Echo

He asked me if I was not feeling good. I told him yes. Instead of doing something, dealing with it, saying we should talk about it, he got drunk.

He’s always thinking about things and that’s his substitute for doing things or addressing things. He thinks once he 100% grasps things, then he’ll deal with things, but you’ll never be able to understand everything. All that does is prevent you from dealing. Facing. Resolving.

Our dynamic is I give and give and then I realize he’s not giving back. When I point it out, it’s like pulling teeth until I want to leave. Then he gives, but what he gives is just a promise that he’ll give in the future, or that he’s here with me. Just being there is not enough. Just committing to be there is not enough. Commitment doesn’t end at just promising to always be there. And the cycle keeps repeating. What he gives me are these promises that he’s going to take care of me. He’s going to face things, deal with things. These are like that gift certificate. But when I go to redeem the things he says, that he be there in the moment with me, he’s gone. Like the certificate, when you go to redeem it, you find out it’s worthless. Except maybe for more promises.

I dreamed that there were spiders all over the bedroom, the thick black scary kinds. I yelled for him to do something and he went into the bathroom. I was yelling to hurry. I saw a big one crawl under the bed. Once you lose track of them, you don’t feel comfortable in your own bed because you know it’s somewhere in the room but don’t know where. I waited, thinking maybe he was grabbing a bunch of cups or doing something to be able to get all of them so that was why it was taking so long. Then I looked into the bathroom and he was looking at himself in the mirror, inspecting himself. I yelled at him, what are you doing??? I was panicked that he had no sense of urgency, angry with him. In my head, I said, “It’s over.” I can’t deal with this anymore.

The spiders are a symbol for our problems. If they aren’t taken care of they lurk, and you don’t feel comfortable in the place you need to feel safe because you know they’re there somewhere, but you don’t know when they’ll rear their ugly head. He knows I’m scared of spiders and I waited for him to come back and do something. I told myself to be calm, that maybe he was taking longer because he needed to grab more paper or cups to deal with all of them. But when I looked, he was looking at himself in the mirror. Maybe he really didn’t have a sense of urgency, or maybe he was scared of the spiders so that was his way of not dealing, or delaying. But in that moment, I knew that’s the kind of person he is and I just can’t count on him.

****

I like him, I really do.  But you gotta ask yourself if you can do this for the rest of your life.

what’s “this?” Thoughtlessness? Selfishness? Stinginess? What is this?

“This” is all of the above.  All of the crying, all of the arguing, all of the questioning, all of the problems, all of the fixing, all of the stories, all of the times you have to ask me for advice, all of the times you have to pull Shello away to talk to her, all of the times you close the door to talk to Jean.

“This,” is everything.

I know he has a good heart, and I know you’re not perfect either.  But you deserve better.

Best of Reddit’s Glitch the Matrix Board:

We have a breakfast laid on at work every morning, just a simple buffet of eggs, bacon what have you. Nothing huge and it’s really only to feed about a dozen people or so. I am usually one of the first guys from my team to get to work and the kitchen was deserted as usual. I walked into the little kitchen, there was a ceramic egg tray thing with 12 eggs in it, like the bottom half of an egg carton with a socket for each egg. All spaces are filled with warm freshly boiled eggs.

I take one, walk over to the garbage bin, shuck the shell then I walk back over to the food and stop dead. There are 12 eggs in the tray again. No one entered the room while I was peeling the thing. I touched the mystery egg it was the same temp as the other eggs around it.

Not a big thing, nothing major, but something very strange. Given one does not get presented with strange eggs from a parallel universe every day I peeled and ate that one too.

*****

About 4 or 5 years ago I worked at a Little Caesars Pizza. Usually I would work inside on the pizzas but we had just started up this Monday Madness deal where pizzas were only $4 on Monday so we needed someone to advertise. I was a wild and weird metalhead so I took up the position on Mondays of just going out there, throwing around a sign to get attention, and bring people in for pizza. Not exactly glamorous but I had fun.

One day while I was out there doing my thing I see a van coming straight at me. It jumps the curb and slams in to me and I feel it crush me against the electrical box controlling the street lights. I see a quick flash as the traffic lights flick off then black out.

I gasp and I’m still on the corner and nothing has happened. No van or anything. Well, I was a little shaken up so I decide to pack it up and walk back to the store for a break. I walk no more than 15 feet away from the corner when I hear a crash. I look back and a van just hopped the curb in to the electrical box and I watch the traffic lights flick off.

Needless to say, I took the day off. Still think about that from time to time.

*****

When I was 15 I was incredibly depressed and struggling with my OCD and anxiety. It got to the point that I decided to kill myself. I arranged everything (Note, when, where, how etc.) and waited. I waited about a week until my parents went out to dinner. I attached a note to my door telling my parents not to come in and to just call the police, got dressed in my nicest clothes, showered, did my hair, and put a suicide note in my shirt pocket. My father had a number of guns and I chose one of them to do the deed with — a Beretta 92 handgun or something like that. I went into my bedroom, turned on some music and laid down on my bed. I put the barrel into my mouth, sang a few lines of ‘Freefallin’ through tears and pulled the trigger.

