The highlights of my day were:

Buying Nalgene knock-offs for $2/ea.
Seeing a girl from across church.
Hugging Grandma Ware.
Shakespeare in Love.
Finding out a dear friend is lesbian.

Ok, now what?

I was wrong about Will Shakespeare.

If you have not yet seen Shakespeare in Love, do so quickly,
for it does the bard well and renews my faith in poetry
and passion and love and swords and a grave bit in comedy.

Periodic sentences are my friends. I need none but them.

is role-switching a sin?

no really. I want to know.

role-conflict is a pain in the ass.

but is it a sin?

heeeeeeeeeeeelp

AIDS, Hunger, Traffiking, Genocide, Terrorists, Wars, Empirialism, Globalism.
College, Scholarships, Proposals, Papers, Research, Research, Research.
Legislatures, School Boards, Church Boards, Live8, G8, Communities, Students, Friends.
Futures, Destinies, Plans, Opportunities.

It's all very overwhelming.

I'm being presented many opportunities, which are rather ideas right now:
MTV Grants to tackle global issues: $1k in exchange for a very good proposal.
Writing the legislature to encourage state grants for students (the Promise Scholarship was canceled this year).
Travel this fall.
Work on a ship this fall.
Go to Whitworth this fall, or Green River.
Learn to cook, sail, photograph, fly this fall.
Start a small group with the younger guys at youth group: someone needs to lead them.
Start volunteering otherwise, now.

It's all very overwhelming. What do I do? Where do I start? Do I start at all?

Playing Paused

It's 9 o'clock. My life is on pause. The trees blow past me in the wind. I follow the sun as it sets, and I think, "My foot isn't touching the ground." A friend runs past, like the roadrunner, dust flying twelve feet in the air. I shout, but my breath puffs like a balloon and pops. I think, "If only I could inhale." I think, "'If only' is synonymous to 'should'." I should inhale, but there is only to do or to not do.

My name is Galen and my life is on pause. I think, "I'll catch a train to Princeton. I'll get up early to get to the station in time to catch the train." I think, "I may be only quoting a friend." I hold my foot aloft, like I'm in a marching band, but I don't play the trumpet. Instead I watch a small fish chase a large fish in a TV in a shop. The smiling clerk speaks in clipped sentences. I hear the music, but I don't play a trumpet. I hear the bass, the dialogue, the score and the silence. The movie plays till the credits, and they roll by like a bus.

I see a bus, a brown bus; I see a child in a brown sweater, seventies style with the popped yellow collar and rose colored glasses. He carries a guitar which weeps, and the tears blur my eyes. He plays and I think, "My fist is clenched. My face is wet." The wind blows a sign, a bag and a dirty man who smiles with twelve teeth. I think, "He gets a lot of smile from each tooth." I think, "I would smile if I had twelve teeth." I would smile, but there is only to smile, with thirty-eight teeth, or not.

On my couch, my life is on pause. My finger hovers on the remote and I think, "If only I could push play." If only I could.

Won't you? The dog is barking, the rain falling, the leaves blowing and it's September now. Push play, before Labor Day, or I'll miss the first day of school, or I'll miss my plane.

America the Gray

I was having a discussion with Azina about fruit and it dawned on me how shielded Americans are. Everyone is protecting the general populace from all forms of knowledge and experience. There are thousands of varieties of fruit in the world, yet the grocer only sells ten. We get apples, bananas, pineapples, mangos, kiwis, oranges, grapes, pomegranates, some berries and the occasional apricot. How boring. When researching Thailand I learned there are fruits there that we've never tasted; that disappoints me. How much have I been sheltered from, living this "good" life in the US? In this land of plenty, of materialism, where I can have whatever I want, what are we missing?

Isn't there something amiss... doesn't it make you think, and even terrify you, that even the grocer is hiding something from you?

And this is just fruit. What else don't we know? We who are so superior?






