One Thousand Bricks Of Light

  It might be cold, I might be tired, but I have to keep going. 

I realize going forward that there will be times when the struggle seems harder than others, and days when I feel fine. I know I'll have days where I am alone, unsure, and downtrodden by magnitude of life. But I will keep on going. Random acts of kindness are something that you've proven to me can still drive people. Even the smallest act of kindness inches the darkest day toward the light. Gotta keep movin.

I have been beaten down by life more times than I can remember, yet somehow I've been either too stupid or too stubborn to stay down. I guess I've always been a bit of both, along with a bit of crazy.

I want to shine, I want to be happy again. I want comfort from fear. I want this fire, this engine of hope to rev with better days. There is a fire building, not an actual one mind you, a metaphysical one. It is one that reaches to the depths of despair within the psyche and says, "no more pain. No more hurt." 

This needs grow. It needs to thrive. I wake up early and go to sleep late, wasting time. I can't do this anymore. I have to be fighting for better days.

When l wake up I have to remember to work hard for what I want. It's gotta be me who has to take charge and start fighting. I would rather die for what I believe in, for what I want...than to be nothing. I am aware of the fact not many will see this. Just like I know that the people who do see this might think I'm crazy, and maybe thats true, but the day is not won with conformity, it is won with ingenuity and ambition.

Run, walk, crawl. However you it, you need to be true to yourself, and kind to others. If you see someone who has stumbled and lost hope, lost their way...you do the humane thing and get them moving and you keep them moving until they can't. Make them feel worthy, make 1 person feel like 300.

And then remember this. Progress requires constant effort. It breaks, and it builds. Laziness is the blanket of depression. One day, a time will come when all the struggle and hardship, all the tough days and all the long nights will end. One day something small will become something great.

You Mean Santa Wrapped Them

 I still found myself writing up a Christmas List this year, despite my being full - on "into adulthood" age. Its essentially the same list i've given to family members for years now with items moved around. I don't want to give the list, but they ask for it, and I can't not do a tradition. I don't like asking for these things. Not anymore. It feels so childish and insignificant in the grand scheme of things. And do I really need anything? No....well...I do need a new vehicle, and I really do want Jessie Graff, but I don't need another book right now. I don't need a potato chip in the shape of Illinois either. But tradition.

This time of year has always been about tradition for me, more so than any other point in the year. This year however, it feels different. It feels rushed, yet simultaneously tiring. Maybe its the crippling depression, maybe its because Thanksgiving came later in the calendar, who knows really? What I do know is that its been a struggle. To get gifts, to cook and clean, and do it with one arm that is just getting used to being used again. Thanks to Dr. Panov. 

I struggled so much with a lot this year and lost a lot that i'm just done with it mostly. Somewhat waiting for the year to dump one last surprise on me and then i'm done. 

I'm not a fan of surprises usually. they're often bad news loaded, or just not worthy of the term, "Surprise." Then there's always this fear I have that if it is a "good" surprise, I have to react a certain way, and if I don't i've offended the other person. 

This is never my intent however, it's just how the Asperger's or whatever I have makes my mind work. I am also fearful of what I perceive to be hundreds or thousands of people suddenly stopping what they're doing to solely focus on me for that moment. And then I just wanna run and hide. That's why I think the people who propose at like...a baseball game or whatnot are psychotic.

That was kind of a long winded explanation, sorry. But hey, meandering exposition is kind of my thing though, I suppose.

So, I don't think i'll be getting any surprises...but the sick thing is, I kinda want one. A good one anyway, just to kinda send the year off right. 

I want that surprise Christmas kiss or visit from someone unexpected. Maybe if I get that one victory, even at the last minute, all the failures of the year, all the missteps, all the shit...it won't be as bad.  

I need it because i'm worried about next year. Here's where my crazy Asperger's comes out. Or maybe its superstition. Or both. 

Years ending in 3 haven't been kind to me in recent years. 2003 - between losing my mom and job, busting my arm twice, and having my best friend desert me, might have been the worst year of my life.

2013 wasn't much better. I struggled with a work/last year of school balance, and lost both my cousin and my uncle. 

My father and my aunt are up there in age, so theres the constant fear surrounding them. That will keep me on my toes. Then theres the "Chaotic Evil" possibility. The random bad happenstance, that even me, in my master planner mind can't account for. I can't be in a constant state of worry though. It's not healthy, and it's just not sane. I also just don't like it. I don't like always thinking of what could go wrong and say, "I told ya." I hate being that guy. I wanna kick that guy in the balls. 

I want to be the guy who sees good things coming and plans for them. And I hope to. I already plan on getting my "Always Looking Up: The Happiness Project" photo series back up and running, with a new direction and focus in mind, thanks to Dr. Leaver on that one.

I want to at least start a major chunk of the leg-work on the road trip. 

I hope to get a bunch more photo projects done.

So theres things I can focus on that are good. I just need to laser focus on them. (Maybe I should get an actual laser too. That'd be swell. Dangerous, but swell. I really thought by this point in our timeline, lasers would be more commonplace, but we as a species have barely learned how to correctly use an air-fryer at this point so maybe we can hold off on the lasers.)

Another thing thats got me down lately is the crushing loneliness. I get that i'm not always fun to be around, with the arm, the Parkinson's, and the fact that i'm so damn hot its intimidating(I'm also literally hot too, I sweat like a fat man staring at a canoe.), but I need to get out there with people again. 

Sure people have suggested Parkinson's support groups, and yes, i've tried some of them, and they were full of people literally 40-50+ years older than me. Not much shared experience there. Plus, and this is going to sound...I dunno, picky, or just messed up, or both, you choose, but every time someone brings up one of those groups, I feel like they're either shunning me off, or just saying, "Well I don't know what to do with you, so heres some other shaky stiffs," and thats not for me. I don't like being reminded of what I might became in that way. 