Then it went into a third person type thing where I was just watching myself. I saw myself laying dead on my bed, slumped over and bleeding everywhere. I watched myself lie in my own gore for what seemed like forever. Then suddenly it felt like all the wind get knocked out of me, and I was back in my body.

click

The gun jammed. I just threw it onto the ground and sobbed into my pillow for hours before cleaning up everything and going to sleep.

I have no idea what happened that day, but I’m more grateful than you can imagine. After that I really made an effort to turn my life around, and it did. It’s scary thinking that I wouldn’t be here right now if it worked.

*****

People want me because I’m a mirror. They are really just looking for themselves.

I absorb people’s unconscious. But I can also mirror it back to them. You would be surprised how many people don’t even recognize their own reflection.

What if you went around the world and found your mirror? Then wouldn’t you in fact, contain the world?

Pisces are difficult mirrors.

I’m kind of bummed because I have a thing for this guy who plays basketball at the gym, and rarely do I have a thing for someone and go out of my way. Ever since Seattle and the whole wanting only what’s mine thing, I’ve been cautious about not wasting my time, not feeling obligated spending time with people if I’m not feeling it. That’s caused more people than ever to approach me, and it’s funny because something about that, the unattainability, makes guys try harder. But end of the day, I just don’t have patience for it anymore. I want my partner. I want someone I can see myself having kids with, having a future with.

Otherwise I’m just gonna make a shitload of money, buy a mansion on a hill and live like Bruce Wayne.

So I like this guy–I can tell a lot about a person from the way he plays basketball and this guy works hard, is a great teammate, and is a very generous and positive person because like me, he’s always vocally encouraging on the court. Dark hair, neat beard, hazel eyes…something both masculine and gentle about him…he just does it for me. I really like him.

Except he’s just not that into me.

And I’m bummed.

I figured he had a girlfriend because something about him seems unavailable. I remember he left early once because he said he had to go pick someone up, and so I assumed it was a girlfriend or a kid. But it was funny because I had a feeling, so I went on match.com on a hunch, and found his profile. Said he just moved here from Pittsburgh for work and was new to the area.

I have a profile that’s hidden from using it on and off over the years, but the truth is outside of meeting up with people in my early 20’s when I first moved to LA, I’ve never been interested enough in anyone who’s contacted me on that site to do anything about it, so I don’t have a paying membership. I signed up just to be able to contact him, saying I just moved here, too, and if he was ever interested in a friend to meet up for coffee with, etc. He didn’t respond.

I saw him at the gym yesterday, the first time since writing him, but we were playing on different courts. On some level he was aware of me–from the opposite end of the gym, he was mirroring me. But I pretended I didn’t notice him, respecting his space. If he wanted to talk to me, he would.

I played a few games and was cooling down by shooting around. I found myself watching his game. He missed a shot and he got frustrated. I put believe into him, wanting him to embody the strength I saw him to have. He ended up disrupting the play on the defensive end, rebounded the ball in traffic, then hit a 3. I was so happy at what happened that I broke out in a huge smile. I felt radiant, laughing inside. As he ran back after hitting the 3, he happened to look up, saw me grinning, and looked almost surprised. He smiled a genuine, happy smile and said, “Oh hey!” and waved. It was a great feeling, to connect in that moment. And a part of me was happy that in his feel-good moment, he had looked over and seen me in my moment, so that he would associate his happiness with my smile.  

I left while he was still in his game.

I wish I had as much confidence in myself in personal matters as I do in professional. I go into every customer meeting so passionate. But here…I want the guy to want me. I want a guy to help me break down my walls. But I haven’t found that guy. I want someone who can see how invested I can be in their success and their feeling good about themselves, and appreciate that.

It’s even more frustrating because lately I’ve been so popular and meeting so many guys who are interested in me, but when it comes to the ones I’m interested in, I feel powerless.

In the rare moments when I meet a guy I want, I want him to want me back.

It’s so simple. But it feels like I’m consistently being denied.

It’s because that night, I laid in bed and thought about it. And I decided that if being ready meant being completely open to believing that if this guy is the one I’ve been waiting for, then I would accept him as he is. And I let myself put those dreams on him, and allowed myself to believe it was possible.

And it was the same old shit. I did something I’ve haven’t done in a long time, want something and be willing to accept what I got. And it was illusion.

This world is all smoke and mirrors.

Everything is always in motion. Everything is always changing.
Where is it we go in those moments when we’re not here?
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A mirror only shows you how you see yourself. It doesn’t show how others see you. Think about which side is which when you are looking at your reflection, and when you’re looked upon by others. You see yourself, but it is not the face that others see because it is the opposite.
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Full moon over North Beach and the weirdest thing happened. We were leaving a sushi restaurant and taking pictures. It was my mom, Edward, my grandma and I. I saw this guy in a Prius wearing a skull cap drive by. We smiled at each other. I saw him turn his car around as we got in ours.

