Do you know how to juggle?
I don't. But I still do it. I juggle the time I spend working on my "personal projects" and the time I spend browsing youtube and creating tweets. I juggle the few reasons why I like to be home and the million excuses of why I need to keep moving. I juggle my words in a mismatched way, and try to decide where the best one's fit. I juggle my next step and the one I just took. I juggle those things that I keep to myself and the many ideas I press unto this keyboard. I juggle the sun over my right shoulder and the shadow to my left. I juggle lots of things, so much so, that the word juggle seems weird and slightly innapropriate now. But if there's anything I juggle that's worth being caught, it's my friends. I love them.
That said, there's a few that really make me think. Think about concepts and beliefs I thought I had all figured out...like age.
You see, there’s a delicate coexistence between two friends divided by a few years time, experiencing the same thoughts and emotions, one after the other. So my question: Does the older play the brother; bestowing on the younger the lessons life has taught him? Or does he let his friend live, and learn them on his own, potentially allowing him to be hurt along the way? If he does decide to play the role of mentor, does that devalue their relationship as two young friends experiencing life simultaneously, or does it make them stronger? A few years seems insignificant in the longer rhyme, yet when this partition occurs on the edge of adolescence and the brink adulthood, the lessons seem important as ever. I suppose the older will always offer wisdom, and it’s the job of the younger to not believe him till he sees it for himself. Yet there’s always the chance, that very likely instance, when that younger man teaches the older a lesson he missed along the way.
It’s funny the way two friends evolve. The roles we take, the masks we wear. I’m not sure why I’m putting this thought out there, but it presented itself recently. Maybe age is as useless as a bottomless mug. There’s things we all experience, and for that we can always take advice. But there’s pages more which we don’t have in common; experiences that make us…us. And it’s those bits of life that simply defy age.
Sunday, May 31, 2009
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
Memorial Day.
I judge the day by what I can hear without moving from my pillow. Lawnmowers are humming and kids are screaming out rules to some antique game. It must be a beautiful day. I've been judging the summer day this way since I can remember. But when I used to hear the kids outside, the rules were foreign and I rushed to join them. Now I just listen, smirk and consider sliding on my running shoes. I stretch my arm across the sheets to a laptop left hunched over, asleep. I give it life. A strong glare makes it difficult to read the messages scattered about my screen. The sun's out. I twist my body to find a resolution and sure enough I'm left awkwardly hunched over. Funny how roles are reversed.
Mornings give us a quick chance to summarize the day before and consider the day ahead. Yesterday was a good day. Mike's family has been a home to me since high school, and a barbecue at their house meant entertaining dialogue that renegotiated the met's bullpen and crushed mike's middle school glory days. Even better, I got to share those moments with a small cluster of faces I hadn't smiled back at in a while. A few conclusions:
Sean holds the same fetish with the word 'epic' as I do, which is like finding out you share the same birthday, except more epic.
Ricky had to leave early to turn coffee into starbucks.
Colin was reliable as ever, joining me in a backyard rum & coke.
Anna tried to convince us that 100 is the new 2.
Randi, as usual, exemplified her worthiness to compete on East Coast Punk Rock Jeopardy if their ever was a show.
Nate's job gave him a sweeter set up than a skittles factory. Taste the rainbow.
Colby carried Mike in beer pong.
Owen was there. That should speak for itself as he is "more talked about than God" in Poughkeepsie.
Julie didn't say much but was probably thinking a lot given these circumstances.
And Mike...well it was his graduation party.
Mornings give us a quick chance to summarize the day before and consider the day ahead. Yesterday was a good day. Mike's family has been a home to me since high school, and a barbecue at their house meant entertaining dialogue that renegotiated the met's bullpen and crushed mike's middle school glory days. Even better, I got to share those moments with a small cluster of faces I hadn't smiled back at in a while. A few conclusions:
Sean holds the same fetish with the word 'epic' as I do, which is like finding out you share the same birthday, except more epic.
Ricky had to leave early to turn coffee into starbucks.
Colin was reliable as ever, joining me in a backyard rum & coke.
Anna tried to convince us that 100 is the new 2.
Randi, as usual, exemplified her worthiness to compete on East Coast Punk Rock Jeopardy if their ever was a show.