(Don't any of you go and tell me that tomatoes are a fruit. They were omitted for dramatic impact.)

free write

I want to write so badly. It aches inside me. My laziness is a dam holding back a flood of words and life and hope. Laziness the Dam. Damn Laziness. Write first, edit later. Write what? Edit what? Words. Which words? There's a lot of them. Take one: desert. Desert. Place it next to another: town. Desert Town. Two more: and here's the hard part, because settings are easy -- we see them all the time, but we refuse to see stories, because we're looking at ourselves in every situation -- but here we go anyway: old man. Desert Town, an old man, stumbling from an old car, carrying an old crutch. Is it windy? No, that's cliche. Well, nothing is rather boring. Ok, it's raining. In the desert? Sure. It rains in a desert? Don't you think that's a little unusual? Isn't an old man in an old car in a desert town a little unusual? -- he is stumbling. Why is he stumbling (I concede the rain)? He's dying. Of what? He's only one leg, amputated, he's dying because there's a cancer eating at this other leg. He'll soon be without any legs. That sucks. Yea, he's limping on one crutch and a bad leg. Don't take your fingers off the keys: you'll never start again. Relax, I know where this is going. He's from the West, and he's heading East. He's from California, San Joaquin Valley, 93, One legged, with cancer eating the other. He stumbles on one leg in the rain. He reels as he slams the door: it's an old car with heavy doors. What do you mean by reels? I mean he sort of hopskips, like someone just shot at his foot. He uses the crutch to prop himself, but it takes a few hops to get it right. Ok, now he's... standing in the rain? Yes. He's looking at the closed gas station. And? And the rain drips off his silver hair, onto his face. It channels through the wrinkles on his face, and runs down off his chin. It looks like he has a water beard. It's raining that hard? It rains hard in the desert. How long does he stand there? Not long. There's an elderly woman who yells at her daughter to get that man out of the rain. She's in a house behind him. The daughter looks out the large plate glass window, the one streaked with rock chips from the highway that's only been there 20 years. Does that matter? Yes. This is a story about letting go. Oh. So what does the daughter do? Gets the man inside? Yes, of course. He turns slowly. Then limps a few hops in her direction. When she sees his leg, or lack thereof, she runs into the rain. It soaks her obviously, soaks her cashmere sweater. Sweater? I thought this was the desert! When's the last time you went to Arizona in the winter? It snows in Arizona. More than it snows in Seattle. You're crazy. You're ignorant. I'm you. Not right now. Fine; so she gets soaked. And... Helps the grandfather into the house. It takes them a few minutes, and they're both shivering when they get inside. The old woman has a walker, one of those metal ones with tennis balls on the feet. She lifts it and sets it down with a clunk, steps twice and does it again. It takes her almost as long as the man to get into the kitchen. She smiles at the scene, but he hasn't seen her yet. Do they know each other? Is this a lucky coincidence? No, they don't know each other. He wasn't looking for her. Do they end up in love? That's so predictable. No, no, not in love. But love. You'll see. You know where this is going? Yes, sort of. Can you tell me? Sure, the joy of this sort of story isn't the suspense, but the process. Ok, then what happens? The man came to the town, the desert town, in search of an old brother and sister, who'd lived their whole lives in this town. They're both older than him, and had left when he was still a boy... That'd make them in their hundreds. Yes, and he's angry that they left him behind in Mississippi. He's come to finally confront them about the bitter life they condemned him to when they left him with their alcoholic father. Another cliche! No, no, not this time. This time it's true. This really happened. It did? When? About 5 years ago. To whom? My Grandfather, and my father, and me, and to you. Me? I was there? Yes, the critic is always there. You are the whole reason the brother and sister left this boy behind, and went west. Me? Yes. Criticism is potent. Now the grandfather has come searching for his siblings, to confront them, but he won't ever find them. Why not? They're dead. I knew it! You were right. So end of story? Nope. He finds her instead, and her daughter. He'll stay there for a few days while he searches for his siblings, and during that time, they'll love on him, and compliment him and encourage him and make sacrifices and he'll be loved. And love will erase all wrongs, blah blah blah, blah blah. Yes. He'll be loved, and he'll let go. And end of story? Still no. He'll work his own magic. The old woman has clung to her dear old house for the 20 years since the highway came through. It's getting busier and busier as evidenced by the every multiplying scratches on the window. The daughter keeps telling her to move. It's too noisy. The old days are gone. But the house is where her husband lived with her for 49 years. She'd almost given in, when the man arrives. She'll die at the end of the story. In the house? No, she'll have sold the house and moved to California with the man. Aren't they a bit old for... that? Not everything is about sex. Somethings are about affection and love. Love. It's an amazing reality. Reality? Yea, it's more than a concept. It's enough to teach him to let go of his bitterness, and her to let go of her memories. Instead of letting these anchors drown them, they'll cut the chains and be able to truly love their dead relations, instead of loving -- or hating -- their memories. It's about forgiveness, about forgiveness for the abandonment they both experienced. They're starting over. They're kind of old, don't you think, to be starting over? No, and that's what this story is about. It's never to late to forgive, and to let go.