They wanted me to drive. As I was fumbling around trying to figure out the lights, my mom said, there’s was a guy who was almost naked. We looked around and she said he was gone. We asked her a bunch of questions–was he in a car, was he showing her that he was naked… She said he’d been standing by a car and was wearing a g-string. Her story sounded bizarre and I wondered if she was going senile. But then, a few minutes later, we turned out of the parking lot and there walking along the side of the road with his bare ass cheeks to us was a naked guy in a g-string.

We busted out laughing. I wanted to go back and take a picture of him so people would believe this, but when we turned back, he was nowhere in site. As we turned onto the highway, a Prius screeched by in the left lane. I remember thinking simultaneously that this was the guy from the parking lot, and that I must be driving too slow.

We were driving and talking about the g-string man. We wondered if he was going to the house party that was going on near the restaurant, or maybe he was doing some night swimming. As we were lamenting not having a picture to verify our experience, we rounded the corner and there, walking away from us was a butt-naked guy wearing a g-string. We howled in laughter and my mom demanded this time, we had to take a picture.

We turned around and rolled down our window, but the guy was back inside his car. Just go, my mom said, and we jammed out of there, but we were going in the opposite direction from the hotel. They were telling me I needed to turn the car around, but I was watching the rear-view mirror. Bad news, guys, I said. It looks like he’s following us.

It was seriously scary. He followed me through these empty streets lined with trees that reminded me so much of that forest road in la push when I went out driving alone under the full moon. Come to think of it, one of the local cops had pulled me over, but acted like he just wanted to talk to me.

So this guy followed me, flashed his lights and kept trying to get me to pull over. My family was freaking out and keep saying that she was very scared. I told her to calm down. I wondered if I would have to prepare for defensive driving maneuvers in case he tried to run me off the road. A fucking Prius! I wished I could be doing this in a BMW but I figured I learned how to drive with minivan, And I used to race with it.

So I kept an eye on him, trying to drive like I didn’t even notice him, not panicking. Edward navigated me to a loop that would allow me to drive towards the hotel, which saved me a 180 maneuver. At one point, he was honking but we ignored him. So he swerved into the right lane as soon as one opened up and looked right at me as he passed by.

Slowed down, letting him increase the distance ahead of me. I would rather have him in front but I was afraid he would stop and block the road or something insane. My family calmed down but I was still tense watching his taillights. He did slam on the brakes once and I slowed to a crawl. The car behind me must have thought I was drunk. He started moving again. So did I, keeping as much distance as possible. He gained a lot of ground, then suddenly hit the brakes. I got a rush of adrenaline. He pulled over!, my mom yelled.

I approached carefully, seeing his car but not him. I worried he would jump in front of my car. I decided to make break for it, stepping on the gas. As we pass his car, he suddenly jumps out of the shadows with his thumb out like a hitchhiker. Still in nothing but a skullcap and g-string.

He’s waving some blue squares of paper in his other hand. They look like club fliers or something. Of course we don’t stop for this crazy motherfucker so we keep driving, passing him as he furiously waves his thumb at us. In my rearview mirror, I saw him throw his hand to the sky in naked frustration. Then he scrambled to his car,

He’s still following us, I said.

We were about 10 miles away from the hotel, arguing about why this was happening and what could he want. He was behind another car that was keeping him at bay, but it looked like he’d given up anyway. I performed a scary dotted-line pass of two cars and with them between me and the Prius, I felt better. The whole experience was bizarre and creepy, and I was glad I wasn’t the only one who’d witnessed it. How weird would that be if that guy was some ghost who haunts is stretch of freeway?, I said.

The weird thing was that there was something on the windshield the whole time we were driving, like a frost stain.the wipers weren’t resolving it; neither was the defrost. It was troublesome enough that my mom was complaining about it. But after we got Way from the guy, my mom made the comment that the weird frost was gone. Like somewhere during that guy chasing us, the weird frost disappeared.

When we pulled into the hotel, we asked the woman at the gate if shed ever heard of some guy in a g-string, then we told her the story. She was blown away. I’ve never heard of that, she said. You should have called the cops. The guy at the valet wondered if it was some guy he called Monkey Man that he’d heard some stories about, but when pressed for the details of those stories, he couldn’t provide details.

The funniest thing? My t-shirt read, WTF?

you’ve got to let me have it. and by that, you know what i mean.

meaning is mean. just actualized.

i once met a man in the woods, who made the woods disappear. i lost him in a dream.

it’s not my fearful symmetry they fear. it’s my lack of control.

i was afraid of you. for all the wrong reasons.

they’re all inside of you. bearing their own seasons.

if i wanted it to stop…

if jesus took the midnight train,

and found his god in a pillow stain

would you still know who to trust?

but jesus would never be on a train. he’s dead.

in the mirror there is a path

that shows you now and where you were last

and in the space between you can fall…up if you want to.

until you wake another you in a more familiar place.

this place has its own time, and you are your own mind, but when you look in the mirror,

it’s not you.

travelers. do you know who i am?

