Sometimes I feel...

For innumerable evils have compassed me about: mine iniquities have taken hold upon me, so that I am not able to look up; they are more than the hairs of mine head: therefore my heart faileth me.

Psalm 40:12

The biblical words of David are sombre.  He speaks of his destitute soul and ravenous enemies, his fear that God may hide His face despite this misery, and the trials he faces as religious man and king.  Ultimately, though, his songs surrender it all to God through his militant and unwavering faith.

There are many bodies walking past us everyday who are caught in just such a tragic cycle, but not always with props to keep them upright.  They may be drowning in an all encompassing sorrow, a sorrow that yanks them from the shore of contentment and rolls over them in waves of dejection.  Their pillows are encrusted with the salt of sleepless nights' tears.  There is no longer an ebb in their tears, but rather a constant trickle.  Anger stings their eyes and jabs their hearts.  A smile becomes taxing and a breath becomes thick, as thick as the viscous depths of sorrow.

Within these bodies there are punished souls.  These souls may be plummeting into an inescapable pit, quickening as time ticks in their ears.  The walls of this pit are never smooth, but rather are jagged with the regrets, failings and betrayal of the past.  As they fall, these sharp edges rip into their foggy flesh, drawing streams of spiritual blood.  Each soul has been beaten and tormented by its own demons.  Higher consciousness is replaced by phantasmagoria.  Their angels seem, to them, to drift above the mouth of this pit, blithely watching as they careen further and further away from the light.  The innumerable imps of despair and acrimony screech at them, and are their only companions in this punishing plunge.

Not everyone has a lifeline when iniquity drags them into sorrow and punishment.  However, it is often only the belief and faith in something or someone higher than themselves that can save them.  The constant tears of the body can be dried by acknowledgement of one's blessings.  The fall of the soul can be buffered by the reality of a better future.  Clarity can defend against imps that block the help of angelic guardians.

Sometimes, one will feel like a motherless child a long ways from home, almost gone, defenseless against innumerable evils and iniquity.  In such times, a raft must be crafted to rescue the body from sorrow and a parachute to pull the soul out of punishing pits.  One must find a way back home.  Do not allow the mind to be overcome by darkness.  Escape the grasp of monsters that salivate at the scent of despair.

 ---
"How did I know that someday -- at college, in Europe, somewhere, anywhere -- the bell jar, with its stifling distortions, wouldn't descend again?"

- Sylvia Plath, The Bell Jar
---

"Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child" - Sung by Paul Robeson

Chasing lizards

Is it ever too late for self discovery? Do you ever pass the point at which you can pause everything and go on a directionless hunt for this being you have entertained within yourself for your entire life? These days I think a lot about what I want to do with my life.  I see a path being laid out before me and I feel a visceral protest.  I wonder about the choices I have made and whether they were the best that they could have been.  I think of how long it has taken for me to reach the goals I have set for myself and I am overwhelmed.  Most distressing of all, I wonder who I am in all this 'profession + life building' talk and I realize that, while I have always had an answer, it may not have been completely true.

In many countries, students take a gap year after high school or even undergrad of university to do whatever tickles their fancy.  They are expected to use that time to do all sorts of useless or useful things with the goal of figuring out what they want to do for a living.  Those who do not take an official gap year may undertake such adventures during school, but the adventure is nevertheless undertaken.  I wholeheartedly believe in this idea of discovery through wild adventure, but is it ever too late to unearth it?

In six days, God willing, I will mark my 26th year on this earth.  I realize now that I could have taken such a leap of faith at some point, but I was seized by sheer terror.  I was not simply terrified of leaving my familiar place, but of leaving both familiarity and career path at once.  I was raised to believe that one must dedicate all to school and career and not deviate until the path was established.  After all, you cannot regain control of a train that has been derailed.  Now I know that my hyperactive brain may have turned that into a nightmare that it did not need to be.  Having deviated once (from medicine to bioclimatic research), I understand that some amount of deviation is okay and control can be regained.  Now I am being guided along another beautifully challenging path through a life in academia.  Which is what I want...right?

Here is where there is a gash in the tapestry.  Loving what you do does not always translate into wanting to do it non-stop to no end.  Now I want my gap adventure.  I want to drive across Australia in an old VW van, writing my novel and learning to surf while I chase lizards for a living.  Yes, I can breathe when I think of that.  I keep hearing that it's too late and that I should go straight from one step to the next.  I have heard that for my entire life.  My gut isn't buying it.

I don't think it is ever too late to do what moves you to your core.  I believe it is up to the individual to decide whether to take the risk dictated by the unique visceral protest.  The limitation of age in many things is a societal construct meant to keep things orderly and predictable.  That is fine, but does everything really need to be so predictable? Release your mind and try taking that adventure you've been dreaming of.  Chase those lizards.  What's the worst that could happen?

"Fly Away"- Lenny Kravitz

The song that goes through my head when I think of all this.  Revel in the great video quality of this 'oldie'.

Time Shot the Deputy

As Time passes, it uses a life as a sort of luxury shooting range with which it can do as it pleases.  It may cultivate lush gardens and manicured fields, with bees flitting from one flower to the other to sip the nectar of good health and disperse the pollen of prosperity.  For an added challenge, it may forgo these gardens and burrow beneath the earth, creating sink holes of imploding dreams and acrid springs of dejected tears.  Along the way, there will be plans erected by the owner of this life, and they will be ripe targets for bullets from the guns of Time.  When we fear that life may be ravaged, we will deploy our hopes as deputies to guard our fields, but they too can die.

Essentially, we all change.  Our plans, feelings, needs and idiosyncrasies are not static.  It is interesting to look back at life and see just how things have been shaped by this dynamism.  Do you like the same foods? Do you have the same dream car/girl/house? Is your career going the way you planned? Is it even the career you planned to have? How far along in life did you think you would be at this age? The person you have become is a conglomerate of experiences and emotions that do not always cooperate, but must coexist.  Do you ever check to see if they are at each other's throats?