Nate's job gave him a sweeter set up than a skittles factory. Taste the rainbow.
Colby carried Mike in beer pong.
Owen was there. That should speak for itself as he is "more talked about than God" in Poughkeepsie.
Julie didn't say much but was probably thinking a lot given these circumstances.
And Mike...well it was his graduation party.
Friday, May 15, 2009
A Lumber Yard.
An abandoned lumber yard. I found myself down by the weathered file cabinets and brick walls stained in graffiti. I wasn't alone. We don't go to these sort of places alone, now do we? I had a friend. A great friend. Who pushes every limit to meet any challenge. If you give her lemons, she won't make lemonade. She'll dig deeper, probably photograph them, and turn those lemons into the greatest fruit to have hit Times Square. Epic.
Anyway, the lumber yard. I felt like I was ten years old and passing by the house with the ferocious dog and nose-pinching scent. But even when your ten, that day eventually comes when you need to find out more; hop the neighbors fence and bring out that pair of binoculars you saved for this very moment.
We've come a long way since those days. Binoculars are now cameras, with zoom lenses nonetheless. And "sneaking in" becomes "trespassing." Bigger words, legendary concepts. It was the creepiest place I'd ever been, at least in broad daylight.
What looked like a shattered radio, rested in the dirt, it's contents strewn like a broken piece of jewelry. For some odd reason, I felt like an old jazz melody with a heavy trumpet could have been playing. Our steps were small, as if each toe were pressing one piano key after another.
The buildings settled in the precocious air, releasing echoes of creeks and undefinable cracks into the sky. They hit my ears like a long-awaited sigh, the kind of sigh you'd hear in a bedroom at the end of a nursing home corridor. We navigated the property; the warehouse, the front desk, and studied its detail. Old packaging labels lay tangled in the shrubs as torn mattresses and campfire remnants gave way to more recent life.
The silence was overwhelming.
It's incredible when a location like that can trigger your most primitive emotions. It is abandoned. That's the first thing that comes to mind. But is it sweeter to be abandoned than to be replaced? I've tried to pick a side here, but to tell you the truth I find myself struggling between the pros and cons. It's puzzling, really.
Good luck with that one.
Anyway, the lumber yard. I felt like I was ten years old and passing by the house with the ferocious dog and nose-pinching scent. But even when your ten, that day eventually comes when you need to find out more; hop the neighbors fence and bring out that pair of binoculars you saved for this very moment.
We've come a long way since those days. Binoculars are now cameras, with zoom lenses nonetheless. And "sneaking in" becomes "trespassing." Bigger words, legendary concepts. It was the creepiest place I'd ever been, at least in broad daylight.
What looked like a shattered radio, rested in the dirt, it's contents strewn like a broken piece of jewelry. For some odd reason, I felt like an old jazz melody with a heavy trumpet could have been playing. Our steps were small, as if each toe were pressing one piano key after another.
The buildings settled in the precocious air, releasing echoes of creeks and undefinable cracks into the sky. They hit my ears like a long-awaited sigh, the kind of sigh you'd hear in a bedroom at the end of a nursing home corridor. We navigated the property; the warehouse, the front desk, and studied its detail. Old packaging labels lay tangled in the shrubs as torn mattresses and campfire remnants gave way to more recent life.
The silence was overwhelming.
It's incredible when a location like that can trigger your most primitive emotions. It is abandoned. That's the first thing that comes to mind. But is it sweeter to be abandoned than to be replaced? I've tried to pick a side here, but to tell you the truth I find myself struggling between the pros and cons. It's puzzling, really.
Good luck with that one.
Thursday, May 7, 2009
Educated.
I'm pretty embarrassed to not have followed through with my word. Nevertheless, I'm here. Whether you take it for true or not, I'll say that time, or lack thereof, was the reason I've been so far from these wet socks. A few things that have been on my mind...
Sunday May 3rd, 2009
I ran my creativity dry with that date in mind. I stayed up all hours of the night, made 10 incredible friends, and produced material I had no idea I was capable of. I didn't wait for May 3rd, I worked for it.