  __10/31/10__

I feel like when I meet my guy, he’s not going to have a girlfriend. He may not be exactly ready for me, but at least always reserved a room.

Let’s talk about what honor means to me.

There are so many things I could have, so many people I could want, but I know that if I manipulate things to go my way, I may end up with a very bad situation. And I like good situations, healing versus causing damage. So I exercise a lot of discipline, and I’m motivated by the fact that people can get hurt by my decisions to keep me careful.

These guys show up, and they already have a woman in their lives, but they’re drawn out. We are like two travelers meeting on the opposite banks of a river.

And yes, they see what I am, they are intrigued by the possibilities, but on the other hand, they already have something that’s real. No matter how great or how poor it is, at least it’s real. But still they hesitate, and in their eyes I see an open door, inviting me, yet I also know they aren’t prepared to catch me when I fall through enveloping them in the fantastical. So for the sake of both of us, I don’t. Sometimes men don’t know the way they tease a strong woman is like a child, and the truth of the naive is that their curiosity and daring borders on cruelty. But we learn strength by still caring about you despite how you tease, as long as you don’t get outright malicious.

I want the world inside of me, so deep that the closer I get to touching it, the more of myself I reflect. When we look in a mirror, we always know which is us and which is reflection, because it is trapped inside a little box. But what about the 2am, when you round the corner some dark wet night in a landscape of concrete and metal, and up through the fog you come face to face with yourself? Everything. Your body. Your eyes. Your feel. Your smell.

Who are you then?

The Eye?

Or the Mirror?

Learn how to use mirrors. How you treat them, is exactly how they will treat you. Define your relationship. Define that this is an open system, for both succeeding or requiring disconnection.

I wouldn’t let anyone touch me today.
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The first time I hung out with Curtis. I saw him orbiting closer and closer, testing out different distances. When I noticed he was suddenly sitting on my couch and I couldn’t remember how long he’d been there, and realized if I leaned back he would be within a personal space distance too close to ignore, I decided I needed to leave. He said he had no intentions of trying anything but from my perspective, his intentions followed a straight line with a clear motivation. But he says it wasn’t in his mind.

So then, like right now. The guy in the bar sitting next to me. I haven’t directly caught him watching me, but I know he is because he’s mirroring me. I keep my eyes off him. Pick up my drink, he picks up his. I lean back, he leans back. And we have yet to make eye contact. A few minutes ago, he leaned against the bar to order a drink. His hand rested against mine. I moved my arm. He quickly moved his hand. So if I looked him in the eye suddenly and asked him if he is trying to get my attention, he would be shocked and say no? Or is he completely unconscious of his body carrying out the intentions of his will?

I think I tend to interact with people’s shadows, their unconscious being. Maybe that’s why I see things they communicate that they seem oblivious of (or perhaps they’re not willing to admit), and I have these experiences with people where I have conversations that they don’t remember or don’t own up to. Or maybe the part of these people that reach out for me is a completely different consciousness within the person. Either way, whether or not people admit it or remember, I don’t enter any life unless they drew me into it. I don’t go anywhere I wasn’t first wanted.

Today was my 3rd day of trying to get up at a reasonable hour (aka morning). The last couple of days, my alarm goes off at 8:45 and again at 9:30, but I keep hitting the snooze button until well past 10 until I turn it off all together to get up closer to noon. Last night, I woke up every 2 hours thinking it was morning, and finally got out of bed just past 7. It was incredible! So this is what morning looks like!

I went to the gym and was really sluggish, but I shot around for half an hour (am hitting about 80% from just outside the key), and started Frankenstein while on the elliptical for 45 minutes.

I went downstairs to do some weights (I’m cleared for 5 lb bicep curls) when I ran into this guy I haven’t seen since last fall. He’s got curly hair and big blue eyes, kinda looks like that guy on Bones. He’s a massage therapist and he always looks at me like he’s watching the sun rise inside me. I don’t know how to explain it–kind of a senseless awe. He’d offered to show me around the last time I saw him, and I’d made some non-committal noises. This time, I saw him and his face lit up. I said hi, then beelined to the other side of the gym but he followed me over and was talking to me about how he hasn’t seen me around in a while. I told him I’d had surgery on my shoulder. I felt like a little kid, hopping from foot to foot, talking really fast, swinging my water bottle nervously, scared that he was going to ask me out again. I ended the conversation with something like, “I’ll be back on the court next month so I’ll see you then.” I went and did some lower back exercises but I noticed he was sticking close and watching me in the mirror, so I moved to do bicep curls, and he moved nearby to do shoulder presses. My instincts told me he was working up the nerve to say something, and my instincts said, “Oh shit.” So I only did one set, purposely ending while he was in the middle of his, then said, “Have a nice day!” taking a few steps towards the hallway leading to the locker room. “Oh,uh, what?” he said, stopping. “Have a nice day!” I said, inching a few more steps away.

“Oh yeah, you too. Hey, um, uh–”

“Bye!”

He was still kind of talking as I twirled and hurried off. I got my stuff together fast and took off before he could decide to stake out the locker room or something.

