Echo

if people found out their Other existed on this earth
was a human just like them
had a life somewhere on the other side of the world
and even though you could traverse the world in a leap,
for them to be real, you could never touch them or their world…
would most people have the strength to accept that something magical exists by the power of faith, but only in the distance,
or would they not want to know there is something beautiful that only exists if they don’t touch it?

more than anything, i have most often been mistaken as a poet by seattleites. or perhaps, they are naming a truth i do not feel i can accept yet.

what defines a writer? is it by the number of works they have published? or is it by this private, inner compulsion for voice, to speak?

i have lately, become more at peace when i realized i am someone who will probably be known for one major work, finished close to the time i die.

today, the first day of rains. this city is tough on the body. but as i was feeling the sky for your echoes, i examined my inherent shame at calling myself a writer. it is because i write, but i do not publish. i don’t like people to know what i write, and most didn’t suspect the sheer volume until people found out about the notebooks and blog. but none of it is what i really want to say most, churning to keep me in shape until the time when i can. i write only what i want to say, and i have no control over the flow, like by saying, i want to finish a book, or i want to have a screenplay produced, i suddenly freeze up. i don’t seem to want these things. at least these are not as important to me.

i have something deep and pressing inside me. it is so deep, i don’t even have access to it myself. but the only thing i know, is that there is only one person i want to tell this story to. and i’ve been holding it for him, waiting for myself to get stronger so i could have the words. it is positive, but powerful. with great power comes great responsibility. i think that’s why i’m waiting for someone as strong as me.

i wonder if, perhaps, it won’t be me who writes this story. i wonder if the real writer, is the one who hears it.

Don’t wish it away
Don’t look at it like it’s forever
Between you and me
I could honestly say
That things can only get better

And while I’m away
Dust out the demons inside
And it won’t be long
Before you and me run
To the place in our hearts
Where we hide

–the beautiful sir elton john

Brand New By Tomorrow – Money Mark

Some things grow apart, some things grow together
Some things never start, ours is turning into memories
And guess there’s no way to avoid a broken heart
What I can say is, I will never go very far

We’ll be brand new by tomorrow
We’ll be brand new by tomorrow

I used to love the games we played
But now I have to stay on my side of the street
I like the words we used to say to each other
But now our vocabulary’s changed

Anytime you want me to pretend, I will
You’ll always be my friend looking out the window sill
No sense in getting down on yourself
We put the trophy on the shelf

We’ll be brand new by tomorrow

11 in the pm

i felt your echo in the still blue wind
a thousand breaths waiting on a ghost train
a thousand eyes for a spotlight
a thousand distances that all knew your name
every one, except the one that knew mine

and yet, all it takes is a moment
the space between two hands keeping time.

to lift your head towards the nearest star
to place your heart upon the highest mountain
to fill your eyes in the pools of the moon and say,

today was another beautiful day before i met you.

while in laguna beach last weekend, my parents were reminiscing about the past. they said that the thing about me as a kid, was that any toy that other kids had, the parents would turn around for a second and the next thing they would know, the toy would be in my hands. i just had a way of getting things from the other kids, and it kind of freaked the other parents out. but the kids wanted to give me these things, i said. it’s not like i took things against people’s will.

we realize that now, my dad said. but it was just the fact that we would turn around and things would always be in your hands.

and you were always the leader, my mom said. any party, by the end of the night, all the boys would be running around the house wild, and you would always be the leader. and the only thing that would stop you were the nose bleeds from getting so worked up. and do you remember linus? he absolutely adored you. his mother was so mad one day because you told him to be your watchdog, so he sat on the ground at your feet, guarding you, and even when his mother told him to get up, he wouldn’t.

i have a way with boys, i said.

we just didn’t understand then, my mom said. we should have just let you be you.

*****
a few days before, i saw one of my dad’s friends whom i haven’t seen in probably 8 years. he can’t believe how much i look like my mom when she was in her 20’s. he said he remembers me being 2 years old, and he and his wife watched me for an afternoon. they took me to a park, and anything that interested me, i had to give it a little kick before i could walk away.

some things never change, i said.

Names that resonate for me:

Adrian
Cameron
Miles
Ian

and most importantly,
Ames

Most of the -ian’s make me pause and observe though. Not the -yan’s (like Ryan, Bryan), but the -ian’s.

feedback from my work as a verb (Being) last night:

Hi Julia:
Wow, wow :) It was great talking to you last night, I am thoroughly impressed by your keen intellect and am figuring that some of it might rub off onto me if I hang out with you sometime?
How about that Band?

Thanks For The Introduction To Your World Last Night, You Speak On a level which I would like to be on more often.

Truly, Michael

*****
Unfortunately, I’m still in solitary, gathering mode. I’m looking for something very specific, but I am grateful for the positive connection and the feedback.

“You know what it was? It was your smile. And your smile led me to your eyes,” he said.

10/9/09

1. julia meets cameron
2. julia meets 2 pilots, neither of whom have read the little prince.
3. julia experiences the theoretics (mindblowing)
4. julia makes a man’s hands shake. “you’re such a powerful spirit. your intelligence…i admire it and fear it. i’ve never experienced anything like it. i…i just need a moment.”
5. if you don’t think you’re good enough for someone, then you’re not. i will know him because he will make himself known; he won’t fear me but will be grateful to have finally met me.
6. julia gets bought a drink by a smooth, magician in black named moodi. the bartender agrees to make a fake drink without alcohol, to make sure i make it out of the night.
7. you don’t ask, you don’t get–carl who looks like david boreanaz (who plays seeley booth…whom you will notice, i recently said i would be open to), comes back 3 times over the course of the night. all three times, he failed to state what he really wanted. you don’t ask, you don’t get. and for me to give it to you without you asking, doesn’t benefit anyone. he resigned himself to letting me disappear into the night. as most men who are not ready do.

in the still of the night, it is the rhythms of the breeze that guide you home to me. you have no idea how faithful i’ve been.

I went outside to take a picture of a cloud that looked like a winged dragon crossing the sky.

Was surprised to find what else my camera was catching.

A sky on fire. And a giant lightning bolt.
Z.
I was just talking about you.

Maybe I am a verb. Maybe I run along the Z axis. And the people of X & Y I meet seem to perceive me as being of their world, because I appear 2-dimensional like them, but really, I live on the Z, which is why I can see where they’re coming from, but they have no idea where I’m coming from. But then, upon meeting another being who runs the Z, it gives me proof that our world is just as real as their world.

One of the biggest accomplishments in my life is that in those moments when my mom puts the phone down, and turns to my dad saying, “Jerry, you won’t believe what your daughter’s doing now…,” she’s not saying what I’m thinking about doing; she’s saying what I’ve done. There’s no honor for “thinking about doing.” Only what’s doing or done.

I’m starting to think the problem is that people see themselves as nouns when they should be experiencing themselves as verbs.

I’ve chosen organic lavender, grapefruit and blue chamomile oils as components of Elixr. I chose them specifically for their complementary taste notes as well as for their homeopathic qualities.

this girl’s got crazy flow!