Starting over

mat. 6.33

"Seek first the kingdom of God and his Righteousness and all these things shall be provided for you."

ie. Look God in the eye and he'll be so very happy that he'll make absolutely sure that your hunger will not distract you.
ie. Care about God and you won't have to care about that other crap.
ie. Love God. Period.

"And for the support of this declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor." (Signed by 56 men on July 4, 1776).

Wow. I don't think I've understood the weight of that line before. It ends the Declaration of Independence and it's quite the pledge: "In life and death, in wealth and poverty, in popularity and disgrace, I've got your back. My life is yours, my money is yours, my honor is yours."

I want to say that some day.

Happy Independence Day! Happy Birthday USA.

Are you my hero?

The message of America is of hypocrites and sinners helped by God to change the world. This should inspire us. For if our heroes were not perfect, then we need not be perfect to be heroes. And so, we may consider that each of us has the same potential to change the world heroically; as Jefferson and Franklin did for our ancestors, so we can do for those dying from AIDS, ethnic cleansings, slave labor and hunger. God helped those broken citizens become heroes; therefore, no one is exempt from their duty to love and protect their neighbor. With God's help, we all might change the world, we all might be heroes.

"Looking? You mean catching. No, I haven't caught anything yet."

I didn't belong on that pier. I don't like the slime of fish, nor the taste of salt. I can't stomach hours tying tedious knots, lit by sodium lights, my hands numb and bleeding from the wire traps and raw ropes. I'm not one to spend half a chicken to catch a few crabs. So, I put my face to the breeze and inhaled the adventures collected by the centuries, carried by the wind. And I wondered: if not here, then where? Where do I belong?

Who am I?
Who will I be?
What will I do?
What are my talents?
Where will I go?
Where am I needed? Wanted?
Why will I at all?
Who will I know?
What way will I dress?
Why will I care?
What if aliens invaded?
What would I do?
Would I survive?
Would I be devestated? Or excited?
What if I won Lotto?
Would I be the same?
Would I use the money to stay in school?
Or would $11M be an excuse to drop out?


What will I dream of in twenty years? Will my dreams be the same as I dream tonight? Is that a travesty -- or is that humanity?

Take that, writers' block

"A writer must teach himself that the basest of all things is to be afraid."
William Faulkner

I've heard writers' block described as the fear that what is written will not come out right. That's something I should quickly get over; as Forrester said in that great movie, "Write first. Edit later."

Later. Sleep now.

This, butterfly.

First try:
I think

Start over:
I wish I could tell you how I felt when I saw that butterfly, or rather the shadow from his stained-glass wings. I wish I could describe how it rained and then the red glow from the sun through his wings fertilized a small seed of hope in my heart and how that made me smile half a smile.

Say it simple:
Until today, I didn't know butterflies had wings like the windows in a church.

Elaborate:
I don't remember what I was doing, or how the weather was or what I had for breakfast. What I remember is the flash of red, like a shadow you could see through, when it bounced off the ground and I followed it just in time to see a stained-glass butterfly eclipse the sun like an airplane in a movie about love.

Now I'm desperate:
Oh that I could put into words the picture I would have taken had I had a camera when the butterfly crossed the sun and left a trail of stained glass in the sand. In holiness, hope cast a kool aid colored shadow, and then...