As I have aged, it seems that the complexities and priorities of my life have shifted.  I am now both minimalist and hoarder, obsessive and compulsive, enlightened and confused.  While some beliefs and plans have only been transformed, others have fallen victim to the target practice of Time.  An infatuation with the '67 Ford Mustang Shelby GT500 has been usurped by curiosity driving me to see new places (though I'd still like a Mustang fastback à la Eleanor).  Whether a consequence of independent communication or Babel, the artifice of language (whether English, Spanish or Swahili) now puzzles me.  My career path has also veered sharply off the course I had foreseen.  I now imagine a life of writing and art and wonder if I would ever be able to make such a transition successfully.  I no longer see love, material possessions, reputation or life's general path as the rigid structures they once were, but as living entities that breathe and grow just as I do.

I suppose it is normal for maturity to transform man, but can there be any benefit if man takes no notice of the efforts of maturity? Have our former plans and hopes perished in vain if we have learnt nothing from their demise? Life and Time have taught me to filter the burdens that bombard me, and to lighten the load I once carried with me daily.  I have been forced to search for the exit to many a tunnel, or to dig one where none existed.  I understand that, no matter what I face, it could always be worse.  Still, there are things that overwhelm me.  Time will tell how my maturity allows me to handle them.

'Eleanor' from Gone in 60 Seconds

Oh, how I lusted.

When Brambles Shred Feathers

Lately I have got to thinking about how we are perceived by those we love or interact with.  When our words barrel from our tongues or we fumble through our actions, how do our motives come across? Do we always show what we mean? And, if what we show are brambles when we truly feel feathers, are we justified?

I recently watched the 2011 French drama "Chicken with Plums" ("Poulet aux Prunes") about a renowned violinist who loses all taste for music when his violin is broken and so decides to die.  Nasser Ali, the violinist, begins the story searching for any violin that can make a sound as beautiful as the one he has lost, but all are found lacking and his heart is irreparably broken.  He spends the next eight days laying in bed contemplating his life, denying the pleas of his family, and awaiting his end.  Throughout the story, the true importance of the instrument is brought to light and the full measure of the chasm that has formed in his heart and being is revealed as insurmountable.  One realizes that, at some point, his brokenness will surely claim him.

The women in this story, though, are my main focus for this topic.  Nasser Ali lays his heart bare.  He loves his music and hates the wife his mother forced him to marry, Faringuisse.  Faringuisse is a temperamental math teacher whose every word to him is a shrill tirade about his poor parenting or poor husbanding or just poor act of being human.  Her rage leads her to do the unforgivable, to break the instrument dearest to him.  Behind this harsh exterior, Nasser Ali is unaware of the timid woman who has loved him since childhood and just wants a fraction of the affection he shows to his music.  She spends a lifetime cursing him, but his last few days begging for his forgiveness.  However, he has always loved Iran, a beautiful and mild mannered woman whose father refused to let him marry her in his youth.  He sees Iran walking with her young grandson on his quest for a replacement violin and she denies remembering him, plunging him into despair.  What he does not see is that, when she knows she is beyond his view, she crumbles against a wall and all the tears she has shed for him over the years are renewed.  She is reminded of all the nights that she had listened to the tune of his violin over the radio and had wept doubly- at the beauty of his music and for the love she had lost.  Neither woman can bring herself to reveal her truth, one out of fear and the other out of necessity.  I wonder if the pain they cause him is validated because they love him.

This story reminds me of two things in particular.  Firstly, a melancholic predisposition is not only metaphorically heavy, but physically so as well.  It bears down on one's mind and soul until they crack open, allowing it to grip the body in its vise.  Secondly,  with all our complexities, we often enter into these dichotomous liaisons with others.  They may be romantic, professional or friendly, but they are almost always destructive.  Any two-fold interaction allowing for motives to be buried beneath contrary actions or words will inexorably tumble into quicksand.  I suppose it is quicksand that we all must encounter at some time or other, but is it worthwhile for those we interact with to be suffocated when we mean to cushion them? 

In the song "Landfill", Daughter asks her "torturous" love to throw her in a landfill, push her out to sea or leave her to freeze in the snow and simply walk away.  She both wants and hates this torturous love, but can no longer withstand it.  Maybe severance is the only solution when the brambles begin to shred the feathers.

"Landfill"- Daughter

Understanding and the Sacrificial Altar

No one knows your story.  No one sees the bedsores that your bedraggled psyche nurses.  Anyone can form opinions based on the bits they see, but none will truly understand unless a few criteria are met.  The criteria for understanding are painfully simple, and so often ignored.  They must have had similar experiences, been by your side through your tribulations, or heard details of your story from a reputable source- preferably, your own mouth.  There must be other requirements, but few as important as these.

It is an unfortunate trait of humanity that lives are judged and sentenced without trials.  Orders are given on how each life should be lived by people who have no idea why these lives have become what they are.  Men and women facing woes of all magnitudes are clawed and marred by those who have no knowledge of their conception.  Each man's sorrow or success is an intricate temporal design that he has knocked into place with every sigh, touch and footstep.  Were you there when his pillow was drenched in tears? Who made you judge, jury and executioner?

In Iphigenia, Jean Racine's telling of King Agamemnon's campaign against the Trojans, Achilles and Iphigenia are launched into a maelstrom by a similar misunderstanding.  The gods require a substantial sacrifice if they are to provide wind for the sails of the Greek fleet.  This sacrifice is to be the king's daughter, Iphigenia, who is meant to marry Achilles.  To lure Iphigenia to the sacrificial altar, a doleful King Agamemnon crafts an elaborate ruse in which Achilles' love is brought into question and Iphigenia is convinced that she has agreed to marry a rogue.  Naturally, this information is used to plot their demise.