Sometimes I think I’m kind of a jerk. Do I use my shy awkwardness as a cover for my utter standoffishness? Once upon a time, I used to think, what’s the harm? You get to spend time and get to know someone new, and even if you’re not interested romantically, you make a new friend. But then I remember how terribly awkward I am at extricating myself from situations, especially when I worry about hurting someone’s feelings, and I think you know what? Fuck it. Why walk into something when you’re already planning ways to get out of it. It’s better to not get into it in the first place.

part of perspective is the ability for reflection. i’m moving slower through the book now, using my time. but i love his idea of the universe striving to become self-aware. years ago i randomly met some guy online (i can’t even remember how, i think we started reading each other’s blogs or something). we bonded because we were both gemini’s who lived in la. he published a book of poetry called, in the blink of an I. i loved that title because it was so expressive of the gemini soul, so torn between in here and out there, that our whole outwardly perception, what we see out there, is what we take to serve as our consciousness, the meaning of our I. we met our first time at my 26th birthday party at falcon in hollywood. as usual, disposable cameras were passed out. and he left me with a picture so mysterious, it looked like an abstract representation of space. i found out later it was a picture of his armpit.

the concept of mirrors and mirroring have always been a fascination. this was what hung in my living room when i first moved to la:

it’s dangerous to fall in love with our own reflection, but it doesn’t make our need for reflection less vital. i’ve been reading through a search to find my mention of mirrors. once you can see yourself, then you really know who or what you are, and from there, you can determine exactly where you’re going, and exactly who you want to be. self-reflection is as much getting down to the deepest level inside you as to step as far away from yourself as possible to see as much as you can. the further you go, the more you’ll know. the deeper you go, the more you’ll see. when one side becomes aware of the other, they both grow.

Last night featured an even more violent storm, which attacked the windows, making them cave on their frames. There was zero visibility, and for a while there, it felt like the building might be blown away. I tried not to let it bother me, figuring that this structure had been here for a while and banking on the fact that if it’s stayed intact for this long, it will stay intact yet. I was free writing, and all of a sudden, one line came out of nowhere and landed on the page. It’s appearance was as jarring as stepping in wet, sucking mud (which, incidentally, I did today.). The line was so out of place and strange, that I pulled on it like a loose string, and a whole world opened up. I wrote for 6 hours, just taking down the words, thoughts and lives of these people like a medium at a seance, until I could barely keep my head up. There were times when I was writing and thinking, this may be my most unbelievable writing night to date. Doubt began to creep in, if this was real, if this was any good, if I could carry this out. The story, as usual with me, is out of time, out of place. All I could do was just take down what the characters wanted to say, what they needed said. Even as I crawled into bed, they kept talking to me, showing their lives to me, and even though a part of me was terrified that I would lose this opening by sleeping. I usually write at night, but by morning, in the light of day, I’ll reject what I’ve written. A part of me had to tell myself to trust it. Trust that this is real and what is happening. Trust it long enough for it to fully emerge.

I felt like I was giving birth last night, like it was something that was happening despite whatever my thoughts were on it, and I could either fight it or go with it and help it come out. I remember once, when I read about the 5th house and how it ruled either romance, children or ultimate creative output, how sometimes, you had to choose one of the three to funnel that energy. Maybe for a woman, you can either literally have a child, or you can give birth to something that spiritually, metaphysically, is as deeply a part of you as a child. Maybe in lycan country, like lichen, I have reproduced asexually. Or maybe, I just won’t know who the father is until this thing has fully emerged. It quite possibly could be twins. It doesn’t appear to be black. And yes, what a weird thing to be talking about.

There’s been a lifelong personal debate between me and people who know me. “Are you romantic?”

I never know how to answer that. On one hand, I think the answer is an obvious yes. The fact my life for as long as I’ve been conscious has revolved around the notion of a soulmate, an Other, someone my entrance into this plane of perception separated me from and whom I almost singlemindedly search for. But then I think that could also be symbolism I’ve used in my personal search for god and/or meaning. I don’t believe my Other is the end all be all. I believe he is my partner in a greater search. I see the positive potential in people, I see the positive potential in life. I want us to strive for more, for higher. My relationship with the world around me is one of idealism and romanticism, in the framework of what is realistic (read: possible) for a given plane. I believe I have the power of transformation, if the world would guide me and teach me how to use my abilities. But in spirit, in soul, in mind, I’m the ultimate romantic.

In a conventional sense, what defines being romantic? I’m emotionally secretive and awkward with romantic gestures, even though my well of emotions runs very deep. I hide things even when I can tell in moments when it would serve me to be open, I still feel a need to hide. I rarely have the guts to actually make a full-blown romantic gesture. It’s not from lack of desire, it’s from lack of comfort, a feeling of exposure. But I’m drawn to those who are more easily able to express a romantic nature, who can draw me out. I express my deep feelings through consideration, being helpful, protectiveness, a psychic safeguarding of the hopes and dreams of those I love, their well-being. People I care about matter to me. But despite this, a history of complaints from people about not knowing where they stand. Maybe they just have to ask. Maybe I don’t even know myself. How do you know when you’ve found your Other? I assume you just know. I assume, that maybe you don’t know right away, maybe for the longest time you just know that you DON’T know for sure that they’re not him, until one day, you suddenly know. Until then, I can’t make any promises. I don’t think the question is if I, by nature, am romantic. It’s been the lack of expression. But am I capable? I think if the world is open to the form in which it comes in, my heart and its capacity to love will prove to be undeniable.