Here, try this:
If you stood with the sun on your back and stared out at the sand, lost in thought. And if you poured strawberry kool-aid in the sand, or if you held a stained-glass window above your head, and if you blinked and it was gone; and the sand was sand again. And the sand wasn't red and wasn't magical, but you knew, regardless, that holiness had graced you and would again, with the next butterfly. Then, then you might tell me how to put -- that -- into words.

Thanks:

What one decides at Wal-Mart

1.) I have a sunburn.
2.) Fish are not human.
3.) Rain is depressing or refreshing, depending on whether you are inside wishing you were in it, or whether you are in it.
4.) Fishbowls are cages made out of glass.
5.) Lives are fishbowls made out of money.
6.) If you write it for them, they won't read it; if you write it for you, it doesn't matter.
7.) "It doesn't matter": those are poor words to end on.
8.) I smell like a fish. My life smells like a fishbowl.
10.) Which needs to be cleaned.
12.)

--------------------------------------

I may not have enough money to go back to college next year. That's something to be praying about. I'm ambivalent. Which I always thought meant "good," until I realized it meant "the state of being ambiguous," and now I'm not sure what it means when I say I am ambiguous. I will be happy if I go back to college next year. I will be happy if I don't. This circumstance, though one of the largest in my life, holds no sway over my apathy.

I feel I'm in a fishbowl, not because everyone can see me, but because I can see everyone, and no one notices me. I can see my own reflection wherever I swim, and I can't swim far at that. No matter how much speed I gather, the glass is unrelenting; I am trapped here. Now I sit and stare at myself, wondering what it could be like. How are the fish faring in the river? And those goldfish who live... where do real goldfish live? My life is a farce and I stare at my cage, at me, and like Narcissus, I will die in this water. If I could blink you would see a human expression of boredom; since I cannot, imagine a goldfish in a fishbowl and you will see me, in my life.

Death and hope.

I know I'm losing her. That's why the stew bothers me when I see it left on the stove. It's evaporating, and it needs to be put away. That's my job, to put it away, because she is too weak to do it. She's gone upstairs; she's left the stew behind, for me to put away. She's left me behind to deal. I know it's coming. Whether now, in 8 years, or in 25, it's coming. People whose kidneys fail don't live as long as everyone else. She must know that. What agony to know the end is coming quicker, and inescapably. Her sickness happened in the past; that cannot be changed. And so, her death is inescapable. None of us can avoid death, but for us, death is over the horizon. We don't think about it, because there is so much sea between us and the far shore. Her sickness has placed a new horizon near her, and she can see the shore. She cannot turn back, this is not reversible. God could heal her, but this is irreversible.

And these thoughts haunt my 21st year. That I'll be left alone, and soon. And that I'll have not put the soup away. That she'll die, and the soup will simmer on the stove. I'll have been a bad son, and not put the soup away. I'll have been a bad son and only watched movies with her, too afraid to talk. Talk about what? About those things that scare me. She knows I'm terrified. I don't want to talk about it. Maybe she does. Maybe it will validate her illness. Maybe it will affirm that she's human and that it's ok to talk about her fears. Maybe it's ok and she doesn't know that. Maybe she was raised believing weakness and frailty and transparency to be signs of complaint, of ungratefulness towards God. Maybe she doesn't remember that Jesus asked to be excused from the crucifixion. Maybe she needs to know it's ok to be afraid, cause Jesus sweated blood, and I'm scared too.