The story of Iphigenia is a compendium of many elements of external judgement.  Firstly, her life has been mapped and set on a fatal course without her knowledge.  Her duty to family and country also demands that, should she discover the true purpose of this deceit, her ultimate choice is relegated to forsaking familial and patriotic duty or forsaking herself.  Secondly, she very nearly walks away from the man she loves- a man who would possibly battle raging hordes for her in the dead of night- largely because of the advice of external entities.  These entities judge him and inform her of the best course of action without regard for his true intentions, actions or emotions.  To be quite honest, even she knows very little of them.  Luckily, Achilles is able to clear himself and remind her of his love.  Thirdly, the temporary rift that separates the couple becomes fodder for an enemy within their midst.  This enemy masochistically wants Achilles for herself, and plots to destroy any union the two may share by turning the rift into a chasm.  Tragedy and revelation will thwart these plans, but at this stage of the story that is yet to be seen.

Quite often, we are led to the sacrificial altar by the very people we trust to reserve judgement.  Are we ever lucky enough to find such discerning people? Who have we judged when we, ourselves, were so wretchedly wanting? It would be cruel to say you are at fault to point out when a friend is running towards a fire.  However, as a friend once asked me, what if the fire is good? What if it is a cleansing fire? What if your friend's soul is in need of a great conflagration to set itself right again after there has been so much wrong? It cannot hurt you to look at the whole painting before you try to advise the artist on what colours to use.  It can, however, gradually tear the artist from humanity when everyone he meets criticizes a different splotch of paint on his canvas without even knowing what the picture was meant to be.

The Anger of Achilles, Jacques-Louis David, 1819

Plate Throwing Woman

Have you ever wondered what sort of person you are? I don't mean whether you're the type who likes chocolate ice cream or pistachio.  I don't mean whether you sing in the shower or pick at your scabs.  I don't mean whether you like the smell of rain or hate the sound of people chewing next to you.  I mean the wiring at your very core.  Are you obsessive, compulsive, impulsive, passionate or passive? Are you moved by everything or barely touched by anything? Does your spirit chuckle at the flick of a feather or does it rage at the pinch of a brisk word? What provokes those bats in your cavernous heart?

There are many ways to uncover your personality type.  You may go the way of the scientific by taking such tests as the Jung Typology Test, which is an extensive quiz based on Carl Jung’s and Isabel Briggs Myers’ "typological approach to personality".  Essentially, 72 yes/no questions round up your approach to different circumstances and, in the end, you are presented with your personality profile.  Another route is introspection, which is my personal default.  This is truly where the devil rears its ugly head or, if you are so lucky, the angel's halo gleams.  My feeling is that the approaches go hand in hand and are both worth trying.  This being one of my many points of contention, I have naturally tried both.

I tried the personality quiz under the persuasion of a friend, who was convinced that the results would be at least entertaining.  I was slightly surprised at what I found.  Apparently, I am Introverted Sensing Thinking Judging (ISTJ) ("the duty fulfiller", as described by one profile).  It makes perfect sense.  I almost obsessively follow rules, take a stepwise approach to tasks and stick to the facts I perceive.  If this is the way it's always worked, then you can be certain that this is the way I'll do it.  When I am given a task, I work myself to the bone to present the optimal product and if I do not then I feel I am inadequate.  Most importantly, people can be incredibly frustrating and social norms can be colossal sources of confusion (emphasis on "colossal").  That said, there is only so much that can be explored by a detached yes/no quiz.  After all, what you do when intoxicated by passion cannot be determined by a generalised set of questions.  This is where introspection picks up.

I am very definitively a plate throwing woman.  I have long suspected this, but finally accepted it while watching the movie "The Last Station" about Leo Tolstoy's life.  I watched as his wife Sofya simmered in her disgust of the manifestations of his idealism.  This aristocratic wife and loving mother would lash her husband with her cat-o'-nine-tails tongue and, as if to release her inner brute, would toss dinner plates at the walls or floor (or him) to diffuse her anger.  As I watched her pristine dress deflect the shards of her rage, my own realisation bounced from suspicion to conclusion.  I remember a time when I had less control over my rage.  During that time, I did find that breaking things was pacifying.  I tossed figurines, but never plates.  I assume the effect is not as resplendent, but I remind myself that I have no grouse with the walls.  In the end, Sofya was not allowed to see her dying husband until the moment of his death.  I worry about such effects of hostility.  Who are you pushing away and how far? What parts of your inner being do you singe each time you flare?

The song "Forget What I Said" by Noora Noor has been on replay in my head for days now.  I have had to make the same request for forgiveness.  I would rather fester in silence than erupt in anger, but every now and then I choose the latter and the result can be..."like dynamite".  One such example is tossing a chair at my friend in a lab for implying that I was emotionally weak.  I may even unflinchingly make those promises.  "I'll make good of my bads. I'll make nice of all that is sad. I'll cut off the dead hands of my past."  Living up to those promises is often difficult, but the choice to make them is bound to the duty to follow through.

What sort of person are you? What riles you? What soothes you? What is your deepest longing and what would you do to achieve it? When the cold, lugubrious spectre of loneliness approaches the orifice of your cavernous heart, do you allow him to enter? What keeps you from becoming the spectre himself?

"Forget What I Said"- Noora Noor

The Appetite of Will

"God provides the will, Kim.  Most treasure, or the people achieving it, almost die."

A woman's voice

It is easy to get bogged down by what we want and, for whatever reason, cannot acquire.  We convince ourselves that our despair and disabilities are somehow definitive.  We identify our aspirations, start on paths towards them and, when darkness looms and obstacles cause us to fumble, we are stricken with the thought that these aspirations may not have been ours to have.  We may be struck by anything from the ghoul of inadequacy to the artillery of harsh incidentals, and our capacity to respond is inherent.  However, the purest diamonds are forged under the greatest pressure.