All this was in my head last night as my fingers flew along the keyboard and my mind rode the waves. I realized, as I watched the words spill out, I could possibly once and for all answer that question. Often a work reveals more about the writer than anything else. I want this to show what it is I can’t seem to outwardly express through my person. I want it to end the question. I want people to read this story, and know exactly what love means to me, and to what depths and lengths I believe in this world. I’ve made an art out of mirroring for other people to help them appreciate themselves, their potential. Now it’s time. I need these words, these people, this world inside, to be a truthful, powerful mirror of me.

field notes – triple door 3/13/10 (arrival 10:54pm/departure 12:14am)

If they’re watching you, even from across the room, they’ll mirror you. That’s how you can tell someone is watching you, even if their eyes aren’t on you. Or, when you make eye contact, they’ll perform a gesture to see if you mirror them. It’s to see if you are subconsciously in agreement with them. This is how they test for connection.

If you’re agreeable by nature, you’ll tend to mirror people without being necessarily conscious of it. If you tend to find yourself stuck in unwanted situations and you don’t know why or how, either your subconscious is working against you, or it’s leading you without you being fully aware. It takes consciousness + discipline to suppress the urge to mirror. You have to let yourself relax, stand your ground, solidify your core.

They say that when you write, you have to think of the person you’re writing to. One famous writer wrote from the point of view as though he were talking to his dead sister. You never fully understood who you were writing to and you’re always trying to get other people to tell you. Maybe you’re writing full circle to yourself. Like a game of telephone with yourself that travels through people’s consciousness and back to you. You always said if you lost something and it went around the world through time and space and it found you again, you would believe in god and universe. Maybe that’s your God. A full circle. That everything begins and ends, but there’s really no difference between the two. That everything is everything. Maybe you hope to find that sign of life, where one day, someone calls out your name, in a voice more familiar than time.

sometimes, it’s the moment that grips me in the throat, and i forget to breathe

When you’re in tune with a room, it’s like having a radar. And you can feel who notices you, who wants to be let in. It’s like because they notice you in a crowded room, you exist for them, and vice versa, they now exist for you. You walk into a room, and ignore everyone. And soon, there’s a tingling. A feeling of being watched. And you can feel their proximity. Sometimes, it’s just a knowing. Sometimes, it’s a heat, an echo, or a flat, dull void. And you turn your head in that direction and through the dark, are two piercing eyes. You only let in the ones with smiles you recognize.

I love leaving a place for a month and coming back. See how it’s moved. See what else I notice about it, having reset my perspective. The biggest change this time back is I can sit in a room and not care who the fuck notices me. I can be in my own world, or I can be in the collective one, but either way, if I don’t make eye contact with you, you don’t approach me. For the most part, the room stayed at bay.

Most people won’t make contact unless you’ve had eye contact with them. Learn to look at people, take in information, without making a connection.

I wondered, can I pull signals not in the room. I focused my mind on California and concentrated on, “Find me now.” Looked down at my phone. Red light blinking for a msg received. Two fish on one line coming in at 11:05pm from Northern CA, one from Curtis, one from Rie. I raised an eyebrow. Noted it in my notebook. If today is this magnetic, tomorrow should be even more interesting, given it’s an 11 day. The knowledge is dropping like snowflakes tonight.

I’ve always taught myself. I let myself lead myself. So who is it that’s handing the knowledge to me? Is it something so grand as a greater force? Or is it just me in the Future, passing it back? Have I traveled so fast that I am only a shadow, an echo, of myself? I don’t think that person has that much power or knows particularly more. That person just has wisdom from perspective, as one might if they were a bit further ahead in the story. And I have to make the right decisions, so that the things I know to be true in the future can exist as I walk towards them in the present.

Every relationship has an optimal place and condition that it inherently defines. We try so hard to force relationships into roles, particularly because society demands that of us for order, but in order for them to really activate and fulfill their highest potential, you have to look really honestly and create a space where you can accept relationships for what they are. Even if that means compromises or being unconventional.

Yesterday I got hit with hot oil on my ring finger and it left a welt. I noticed it this morning, and it’s a red diagonal slash exactly where I would wear a ring. I wonder if it’ll leave a scar. It looks like a brand. Like some mythical god branded me his. I would be very disturbed if I found myself mysteriously pregnant with a half god/half human prodigy.

But then again, the world needs a new hero.

If you put too much energy into what other people think, you’ll never even get to know what you think.

Writers are willing to see Truth. Life from the only point of view they could ever really know…theirs.

We are our own personal truths.

No one is simple. There are just degrees of blindness.

