year I followed his stats wherever I could find them. It turned out to be the best year of his career.

Tim Wakefield became my hero, my new baseball diety. If you don't understand baseball, you won't have understood the meaning behind any of what I've been saying. Football games happen once a week for a season. You can root for a team, but you can't truly love a football team. Baseball happens every day, and every day matters. You live and die with your team, you put your heart out on the line with them. Baseball is the sport of the hopeless romantic, and the Red Sox are the tragic heroes of baseball. On the Red Sox, there is no one so enigmatic, so hard working, so heroic, and so misunderstood as Tim Wakefield. His pitch rides with his emotions, it takes him where he goes. Once he lets it go, putting as much emotion into it as he can, if floats and flies and twists and does what it feels like doing. Every pitch is an adventure, and every Wakefield game has the highest highs and the lowest lows. He must always play with his heart on his sleeve. Always.

Finally, I had a baseball hero I could relate to.

Tim was almost released twice, been banished to the bullpen, been turned into the 'mopup man', and then almost not re-signed by a bumbling general manager. Yet, he's stayed on. He's now been on the team longer than anyone else, one of only two players still left from that season. Canseco has long since retired and published a book about how sore he is that he never made it to the hall of fame. Last year was Wakefield's best year since 1995. Against the Yankees in the the championship, he carried the Sox on his back in the only two games they won out of the first five. Yet it was he who gave up the home run in the bottom of the 11th of the seventh game to send the Red Sox home for the winter. He lived by the knuckleball, and he died by the knuckleball. Next year he'll be back to do the same. It's the only way he knows how to be.

I hope one day I will be as strong a person as Tim Wakefield.



- posted by Chas @ 1:14 PM

 
And I'll name it after you

I have always wanted to make a real film about being a teenager. It would be a coming-of-age film I suppose, but one that doesn’t pander to ridiculous stereotypes and clichéd ideas about social dichotomy. I want to try and reproduce the feeling of how serious everything seems, and the relentless battle between cynicism and idealism. I want to try and show the moment when someone first truly realizes what love is, and I want to show the varying degrees of perspective that are lifted one at a time from consciousness until you finally get a glimpse of the scale upon which the world really exists.

I plan to stray from the linear structure of having two main characters that fall in love, but I also don’t want to go with a fully ensemble cast either. I want to try and show life from a real perspective without too much manipulation simply to create a more concise and well-structured story. I want the structure to come from very self-conscious editing as opposed to from a heavily contrived storyline. I have thought of doing something similar to John Cassavetes, and shooting the project using method actors and improvisational theatre techniques for added realism, but I am still undecided about that.

I want it to be a film about moments, life-changing moments in the lives of different people who are in some way connected. I want to share those feelings and emotions that always seem silly when you talk about them later with anyone else, but affected your life more than you will ever care to admit. It’s going to be a film about unrequited love, loneliness, happiness, and fulfillment all at once.

I want the emotions to carry the narrative, and I want people to feel the film as opposed to simply seeing it and hearing it. I want to capture the idealism that I am showing by writing about wanting to do all of this. I want to show the pure need and desire that comes with the creation of art as well as from the discovery of love.

I don’t know if this is a viable plan, if that sort of structure could really work for a film. I written many pieces of writing and dialogue that could be used in such a film, and I have many of the scenes visualized. I plan to try and produce it one day before I forget the feelings that gave me the ideas for it in the first place.

- posted by Chas @ 4:27 PM

 
Unravelling The Past

In "The Salmon Of Doubt", Douglas Adams claims that not until we invented computers did we begin to get a grasp on what happens when an infant is born and sees the world for the first time. They are rebooting. My parents love to tell embarrassing stories about when I was very young, and one of their favorites comes from the moment when I was born. Apparently when I first saw the world, I didn't cry and I didn't scream. I looked around, incredulously, apparently with a look on my face that said "well, I guess I'm back HERE again."

There is this wonderfully eerie and deep feeling that you get when you first realize that you have known someone before. I don't mean 'before' in the sense that you went to high school with them, or even in the sense that you climbed trees with them in kindergarten. The sense that I'm talking about is when you suddenly go numb and realize that you have actually known someone for a very long time, longer than you've been alive. Bits and pieces start to come back. Perhaps they are images, colors, or faces. Perhaps they are feelings, emotions, or thoughts. It all suddenly connects, like bits of a long-erased hard drive hitting allignment again. You knew them in a past lifetime.

I felt this way around Kati from almost the first time I met her. If we had met in person, it could very well have been the first time. Since we met online, it took a few days. In the years that I have known her, she has surprised me upon occasion with an image or a memory that suddenly flies back into her conciousness. There was a yellow dress, a carriage, and a clear sense that I had done something terribly wrong. All of these things would trigger inside of my head, and resonate with parts of my thoughts I never knew existed.

Last night, Kati saw more than I ever knew it was possible to reclaim. She saw my wife, a beautiful blonde woman with hazel eyes, a green dress, and freckles as a teenager. She saw my wedding, hell, she was at my wedding, though she still doesn't know who she was. She saw my daughter, first as a small baby in a carriage and then as a young woman wearing that yellow dress. I was pulling her away, not angrily, just...away. From someone? something? I don't know. I did something to them, and I hurt them. I don't know what I did to them, what happened, or how Kati was involved. I do think it's interesting how she knows more about my life than hers - she had an important part to play in whatever happened. But...if I hadn't been there and I hadn't heard her, I wouldn't have believed it. But I was there. I did hear her. It was real, all too real. I want to know how I hurt them...I want to make sure I never do it again. Once is more than enough...

I saw her face flash in my mind, just for an instant once Kati described her. I know it was real, I know it. I wonder where she is now...

I wonder where they both are now.

- posted by Chas @ 6:07 PM