***

I don't think too many happy thoughts. Not me, stuck in these two worlds. One is of reality -- and it is painful. The other is my fantasies -- and it too is painful. I look at the death, the Rwandas, the mothers, orphans, sick, diabolical, poor, rich, unhappy, experts, soothsayers, prophets who've got it all figured out. All figured out. Right. This chaos? No. Liars. And this world really hurts. I close my eyes. I dream of tropical islands, my island, with the wrinkled Japanese soldier, defending his nation from me, and American. "The war is over" I would tell him, and we'd be friends. I'd visit him, sailing up to the island and splashing through the blonde sand to his lair. He'd tell me he would die soon, and in peace, and that he had one more thing to show me. He'd lead me through the cave, holding an ancient lantern guilded with gold, azul and rubies. The false wall would swing open and he'd tell me, "All this is yours." I'd be amazed by the glistening treasure and by the stories all the pirates told on their voyages to this island, my island. The pain deafens me to all those who say, "Write first, then look for islands later." I know this is a fantasy, people. It hurts, because by it reality appears so much worse, as a bright light makes the shadows darker in my father's worried brow. I know it's a fantasy, that I'll never have my island, and this makes me want to write less. There's no way out of this reality, so why try? There's no better it could be, so why dream? Hope deferred makes the heart sick; hope will be deferred till death. Funny, the hope kills us, and the death presents us finally with that for which we hoped: a reality we can stand. The glass isn't half full damnit; I'm not a pessimist. There is no glass, no hope of a glass, and there's this pouring rain that I can't drink; the few drops on my tongue only ravage my thirst. I want to think happy thoughts, but hoping for happiness hurts more than just being honest about reality. Maybe this is why my mom is a realist. She knows she'll die someday; now that she's ready for it, it hurts less. She's got it beat. Beat death? We can only hope.

Dawn.

The dawn creeps up on us, and we do not wish to acknowledge its coming.
Why do we roll, pull the sheets over our eyes, hide ourselves from something beautiful?
It comes, but we deny it; we'll meet it when we're ready, on our terms.
It fills us with joy, if we are happy to accept it; with resentment if we long for just a few minutes more of darkness.

Why do the birds greet your dawn so early? And must I resent them for their joy? Only, they shouldn't be happy yet, not till I too am ready to see your sun. They annoy me now, so full of their righteousness, because they have no shame, no pride, and love to leave early from the dark.

I'm tired of the dark. I'm ready for the dawn, but I do want to sleep. I hate my slothfulness. I hate that I've missed so many sunrises. I hate that I've wasted hours. You do realize, it will take all of your blood to erase this. But, I don't want to be separated, and you say you don't, so let it be enough.

Worry.

A man is rich in proportion to the number of things he can afford to let alone.
Thoreau

the rain i fall in

Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Sinclair Lewis, Steinbeck. These men wrote for the twenties and thirties.
John Knowles, Orwell, wrote for the forties and the fifties.
John Irving wrote for the Baby Boomers.
Yann Martel, he wrote for postmodernism and pluralism.

Who will I write for? My generation? Can my generation be said to have a voice? It seems all of us each have our own. It will take thousands of writers to speak for all the different voices. One for the goths and nihilists, one for the partyers and preppies and white girls who love black rap, one for those who give a damn... Bob Dylan, he can write for us, one for those who need a reason to wake up in the morning, one for those who want to smile though our teeth are covered in blood, one for those who find answers in people, one for those who find answers in books, one for those who drive hondas and live in the suburbs, one for those who will never have a real job, one for those who would rather be bums, one for those who want to write but cant find the words, and one for those who have words to say and no friends to listen. And perhaps this is the voice of my generation. We are not blue, or red, or yellow. We are all the colors, thrown together in a mudpuddle, and we make white. Our voice is chaotic, and many, but symphonies sing many parts, all at once, and we stand and applaud. We are independent and unique, all of us together. We are each raindrops; and our voices are the rain.

Love, what is it good for?

What is it about love that makes the whole world beautiful?
People who fall in love or in like seem to forget there are millions of people crying.
I'm happy they get this release, but is it real? Or is it just mere momentary denial?
And what is it about falling in love that sweeps away every possible reason for tears?
People who are in love only cry during sappy movies or when they get dumped.

Can the affirmations of just one human being assuage the rejections of a universe?
And does anyone ever truly get rejected? Who has ever rejected a friend? An advance, yes,
but a friend?

Smile people who are in love, smile, to give the rest of us hope.

I think the world's greatest inventions have been squashed beneath the weight of obligation.
We have not yet cured cancer or established colonies on other planets or perfected teleportation because the men and women who conceived a solution to such problems have since died beneath menial chores and deadlines.
Perhaps it is no fluke that Einstein conceived General Relativity while working as a mail clerk. Many men would have liked to have done what Einstein did, but he was the only one with any free time.