Every now and then I succumb to my ever present mental incontinence.  I may or may not be the only one to witness the deterioration, but it happens and eventually passes.  What I have learnt is that it is what is gained from such an episode that is important and not one's appearance as it occurs.  I have always and continue to be very strongly offended by the idea of being considered weak.  I once thought breaking down was a sign of such a character flaw.  Now I know otherwise.  Now I understand that breaking down can be part of the process of discovery, construction and breakthrough.

The greatest minds and personalities of the world have all been driven to the brink in one way or another.  Scientists have endured ridicule, disease and countless hours of nothing but intense study to uncover a subset of the universe's many secrets.  Political activists have intentionally withstood starvation, incarceration and torture to shatter the domes of oppression that have trapped their people.  Religious leaders have faced not only physical persecution, but metaphysical warfare with every soul they have tried to enlighten.  Then there are others whose names are not known to the world, whose lives have plunged into ruination like a flash of light before their eyes, and who daily scrape grime from their hearts so their veins will not be clogged with crud.  Whether Curie, Ghandi, Christ or my friend Laura, anyone of note who has ever moved the world or just one life has done it despite pressure.

The quote at the top of this page has stayed with me for a while now.  The source is stated as it is because it was told to me by a woman's voice a few nights ago as I lingered at the juncture between the dream and waking worlds.  She was clear. "God provides the will, Kim.  Most treasure, or the people achieving it, almost die."  It showed me that our will, our capacity to endure and pursue our goals, is inherent.  How much of that will we choose to harness in times of trial is dependent on us.  It also showed me that we often fail to look beyond our own endurance and what we face in pursuing our desires.  What of the desires themselves? The object of one's longing can be just as fragile as one's will.  Hence, for the sake of both will and desire, the pursuit cannot be halfhearted.  One or both may not survive.

My Body

My heart
My heart is anxious for things of which it dare not speak
My breath greets my chest with short hellos and takes leave with abrupt goodbyes
A spear strikes through this heart, entry and exit marked by small yet gaping wounds
A tremor overcomes this heart, once struck, for it is weak and blood is such simple armour
Still, it beats, it pounds this chest, this refuge that failed to protect it from the spear

My bones
My bones corrode and crumble where they kiss
Between them,  there is no flow of love, no fluid of ease
The cold bores through this calcified scaffolding and stiffens it with the breath of anguish
In demand of warmth, they clench their jaws and gnash their teeth for all to hear
They plant their claws into the mountain of distress that they have constructed

My mind
My mind is a raging tempest
The spear that strikes my heart has brothers, and they attack my head in droves
To fix these ills my demons are shunned, and for this my anxious heart sheds a tear
There is an abiding fog, through which only scattered fragments are seen
Still, the spear has brothers, and they will never die

My body
My body is persistent, but it is slowing
My body is persistent, but it is withering
My body is persistent, but it is unsteady
It is frustrating to each part of itself and of this it is aware
It is withering slowly in its unsteadiness, but it must persist.

Not That I Speak In Respect of Want

Not that I speak in respect of want: for I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content.     Philippians 4:11

Every now and then I end the day feeling content.  Truly content, not "I faked a smile for two dozen people so now it's stuck" content.  On those days I recall little things that made me chuckle, like men tripping over themselves to help me because my dress was a bit more figure hugging than usual.  In those evenings I look forward to the shows I have marked, like Da Vinci's Demons on Starz on a Friday night.  The thing that often baffles me is how such contentment is able to manifest itself at the hind end of a day fraught with grumbles and disgust.  How is it that, when despair is everted, it is peace that lines it?

I am quite a fan of French storytelling and its unique mixture of quirks, tragedy, comedy and twisted sexuality.  It is a mixture that will leave you all at once reeling with laughter and wondering what sort of creature you must be to identify with any part of it.  There is a common thread that runs through these stories, whether they be the odd characters played by Audrey Tautou or the tragedies written by Jean Racine.  In the midst of a tattered, twisted and tempestuous world, somewhere there is a flicker of contentment.  It may not be the contentment of a sane or moral man, but it is contentment nonetheless.  It may not be the all encompassing happiness of fairytales, but it is peaceful happiness.

I have many questions about contentment and peace.  I believe happiness is a wondrous, spectacular goal to aim for.  I do not believe it is easy to achieve or that everyone truly achieves it.  The "happiness" most humans search for is the bubbly version that princesses feel when kissed by the most epic philanderer ever to be revered, Prince Charming.  At some point in our youth, we hear from a masked source that the possibility exists for permanence of this happiness.  For a moment one may be happy.  For a day one may be happy.  If one is lucky, there may be an extended period of happiness.  If there is a way to be truly happy for all time, I believe it requires a heavy dose of denial and "laa laa la laa laa I'm not listening".  Overflowing happiness is sweet, I am sure, but it must be fragile.  Can you imagine the sorrow and brokenness that must ensue if such a fountain were ever to run dry?

Contentment and peace are different concepts.  They do allow for permanence because they do not require ignorance of tribulation.  The smile they conjure may be narrower and dimmer, but it is no less a smile.  Their similitude and entanglement allows them to be allies in a war for stability.  They are the building blocks of true happiness, and is the foundation not more critical than the facade? If the heavens, whether Valhalla or the Elysian Fields, are built on peace and contentment of one sort or another, is that not validation enough of their adequacy in the grand scheme of the soul's existence?

My hunt is not necessarily for turbulent happiness, but rather for laminar tranquility.  Like Amélie, I want to find an outlet that lets me overcome loneliness and the stagnation of this life while touching the lives of others.  It can be difficult to strike a balance between the side of me that wants to brighten people's lives and the side that sings "I'm staying away from people today" when I wake up in the morning.  In any case, for contentment to take root one must evaluate the state of life and accept it, also accepting the need for upheaval as a part of that process.  My upheaval has been slow, but the process has begun.

Honestly, the series could turn out to be rubbish, but they had me at "da Vinci"
 

"Feud"? Really?