When I came back from Athens last year, my priorities took a spin. I was no longer the career driven student I had defined myself as. In fact, I lacked definition of any kind. "Student" became a minor piece of this huge puzzle, and life was a whole lot more than a career. I spent the greater portion of 2008, contemplating what my future would entail. It used to be "advertising copywriter extraordinaire - go big or go home." But that title sort of lost its polish somewhere over the Atlantic.
In the last few months, I've been forced to work toward that title whether I liked it or not. I had to graduate, didn't I? And for the first time in nearly a year, I felt career driven again. Not in the over-the-top, melodramatic way I had been, but nevertheless driven. I had a goal. I wanted something. Badly. And I was having the time of my life earning it. I poured my energy into a campaign. But it was everything else...the people, the laughs, the work, the outcome...that really brought me back to an equilibrium. I still want to see the world, defy normality and save love, but now I know the reality of it - you do have to make a living somehow, and so pick a path you love with people that make you smile.
SO...May 3rd. It was competition day. It was every human emotion thrown into a martini shaker. We nailed it. It was everything we wanted to say, the way we wanted to say it. As the day progressed, we grew more and more confident, in disbelief that our campaign might actually win.
It's amazing how hard the blow feels, when all that energy falls flat.
In short, we took a risk that wasn't well received. Yet I'm glad to have lost for having taken that risk and not because we simply didn't measure up. That said, it's still hard not to let it get to you. The train tracks never seemed to reach Poughkeepsie that night...
Today was my last day of classes. I'm not really sure what to do with that little fact. Delete? Na. I'm okay with it. I have to be. I did a Shakespeare reading and later workshopped a screenplay. Two things that, in my opinion, scream college education. Pretty cool.
In my immediate line of vision I see this:
MAD magazine, deodorant, duck tape, a solo cup, a straw hat, a 1970s orange swivel chair, a cowboy lamp, a Greek postcard, a running shoe, a ticket stub, a toaster, toothbrush, suitcase, and the word "hope" scribbled on my wall.
The window is open and Christmas lights are crawling along the sill.
This is my college. This is me, educated.
Sunday May 3rd, 2009
I ran my creativity dry with that date in mind. I stayed up all hours of the night, made 10 incredible friends, and produced material I had no idea I was capable of. I didn't wait for May 3rd, I worked for it.
When I came back from Athens last year, my priorities took a spin. I was no longer the career driven student I had defined myself as. In fact, I lacked definition of any kind. "Student" became a minor piece of this huge puzzle, and life was a whole lot more than a career. I spent the greater portion of 2008, contemplating what my future would entail. It used to be "advertising copywriter extraordinaire - go big or go home." But that title sort of lost its polish somewhere over the Atlantic.
In the last few months, I've been forced to work toward that title whether I liked it or not. I had to graduate, didn't I? And for the first time in nearly a year, I felt career driven again. Not in the over-the-top, melodramatic way I had been, but nevertheless driven. I had a goal. I wanted something. Badly. And I was having the time of my life earning it. I poured my energy into a campaign. But it was everything else...the people, the laughs, the work, the outcome...that really brought me back to an equilibrium. I still want to see the world, defy normality and save love, but now I know the reality of it - you do have to make a living somehow, and so pick a path you love with people that make you smile.
SO...May 3rd. It was competition day. It was every human emotion thrown into a martini shaker. We nailed it. It was everything we wanted to say, the way we wanted to say it. As the day progressed, we grew more and more confident, in disbelief that our campaign might actually win.
It's amazing how hard the blow feels, when all that energy falls flat.
In short, we took a risk that wasn't well received. Yet I'm glad to have lost for having taken that risk and not because we simply didn't measure up. That said, it's still hard not to let it get to you. The train tracks never seemed to reach Poughkeepsie that night...
Today was my last day of classes. I'm not really sure what to do with that little fact. Delete? Na. I'm okay with it. I have to be. I did a Shakespeare reading and later workshopped a screenplay. Two things that, in my opinion, scream college education. Pretty cool.
In my immediate line of vision I see this:
MAD magazine, deodorant, duck tape, a solo cup, a straw hat, a 1970s orange swivel chair, a cowboy lamp, a Greek postcard, a running shoe, a ticket stub, a toaster, toothbrush, suitcase, and the word "hope" scribbled on my wall.
The window is open and Christmas lights are crawling along the sill.
This is my college. This is me, educated.
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