I'm not saying i'm above them or anything like that. I just don't want a reminder of, "hey, you're broken." I want to feel like I am still capable of being my old self to some extent.

So then I find myself...by myself. But dammit i'm going to fight it hard. I'm gonna regain that insane but good attitude of no fucks given to the narrow minded ilk. I remember on the first day of 5th grade I drew on my face with magic marker because I thought I was gonna honor Native Americans. In my head it made total sense, and even though it was random, in my mind I was doing the right thing.

I'm a little bit better informed now, and I feel like I can get the same...crux of that message across without the theatricality. But I can and still will do recklessly good. I don't know how, but i'm gonna make things better. Just watch me.

Steam Powered And Rogers Resolute

   I often find that time, the concept of it, is frightening, if for no other reason then the fact it's arbitrary in many aspects. You can't fight it, nor can you rewind it, you can't stop it, you just have to exist with it.

So when I look at the calendar in the corner of my screen and see that the year is 2018, following 3 numbers that have been seared into the collective consciousnesses of a generation, I wonder why I am still accompanied by temporal shock. Has this much time really transpired since then? "Can't be real.", I tell myself. Then I am reminded of Don Henley's tune, "In a New York Minute." He remarks on how, "everything can change." And my word has it ever.

We were all transformed that day, we became wholly different. Fearful. Hostile. A reflection of another point in time that we sought to distance ourselves from.

The days since have grown longer for many of us, and many of us have become more world weary and tired. Aching, Our feet our heavy with life, though we wouldn't admit as such, for admitting any weakness is an insult to the machismo and bravado some try so desperately to cling to, as if to admit to anyone that empathy is not welcome.

We desperately need to alter this outlook. We can be better. Our feet must be heavy and loud with optimism and yes, hope. A welcoming of emotion and humanity is very much a good thing.

Everyone of us is on a clock. That clock will run out. Maybe not today, maybe it will be in 20 years, 40 years, but at some point, it will run out. Our time is finite. Is living in fear and anger really the best use of that time?

I'm one of those annoying people who lets bad days stack like Lego bricks into a bad week, bad month, etc. Now, I don't know if you're like me, and wow do I hope you aren't...but if you are, at least in that aspect, you and me have to change that mindset fast.

Every year I write these monologues and I try, in my own minute way to not just illustrate my thoughts, but to stir others to action, to shake the dust of that day off and rise. Rise like my mothers favorite musician, Bruce Springsteen urged us all to do. It may be as simple as going out for a run or walk. Be Steadfast and unwavering. Be tenacious and posses boundless energy.

There is no reason not to. The urgency of the ever ticking clock should spur you to do more, do better, do good, because while the future is a mystery, why not try and make it a good one?

After Ascension

   Each year on this day I attempt to repeat the same schedule as I did 16 years prior, at least I try to. As the years pass, I have found life often alters the schedule. As a friend once said, "we plan and the universe laughs." Sometimes change like this can actually be for the better.

   That day is slowly beginning to fell like many years ago, and that actually scares me. The passage of time in general is quite sobering.

   The ruins of the chasm in lower Manhattan have been filled with the memories of a day forever frozen in memory. I, until this spring during a race, refused to set foot on that hallowed ground. "This is not my place", I thought, until the kindness of a friend imbued me with spirit and determination that made the open wound in my mind and soul begin to heal...just a bit.

   This is one of the many reasons why I run. It is healing, freeing, in a way, even though it can be at times tortuous, it lets the mind expand and breathe, giving birth to new ideas and thoughts, pushing the clutter aside.

   It seems as though we're sometime out of touch with ourselves and with others. And we need that to end. We need to learn how to make better use of what we have at our disposal.

   You may find that even what was a traumatic event, in many cases, becomes a learning experience. You grew and gained from it. Eventually, even, you might even become a better person from it. That is how we are supposed to grow as a species, as a culture.

   Yet, we're lately, we seem to be out of touch with ourselves and with others. And we need that to end. We need to learn how to make better use of what little time we have on this rock, what we have at our disposal, and utilize it to improve the world. We are not doing this right now.

   For example, Staten Island, while my home, no longer feels welcoming to me. A place I would once staunchly defend to no end has turned into a cesspool of bitterness and bigotry of which I fear there may not be a return from. This is something that was told to me by multiple people, all of whom I rebuked, until last year. We need to take a long hard look in the mirror and ask ourselves, "Have we really progressed as a culture, as a species?" I don't think so. If this is the best we can do, i'm not impressed.

   In fact, in light of the recent weather events, some people are claiming the, "end times" have finally arrived. Me being a staunch atheist, just sees it as a continuance of the cycle of life, albeit not a good one.

   Yet through all this, I still have hope. I'm no longer the full blown optimist I was a child, though I look to the rest of my city, once ruined, and see that it has been reborn, and though some may argue otherwise, I think this is truly for the better. It's certainly beats the alternative. Being stuck is something i'm good at. I'm not happy about it, nor am I proud of it. It is, in fact something i'm attempting to rectify. But, unlike this city, it is not a change that can happen in an instant. You to can make positive change happen.

   Making my way through this darkness, I'm still searching for the bright light of my finest hour. It has been a titanic battle of wills, and many days I find it difficult to even get out of bed. But I do, and push through to the best of my abilities. Some days are better than others, and some days the only way I can get through it is by using the mindset of, "I know something out there is trying to beat me, and i'm gonna fight it just to piss it off."

   What was once an empty sky has once again been populated with glass and steel. Stone and wire. Men and women. People. Going about their lives. Everyone of them fighting a battle most of us will never know anything about. So when you interact with these people, or any person, take the briefest of moments and remember that. Be human. Show compassion.