I had a discussion with a friend today about the not-so-recent Twitter spat between Justin Bieber and The Black Keys drummer Patrick Carney.  Admittedly, the "discussion" was largely one-sided and occurred quite soon after my remark "I've been listening to The Black Keys a lot lately" was met with absolutely zero recognition of band name or song sample.  This feud, as it has been called, occurred almost entirely over social media and was even mentioned on serious news channels.  Naturally, I have a gripe with the very principle of all this.

Firstly, the word "feud" has been degraded into a decrepit excuse for a playground tiff between childish twits who have nothing better to do with their lives than spur petty arguments.  As with many formerly formal elements of our language, it has been taken to the gallows, stripped of all glory and basic decency, and hung until it has been deafened by the snap of it's own neck and has choked on it's own blood.

That said, some background is in order.  For those of you who do not know the band I am referring to, The Black Keys formed in 2001 and gradually built underground fame until finally gaining mainstream popularity around three years ago, which was when the awards began to roll in.  Their sound is modern day Beatles spiked with blues, but have a listen for yourself ("Little Black Submarines", another of my favourites, is also linked below).  You all know the other guy, "baby, baby, baby" and all that.  In any case, information about the "feud" can be found here or in any simple Google search.  I apologise for what I just made you read...

My issue with this all comes in two forms.  The first is the utter buffoonery that is today's entertainment-social media-journalism environment.  That whole argument should never have even gone past the initial statement and it is a shame that adults, who should know better and set an example for those younger than themselves, can be such morons.  Social media platforms have put publicity in the hands of those whose mouths should be forever encased in duct tape and have allowed them to vomit across the Twitterverse until there is nothing of substance left in sight.  The media reeks of putrid, regurgitated nonsense and we cannot escape it.  That is, unless we decide to live in trees or caves and away from mass media for the rest of our lives.  Unfortunately, that's how you get declared clinically insane and dragged kicking and screaming back to this madhouse they call "culture".

My second issue is that respect is what matters.  It doesn't matter that you got a Grammy the minute you were tossed into the limelight because you made teenage girls wet their pants when you flicked your hair.  It also doesn't matter that this little upstart has offended you.  Have some respect for people who have worked long and hard and it never gets old fashioned to have a little extra respect for people who are very clearly your seniors.  This is not an isolated incident.  It seems that the more modern we get, the less we need to have basic decency.  It does not go out of style to treat people as if they are intelligent human beings until you discover otherwise.  If it is that you do discover otherwise, have some pride in yourself and try to maintain some decorum.

All in all, what it boils down to is that we cannot escape mass media, no matter what sort of circus it becomes.  People want drama, show business and people's business (preferably in combination).  We may hear full details about the scarf a rock star wore after her terrible break-up following a story on the rift between Israel and Palestine, but that is how the cookie crumbles.  The masses get what the masses want.

"Little Black Submarines"- The Black Keys

Pray the Demons Out

It may come as no surprise that neurological conditions fascinate me.  While it is completely understandable that they are burdens to their bearers, the madness that spills from a broken mind is a creation wholly unmarred by the incarceration of the waking world.  There is no leash holding the bits of the bearer of that condition to what is known or what can be realistically conceived.  The mind is shattered, and each shard is cast into an unknown, unheard of, fantastic realm that no one else can see.

What is most captivating of all is the courting of the threshold of normalcy that is undertaken by the bearer of such a condition.  She flits over it with uncertain feet, uncertain fingers calming uncertain lips, wondering whether to chase the music to which she now dances.  He speaks to it because it demands his words, pulls them from him beyond the reach of his will, and he wonders whether to wander where the wind instructs him.  In the end, she may choose to continue her dance and he may choose to continue his conversation, and once they have crossed that threshold and stepped into the sunlight of their waking dream they will be slapped with the label of 'epileptic' or 'schizophrenic' and yanked back into the prison of normalcy by well meaning peers.

I mention epilepsy because it is very closely related to migraines, particularly those with aura.  They are so closely linked that having one increases the likelihood of having the other, and the border between them is not always distinguishable.  The epilepsy most know is the demonic possession of old.  The epileptic is the contortionist, the linguist, the grotesque performer whose erraticism makes the blood curdle and the skin bubble.  However, as it turns out, it is not simply bumbling and barbaric, but also silent and precise.

In last night's episode of Monday Mornings (TNT's answer for a mob of House addicts going cold turkey), a young man was brought into Chelsea General Hospital by his mother because he was a compulsive writer who was also epileptic.  She had been concerned that writing had become an addiction for him, and so had stripped him of his laptop, paper, and writing implements for one weekend to try to make him "normal".  During his resulting epileptic seizure, he had found a pen and written all his thoughts on every inch of his exposed skin.  Ultimately, he chose not to remove the potentially fatal lesion the doctors found in his brain because that would rob him of his creativity and, hence, his identity.  One of his doctors agreed, and it was then that I learnt of all the great writers who have had epilepsy.  Dante, Poe, Dickens, Moliere were all at least suspected to have had epileptic seizures.  Of course, this does not even begin to take into account all the composers, artists, actors and generally creative members of society for whom this was reality.

Very often, creativity is the reflection from the scattered shards of a broken, degenerate, fragile or hurt mind.  When beauty erupts from the depths of all that brooding volatility, what is treatment, really? What is normal? Almost all the artists I have ever admired were at least mildly mad.  Would their paintings, stories or music be as enthralling had they not been? I have always been told that my dreams and imaginings were strange, that my stories must come from a twisted place.  When I speak of my voices and shadows, the primary reaction is usually the facial distortion of one who is unsure of whether my tales are fiction or fact.  The secondary reaction is more varied and much more amusing, from "you need to get help" to "we need to call a priest/preacher to pray the demons out of you".