The arks are where the knowledge will be stored. Like grabbing what will be needed for a new mankind. For whatever reason, I’m in charge of information, knowledge. Understanding of humanity. A belief in innocence.

If you detach and live in your own world, but your world is powerful enough to pull people into it, does it matter if it wasn’t the original world?

Fuck, I got caught. Unwanted eye contact. Now a conversation is inevitable. At least this is like paintball. Get caught and you’re just dead in the game. Out there, get caught and you’re dead.

I just pretended I was deaf and/or foreign. First time I had the guts to commit to that. The thing about that play is, if you can’t pull it off, you’re SUCH an asshole.

Sometimes I wonder if this blog is about the things I care about, or the things I let go. Probably a little bit of both.

“Are you writing a book or something?” He was Filipino with a blue baseball cap. I smiled.

“Just a letter to a friend,” I said.

They say, “You can’t use people for sex.” And she thought, “But why else would you get close to them?”

This fucking guy ambushed a group of tall, pretty girls dressed like they just left the symphony. “I’m not like a one night stand kind of guy. I’m just a 4, you know, but this girl was an 11. So what can I say? It was like hitting the lotto! I couldn’t say no. But I didn’t want to be that guy who’s an asshole and uses girls, so I tried to call her the next day, but she’d given me that you’ve-been-dumped hotline, so I guess she wasn’t interested.”

try: cucumber mint lemonade / lavender mint water

Curtis writes: Some people just don’t know when to laugh.

I write: I think it’s a dance. Meanings and intentions with how they work between people. Sometimes people are synched at a low level but it stays consistent. Some people go through cycles of high synch and complete incommunicability. And some people just completely come from different planets.

Curtis writes: Sometimes people from the bigger planet like to bump into little planets just for fun.

This is my biggest laugh tonight. The idea that these people aren’t just bumping the people from little planets, but the planets themselves.

You have to take ownership of what you want. How else do you stand a chance of getting it?

When you refuse eye contact with people, sometimes they angle their bodies towards you, even framing the parts of their body they want you to notice.

Some people just talk in circles that go nowhere. They talk just to distract you from the fact they have nothing to talk about.

The problem is you want a Snake Eyes, Alfred and a champion. You can have it all, just not at the same time.

Do you want to be with an 11 or a 3? Do you want to reach for more or fall back? Chase? Or be supported?

what are we doing here? why are we even conscious if most people don’t even use it?

1. The only times you lie to me are the only times I let you get away with lying to me.

2. Don’t confuse me with sex. Overt innuendo is cheap. It makes me want to pounce you, but not respect you. You’re better off with my respect.

*****

1. Be careful of the Scorpio tail.

2. You’re being mirrored. Be still.

in fremont recovering from the surgery. arm in a sling, limited mobility. can finally somewhat type, albeit standing up as i can’t lift my arm f0r a month. surgery went well and the pain can mostly be relegated to the background, just bad in the morning. i’ve got percocet but have been trying to keep it minimal in power. i hate pills. am watching about 4 movies a day, reading about 3 books a week. not writing. fell into a bit of a low patch where i hate my creative output, not happy with self, place in life. i know it’s just a phase, since my mood can be influenced by how i feel physically. also suspect my left knee needs minor surgery. i really went to town last year with my training-like-a-professional-athlete objective.

watched 2012 and got more anxious. whatever is supposed to happen 12.21.12, we’ll get a hint of it on 12.12.12 as well, which is a date i’m more interested in anyway. they’re both 9 days incidentally. i’m thinking it’s the revelation of the higher consciousness but who knows…if it changes life as we know it, it could do away with our physical attachment to this reality. whatever happens is going to happen though, so it’s best to deal with it with three eyes open.

watching mass media though, i’m noticing a change in creative output. there’s been a huge wave of media dealing with the concept of Others, both showing them in a collaborative, humane light (Avatar, District 9) or fetishizing them (the whole vampire 0bsession). it was most disturbing in the past, when films showed a terror of Others as a threatening, malignant force (ie Aliens, Independence Day, that Tom Cruise movie that escapes me right now). those spread an ignorant kind of fear but were also indicative of the overall terror of the unknown. collective consciousness is evolving. this new era coming up is definitely one i feel more comfortable in. i feel like most of my life i’ve been out of place, waiting for the rest of the world to be at an open-minded enough place to accept me instead of being afraid or threatened by me, and it’s happening now. for now, i’m just observing. i’m out of the loop, on the bench, healing. feeling the vulnerability of my human body, the precariousness tied to this level of life. we are so much bigger than our bodies. we have to find a better system.