I sometimes wonder what 'fixing' my twists and demons will truly fix.  As in the case of the young writer, what does one's identity become if the flaw that once was daily life becomes a faded memory? Is identity truly the same? Can one who is accustomed to weaving worlds from untraceable mist resign oneself to this grounded life of horizon-less asphalt? Can a fluffy, new, fulfilling personality be plucked from a hat without scorching the hand of the one who will never again see the full extent of his gift and solace?

My favourite stories have always been those that dwelt on madness.  They have always been populated by characters who saw people who were not truly there and were troubled by great oppression that did not truly exist.  Whether Alice in Wonderland or Hamlet, whether irreconcilably insane or in paced descent, madness cannot be controlled.  But is there such a thing as 'mild madness'? If it does exist, can it be fixed? And, if it can, if the creative product it spits forth is the only shred of comfort keeping the scattered shards of a mind in sight of each other, should it be fixed?

...

The spirit that I have seen
May be a devil; and the devil hath power
T' assume a pleasing shape; yea, and perhaps
Out of my weakness and my melancholy,
As he is very potent with such spirits,
Abuses me to damn me...

 William Shakespeare, Hamlet

Ichabod's Tartarus

One concept that dominates my mind is that of spirituality.  Spirituality is one of those things that no one can distinctly identify, but everyone knows is there.  The very definition of spirituality is personal, and so there can be no solidified definition.  In my opinion, it is the acknowledgement of the condition of the soul or spirit.  There may or may not be one or more venerated beings in control of this condition, but it is the soul's condition nonetheless.  Tying oneself to a religion makes this condition precarious, because the soul now becomes one's sole means of bartering with the gatekeepers of paradise and purgatory, Elysium and Tartarus.  And, for the truly nefarious, eternally scorching molten torment.

There is no Rosetta Stone  that can translate the workings of the human soul.  Our spirits are all stained by the ink of our fraudulent words, scarred by the jagged rocks of our misfortune, and poisoned by our noxious misdeeds.  We have all, at some point in our lives, seen a spark of glory struggling for breath and snuffed it out without a second thought.  It all makes me wonder, how does the mind cope when the human soul has gone beyond glory?

I have complete respect for those whose faith is the spark that brightens any dark room.  Their spirits are cheerful in public and in private.  Each sip of water is a blessing God wanted them to have and each stubbed toe is a lesson God wanted them to learn.  These are not the figures with whom I have always identified.  They have determined that they are headed for paradise and they have the pearly gates in sight.  I have always been drawn to the tortured souls.  For a time, I had a notion that Dan Brown was my favourite author.  Put simply, he is off his rocker and his writing is not the glorious work of art I thought it was at the time.  He caught me with a common fascination, self-inflicted penance.  Many religions, not just Roman Catholics, use self-inflicted pain to show that they acknowledge their sin and want to suffer as, in the case of Christians, our Messiah suffered.

This is not to say that mortification of the flesh should be a widespread practice or that I have a flagellum by my bedside for use between brushing my teeth and going to bed.  However, I do think quite a bit about sin and redemption.  My mind is often preoccupied with this stain I constantly feel the need to scrub from my spirit through acts of mental penance.  I feel pain shooting through my body as I type and I wonder if this is my purgatory, if a trickle of glory has left me because of my inherent evil.

When I was young, I wanted to become a nun.  I called my mother crying one day when I was 16, because I had decided I could not wait a day longer and I was going to find the nearest convent.  My soul was writhing.  I cannot explain that feeling.  I cannot explain the feeling of knowing with your entire being that you want to serve God and that the only way you can do that is to forsake all else and focus solely on Him and His work.  Well, I suppose those who have actually taken that path know better than I do what that feels like.  I had my reasons for ultimately choosing not to- first and foremost being that I am not Catholic (that may have been important).  Sometimes, I wonder if that trickle of glory is a leak, a leak from the crack that has formed from all these years of trying to contain my thrashing soul.

Cuban Nun (Old Havana), Howard Moo Young

Shade on Woman

There is a piece entitled "Letter to a Good Man" on a blog I follow written by SHD.  In it, he lauds the efforts of the ideal man, should he still exist in this world, and laments his destruction at the hands of our current culture.  The piece is exquisite and brings to light any number of factors that will come against a man attempting to live up to this expectation, which has quite likely surpassed realism and entered the realm of the imagined.

While the death of the good man is surely a great loss for which society should drip in remorse, I wonder what standards have been set and violated for the good woman.  The image of the upstanding, generous, brave and faultless man has always been accompanied by that of the gracious, accommodating, dependent, and unmarred woman.  Tradition dictates that she is a nurturer, supporter and the base of the home or any such establishment.  She is faithful to a fault and stellar with a pot and needle.  She may be intelligent or dim, but she is wise in the ways of the considerate.

Ultimately, she is property.  The kaleidoscope of cultures we inhabit has varied in colour and intensity over time.  I like to consider civilizations like the ancient Nubians, Romans, Egyptians and Hittites as deep, but vibrant tones, waging war and conquering their enemies.  The ancient world was full of strong cultures and equally strong personalities.  As such, a dominant woman was not such an unsightly image, whether as mother, queen or goddess.  Queen Hatshepsut of the 18th dynasty of Ancient Egypt, for example, is considered one of the first great women of documented history, a remarkable pharaoh in her own right and buried in the Valley of the Kings.  Though she was not the first queen to assume the role of pharaoh, she seems to have been the most successful.  However, there is a reason she is known as "the Queen who would be King".  She embodied the role and donned the attire of a pharaoh, distinctly not a simple queen who stood as the overwhelming beauty in the shadow of her husband.  This is not to rob anything from Nefertiti or Nefertari, who were great women as well.  The fact is, they were spouses, and the known world never forgot it.  History is not completely certain of how Hatshepsut seized the throne or how she came to lose it, but what was certain for a long time was the soap opera that was her life.  Of course, for a man this soap opera is a tale with which one regales the ears of the ages.  For a woman, it is a stain.  That is why Cleopatra is often considered a harlot who slept and pillow-talked her way to the top, rather than an intellectual of high standing who used cunning to maneouver an intricate and venomous political system.

I digress.  This post is not a feminist rant about the fight for dominance of women.  I often think, though, on how feminism has mangled Woman.  Woman is no longer obligated to care for those around her as she once was.  She no longer needs to be chef extraordinaire, as it is adequate to be an aficionado of the tin can.  Woman needs no longer to be well spoken, rounded, groomed, or mannered in the sense that she once was.  Instead, she can be as crass as a sailor and disheveled as a decrepit building.  Woman now strives to not simply become Man, but usurp the authority with which history has bestowed him and beat him into sniveling submission.

I have no quarrel with Woman in her quest for equality, vindication and acknowledgement for the things she does.  I have those same goals and am inclined to crave dominance myself.  I, too, believe that the concept of a woman being more credible and stable if she is tied to a man is farcical.  There are many single women who are stable, considerate people, and many attached women, whether to husband or Jesus, who should get a slap in the head for being as insufferable as they are.  At some point, being a woman took a turn for the vicious and the world will suffer for it.

As SHD says of the good man in his piece, the good woman will also be maimed by those of us who believe that independence and vindication call for the garb of the caring woman to be shed (both figuratively and literally).  She will also be emotionally assaulted by the men of today, who feel that she is a puppeteer.  They will see her attempts to embrace and protect them in her heart as a sign that later she will wound them in their beds.  They will smother her in the pus of the expectation that has festered in their souls from being discarded by real and imagined pin up girls.  She will gain a pound here and a wrinkle there and these trophies of the full life she has lived will be the cues for society to strip her status as 'beauty' from her.  Those of us who have hardened our own souls to the lace-lined frills of weakness will deal the final strike, and watch her as she leaks her last breath with furrowed brow and quivering lip.

We have already slaughtered much of the good in this world.  We will continue to believe that it is because the face of good has somehow changed.  Decency does not morph with time.  It is no different now than it was in the ancient world.  The day that our amnesia is lifted may be the day we regain a modicum of hope.

 Katherine Hepburn,

the woman who proved to me that you can still be a lady in a man's suit

Athena Rising

Incepto ne desistam- "May I not shrink from my purpose"

I am often told of my fragility and volatility.  I consider myself to be Pallas Athena, virgin goddess of war, strength, art and all around gracious intelligence.  However, the world tends to view me more as her pretty, but temperamental priestess- still unripened fruit obeying the laws of the divine and liable to being plucked by Heracles, Zeus or some vagrant atmospheric element that sweeps through the temple.

In a way, this image was superimposed on my fate as a sort of stencil by my doting and well intentioned family, along with almost everyone I came across.  I was the delicate, pink-cheeked child who cried at a moment's notice and hid her toys from inexorable damage at the hands of visiting peers.  Throughout my life, though, I have allowed the markings of my being to follow this hovering stencil out of respect, obedience and the understanding that I was to be a proper, well-mannered child and grow into a proper, well-mannered woman.

I questioned very few turns of this guide when I was young and I like to think I have become something of a lady.  However, every now and then I climb a hill, play with a reptile or sit on the floor and I can hear the aghast gasps of everyone who groomed me.  A series of realities becomes apparent to me as if strung together by the hooked paper clips of every "yes ma'am" or "yes sir" I have ever muttered.  In my mind, I am berated by my high school Headmistress for daring to munch on that oatmeal and raisin cookie while walking in public.  In another scene, I am scolded by my father for being clumsy and falling on the rocks in Hellshire...again.  In yet another, I am consoled by my grandmother for being pricked by thorns while attempting to pick fruits from a tree.  Maybe if I weren't so delicate, I would know how to cut that can open without slicing my finger in the process.

When these thoughts come up, I am tempted to imagine some sort of wretched constraint placed on me by the society in which I was raised.  It is a society which, after all, often places frailty on a pedestal- or, in my case, a low stool from which I am in no danger of falling.  When I think things through, I am grateful that those who love me have sheltered me from experiences that may very well have scarred me for the rest of my days.  I remember telling one of the researchers in Hellshire when I first went there that I wanted a scar, because I had never had one and I had always wanted that discoloured trophy that I could flaunt as a symbol of having done something significant, daring or even just fun.  He warned me that I may not like the event that led to that scar or the scar itself once it was permanently stitched into my skin.  Nevertheless, I wanted it and I got it.  Well, I got many.

My point is this.  I cherish each scar and memory of pain as an effigy of the person I was in that moment.  I may not have had the most exciting life, but I am content with the wonders I have seen and the love with which I have been showered.  I am thankful for the experiences that were snuck into my tapestry of time by my family and friends, and for those that are still to come.  I still chuckle when I touch my ear, because I remember when my aunt (my 'Big Mommy') defiantly took me to get my ears pierced without my mother's consent because she just thought I was ready.  I have kept every ticket stub for every movie I have laughed at, scoffed at or just seen nonchalantly with my friends.  I have had a life, and I look forward to filling it with even more moments of awe, basic contentment and every emotion between and beyond.

I will close with these messages.  To those who see me from a distance, I am stronger and even more temperamental than I look.  If at first you do not believe this, I will show you, possibly forcefully.  To my protectors, I am the lady you have built, with a few kinks indented by many falls from that stool on which you placed me.  I am okay with a scar or two and a few patches of dirt on my skin.  It is okay to let go, because if I fall again I know how to pick my pieces off the rocks that constitute this world and glue them back together.

I am a haphazard mess inside a well defined exterior.  I am proud of that.  If I am not yet Athena, all I need is time.

Pallas Athena, Rembrandt, ~1665

Denied Din and Refuted Silence

"You deserve better" is a codex of contradictory emotions wrought into three simple words.  When one is in love, there is a rush of hormones and nervous impulses that implicate the mind and body in delightful mischief.  However, the realisation that the object of one's affection may be happier or 'better off' with another, more suitable option is a difficult concept to digest.