outside of that, very little to report. i recorded an “interview’ with a guy i met a couple of weekends ago in seattle. he had a moustache tattoed on the side of his finger so when he held it up below his nose, it looked like he had a moustache. he was really into me but i kept it friendly but platonic–he’s very interesting, a bit of a muse connection, but not someone i can see myself with as a partner. i met him on a friday night and when he found out i was a writer, he told me he had a lot of stories. he started telling them to me and i soon realized that i would need to record him to capture everything…he was overwhelming me with details. so he agreed to meet for lunch the next day but asked me to not call before noon because “i plan to do some coke tonight so i won’t be up early tomorrow.” everyone knows how i feel about cokeheads (not to be trusted). the next day, he regaled me with stories about going to boarding school and at 17, seducing his english teacher. about his travels across the country, about the many times he’d been arrested for drunk and disorderly conduct. he was coming 3 weeks off a break-up with the mother of his son (a woman who’s half chinese and half vietnamese, thus explaining why he was so zoned in on me), and his eyes would well up with tears every time he talked about it. he told me that 3 years ago, he was in a bar and a drunk guy had threatened his friend so he got in the way to protect him. the drunk guy smashed a pint glass in his face and it required surgery to stitch his face back together. he and his wife used to go out a lot but after that, he looked like frankenstein and he was self-conscious about going out. i used to be a pretty good-looking guy, he said. and then suddenly, it was all gone. i didn’t even look human anymore. it’s taken until now for the scars to heal, and outside of a small scar on the tip of his nose, there’s no physical evidence of the disfigurement though psychologically, they’re still deep.

i listened to him for a good 3 hours. i could tell he was self-editing, more careful about what he was saying because of the tape recorder, but there was plenty there. to be honest, i’ll probably never listen to the tape. sometimes i think i meet these people and talk to them more for them and their catharsis than me really trying to get direct “material” out of it. i know that i was exhausted afterwards and felt really heavy, and slept 5 hours through the afternoon, into the night. as he had spoken to me in those hours, i was somewhere deep inside him, feeling the core of pain within, trying to siphon it, understand it, release it. this man was very strong, very kind, but whatever it was he was carrying was very painful and heavy. i never got a good look at it or a good handle on it, but i hoped it helped.

that night, he called me and invited me out again. i happened to be in the area, after giving a writer who had very negative energy and was frustrated about the state of publishing some ideas about electronic publishing. so i met up with him and his friends. he confessed to me that he’d had mixed feelings after meeting, like he wasn’t sure if he felt used. i told him he shouldn’t feel used, that my intentions are always good. he said that he’d never told anyone a lot of the things he’d talked about, and i told him it’s okay, strangers often find themselves confiding in me and it’s because i don’t judge…i just listen and try to understand. he confessed that he’d invited me out because he’d been worried, that after he’d talked to me that i would think he was a really fucked up person. i told him that he was a good guy, just going through a lot right now, trying to get a handle on the rest of his life. i bought him a drink, but still kept it friendly, even though i could see he was working through his ambivalence, wondering why he felt so deeply connected and having told me so many personal things when he didn’t really know anything about me (he actually wondered this outloud. the truth was, he never really asked me questions about myself. i sensed my value to him required him to subconsciously keep me mysterious so he could use me as a mirror. that’s usually how it is. that’s how “work” connections tend to feel, rather than “personal” connections). at the end of the night, he said, “i really like you. you’re really smart, and analytical. you’re not like other girls. and you’re incredibly sexy too, but that’s obvious. i really like you, but i don’t know if i like like you, or like you as a friend.”

“you want to like me as a friend,” i said quickly.

he looked a little hurt, and asked why.

“i just feel that’s the optimal distance to really appreciate me,” i said. for most people, trying to push for more erases all the positive that the connection as it was meant to be produces. i have many connections that seem to make sense on such a deep level, but not so much in the mundane world. i don’t know why they happen, but i find that by going with them and letting them naturally the way they seem meant to unfold holds great benefit to both me and the other person. i’ve learned that my life generally goes better and i seem more tangibly “lucky” if i’m open to them, even if sometimes, they put me in contact with people i would normally never interact with. i think on some level he understood this (he was clearly still in love with someone) but on an ego level, he wanted to be able to place a label on his feelings so that they could be more comfortable, so he kept trying, putting his arm around me at one point like i wouldn’t notice. i told him it was late and i had to go. i wished him the best of luck. i remember the look on his face as he watched me walk out. like he was trying to memorize me.

i learned a
long time ago, you can’t save people. you can’t make their choices for them, as it’s presumptious to think you could do such a thing, and it defeats the purpose of each man living his own life and learning the lessons of his unique life journey. but i’ve learned that i can listen, and i learn that as i understand things, people seem to understand as well. at least, there’s a comfort to this, that for a brief time, even with a complete stranger, they felt present, seen and known. i remember almost everyone i meet. inside me, they’re all there, their stories, their hearts, their souls. in the deepest of nights, i can feel their echoes pulsing in the darkness. there’s very little difference in terms of what goes on within and what goes on without. everything happens for a reason, including why we meet who we meet, and what happens when and where it happens. i’m still learning what my purpose is here on earth, and perhaps when the time and place have arrived, it will all become naturally clear, part of the flow, and all this is part of getting me to where i’m supposed to be; i’ll never know until i’m in a position of looking back. when the footsteps stop and i’ve finally reached the end of the journey, the top of the mountain to observe the meaning of my life in its entirety. until then…it is what it is.