On one hand, it is a bitter feeling knowing that you have somehow introduced misery into someone's daily routine by simply (unintentionally or otherwise) swaying them in your direction.  On the other hand, it is quixotically soothing that they could possibly find happiness, though not with you.  The joy of knowing your feelings are requited is unmatched, but at what point are you allowed to negate their God-given right to choose to be involved with you simply because you feel they would somehow be more content with someone else?

Is it when you observe that you are Rekha to the archangel Gibreel (The Satanic Verses, Salman Rushdie)? When, though your love cannot be realised, you want him to stay, hope beyond hope that he will stay with you?  When, because he necessarily severs his affection for you due to your duty to family, you (metaphorically) throw yourself from a rooftop and stalk him on a flying carpet in an attempt to seduce him in your posthumous state? Or is it when you become his Alleluia? When you, his mountain-woman, are instantaneously taken captive by his innately seductive aura? When you find that he has come after you out of deep longing for your mind, your touch, your scent, you, and you take him into your heart assuming that he will be yours completely despite the warnings you receive from those closest to you?

I wonder about this every now and then, among many other love puzzles I may never solve.  It is tempting to force separation and distance between you and the one who feels so strongly for you that he would deny himself the basic "better" that he deserves.  It is all at once easy and difficult to become a monstrous thing that you believe he could never desire so that he will finally notice how truly mismatched you are.  However, it is just as easy-difficult to accept that he has seen something in you that gives him a surge of happiness that he would in no way discard.  One must sort through the ridges of the din and isolate those that will strengthen whatever it is that has been built with this chosen being, for emotional investments have been made.  One must also scrutinise the viscous silence for those impurities that seek to defile this built thing, for it is wholly unreasonable to single-handedly make decisions for you both based on clouded judgment.

"This wondrous malady", as Petrarch called it, need not be a mangled, deprecated thing.  It could be a beautiful paradox that unfurls between consenting, though weary, beings who want and may even need each other.  And, though it may be brief, it is better to have tasted that wondrous pastry than to never have had such sugar coat your lips.

No Need for a Hissy Fit

Here are my two 'Saturn ad' cents:

I'm not offended by the ad in the same way I'd say an American or any other nationality would be overly sensitive if they were to react in that way to a similar use of their flag.  The ad is PRAISING Jamaica. Did you realize that? Yes, they probably broke a few copyright infringement laws and a few discretionary protocols, but all in all it was just saying Jamaica is awesome.  Just like the VW and Heineken ads, the use of the great black, green & gold was not degradation, it was admiration. 

Do you want to know what the funny part is? This is exactly what happened in the ad.  One act of admiration was misunderstood by millions and the result was an UNNECESSARY RIOT.  Yeah, I yelled it & I'll yell it again. UNNECESSARY!

When did everyone get so testy & high strung? No need for a temper tantrum, people.  Calm down & sip some Blue Mountain coffee.

For those who missed it:

What's This All About Now?

I've been thinking a lot about life lately.  The main foci have been career, peace of mind, art, travel, love and health.  I've always seen my career as the backbone of my life, the steel on which the concrete of my days will depend for support.  Peace of mind has always been the scaffolding of my life.  It's that structure that allows everything else to be built smoothly and to be structurally sound, although it tends to be creaky and downright questionable more often than not.  My art is the door to my breath and the key that releases my spirit into the woods to wear flower garlands and skip through grass as dandelion seeds are plucked from their stems by playful winds.  Travel has always been the decorative colouring in the corners of my mind.  I want to visit all the ruins of ancient civilizations, from Petra to Athens to the Valley of the Kings, and feel what the people must have felt as their skin got burnt by the sun or sand filled  their lungs in those very spots.  Love has always been that elusive, but tyrannical imp that pulls my hair, teases me with ticklish giggles and yanks from my soul less than glamorous outpourings of entirely overblown affection.  Health, though, has never been a serious consideration for me...until recently.

Recently, I began to notice that all the little quirks of my body were becoming imposing oddities.  My cramping knees became too weak for walking, headaches became sledgehammers to coherency, clogged ears and sinuses became inhibited senses and constant ringing.  Suddenly, my little temperamental body would no longer stay silent.  That was when I realized that the structure of my life may have had bones, scaffolding, doors, decoration and sweet pests, but this was the concrete I had so long ignored.

We don't always realize what's brewing beneath the layers that we consider most important.  Then one day we aren't able to walk, think, hear or breathe and it hits us that we've been neglecting these colossal parts of our beings for too long and they've simply degenerated slowly at their own will.  You see, they don't care that we have reports to finish or people to see.  They do what they are wired to do, disregarding you as if you were the speck of dust on the wall that everyone overlooks.  If that wiring is deterioration, then what do you suppose you will ever be able to do about it?

In my case, I've come to realize that my bodily quirks are more than just annoyances, but what's this new eruption of health issues all about?  They could potentially- and already do- get in the way of the life I have planned.  Admittedly, I imagine my future and everything I want to do and, once continued degeneration is factored in, I wonder if these plans and dreams of mine are realistic.  What have I not told anyone? Take your pick.  This isn't the first time that my knees have buckled beneath my weight, my head has struck me motionless for hours on end, my ears randomly pop every now and then and suddenly I realize I was barely hearing the world around me.  No one needs to know that I've taken to grinding my teeth because almost every act is too painful for some part of my body to bear.

Will the pain stop me from hiking up that hill or writing that paper? It may try, but I'll fight it if I have to.  Hey, it's not that bad, right?

...

Lives there who loves his pain? 
Who would not, finding way, break loose from Hell, 
Though thither doomed? Thou wouldst thyself, no doubt,
And boldly venture to whatever place
Farthest from pain, where thou mightst hope to change
Torment with ease, and soonest recompense
Dole with delight...

- John Milton Paradise Lost