The background murmur of the coffee shop drowns out the subtle idea that maybe she noticed me. I saw her as I walked in, hearing the door slam shut behind me caked in ice, the warmth of the shop reminding me that I was alive. Immediately I began to scan the room. We all do this, we scan a room upon entry and measure the responses of those already inside. We all hope for different answers, some of us want the room to notice and enter with flair trying to draw them in, whilst others want to slip in ghostly silent and avoid any attention at all. I always look for her, perhaps this is exactly why I haven’t found her as of yet.
This time I thought I might have captured a glimpse of her. The real deal, the one and only, the girl for me. Then her husband sat down with their little boy strapped to his chest sipping on his chai tea bull shit and making her laugh. Immediately removing all feeling of hope and replacing it with the usual feeling of loneliness, hopelessness. One more person out of the dating pool, removed from any opportunity of providing me with happiness.
The words of my mother rebound around the hollowness of my skull, “your happiness can’t rely on someone else.” My friends tell me I have to stop looking and it will happen by itself. I on the other hand worry, what if it doesn’t. I am not a passive person. I am, as my friends and I refer to it, a “doer” a person of action. Unfortunately my action occurs most of the time without foresight or thought. I jump into the fray swinging at anything and often come out with a new wound that I watch heal into another scar. My baseball coach hated this about me I always tried to hit every pitch. He wanted me to wait for the perfect one. Guess that’s why I like hockey, I hit everything in that game and it all works out in the end.
So back to this girl and her yuppie husband and their perfect little child. Did I mention that I felt a sudden urge to vomit? It’s not that it really sickens me to see them happy in any way other than with jealously. How do people manage to navigate the intricacies of the human relationship? Some people seem to have been given a handbook that some of us apparently traded in or where looking at something shinny during distribution. I find them incredibly difficult, I think I am good at it but always I wonder if I am failing on some account. You see at my core I am a people pleaser, one who seeks the approval of those around me. Within this search for approval I seem to have lost the very essence of self.
However, I preach and teach to my students regularly that they need to figure out who they are. That the real answer to finding joy in life is within the bounds of self definition. Must be some sort of desire to see one of them succeed to reassure me that it can happen. I always latch on to ideals that I would like to define me but I never seem to truly absorb them into the core of my being. I guess if I had to choose a philosophy to define me I would choose Zen or Taoism. The sad thing is that I only have a cursory understanding of either of these but refer to them as my belief system. Perhaps it isn’t hard to see why I struggle with my decisions in my life.
Well, I hear the barista bellowing out my order. Why do they yell so loud? It’s not like I can’t hear them, even if I am the only one that ordered and am standing at the little piece of granite countertop that they designate the “pick-up” zone. They still yell out my order as if they are hoping someone else will come take it. It’s like they don’t want to give it to you for some reason. Then when you step forward, from crowd of one, to claim your prized beverage of choice they act both surprised and gracious that you finally arrived to receive their blessing in a cup. Self-righteous pricks, you make coffee, stop yelling, get a haircut and stop stretching your ears.
I often look down at my latte and think it is so perfectly chaotic. The milk is mixed at some perfect level with the brown softness of the coffee below. Then I add sugar and always feel the slightest sadness as I stir it all away and force it to meld into a unified color of diarrhea . Then slowly I sip away at it until it is all but gone and I begin to hit the keys on this board. I let the words pour forth in hopes to find some string of them that will make sense. Is there an answer hidden in here? Is my soul their on the “page” hidden between the lines awaiting analysis by some pimply English major who hopes to be a successful professor, but will setlle for teaching grade 3 kids to spell. Well if you find it please give it back, I need it.
Bukowski had it down. He let it all fall on the page, the sad truth of the human condition. We all strive for and rarely accomplish lofty heights of human achievement. Then there are the realists, the ones who live life and realize it is really a combination of shits, sleeps, random sex, desires for random sex, masturbation and hopefully sports. In between theses events we tend to delve slightly into our minds only to hit the barrier of our own limitations. Then when these become over bearing we find our own releases, some of us will drink, others use, some run till they hit euphoria and the lucky few manage to convince someone to share their miserable existence and procreate. Can’t forget to turn the proverbial wheel of life and ensure there is a new generation to suffer the consequences of all our mistakes.
Sunday, January 30, 2011
Saturday, May 15, 2010
Conflicting Desire
So my friend just became a father. He experienced the entire birthing process, as much as a dad can, and came out smiling. I had to ask him what is was like, as a single bachelor the whole experience blows me away. It was interesting to watch as he sat contemplating momentarily a way to encompass the entirety of it in words. This is one of the things I love about him, the natural ability to hold your attention whilst in thought and the ability to take that time to think before he talks. I find myself lacking in that area from time to time. Then with cock of his head he had it.
"We are really just animals" he proudly stated.
This took me off guard, I had expected the typical fatherly story of the miracle of birth. However, in those few words he had truly encompassed the whole experience. He talked of his wife in the throws of labour having a beautiful animalistic natural state of being. She avoided the drugs for as long as she could hold out, then some minor complications caused the need for an epidural. He was so taken by her ability to, excuse the pun I can't resist it, push through.
Now as a single male the whole idea of having a child seems overwhelming to me. I am taken by the natural ability of people to step up and care for this small version of themselves. I have asked a few parents I know how they manage, and I always express how much I respect them. They always look at me and they simply say "You just do it." It doesn't matter how many midnight feedings, or sleepless nights holding a bottle they incur they simply keep going. They make hundreds of decisions that have massive repercussions everyday as they care for a infant. This to me all seems like a responsibility that I find myself both envying and avoiding at the exact same time.
Now, where is all this baby talk going? Well my main concern stems from the two phrases I have heard form these parents lately:
1. We are really just animals
2. You just do it
Look at these two statements out of the context of child rearing. It seems that our ego centric beliefs that we have spent centuries developing about ourselves can boil down to these two points. At our core we really are just animals. Animals that at some point in our existence became self aware and found the ability to reason. Now I am not arguing about any divine intervention that may or may not have helped us along the way. Just look at the facts. We are animals that can think.
What have we truly done with that? In my opinion humanity is in it's teen years. We spent our youth simply using reason to limit our desires. To "child-proof" the world. In our haste to do so we caused massive conflicts in deciding what was the best way to do this. We childishly fought over toys, and the sandbox. We act as both bullies and victims, we are also friends and lovers. We made mistakes, some unimaginable, some that we still don't understand. We used this ability to reason to constantly battle our innermost desires. We want something we took it, then we started to reason out that perhaps we need to share or not take everything. We grew up.
Now we are in our teen years, we look at the mistakes we made as a child and we have to fix them, or at the very least learn from them. However, this takes time and contemplation. A few things we have recently put monetary values on. Time is money and good ideas are priceless. So like a teenager with a liquid income from our summer job we are spending. As a whole we are spending at an astronomical rate. We want the newest shiniest toys, we want the fastest and the strongest and newest toys and we want them now. To top it all off, we stop talking to our peers and parents because as a teen obviously no one understands us.
This is where we sit at the current crossroads in our society. We are teenagers with way to much power. We are consumed with our desires and we will do anything to fulfil or distract us from our inability to fulfil them. We are no longer using reason to advance or grow, we no longer use it to limit our desires. We simply use it to get ahead and find our disposable satisfaction in everything we do. We no longer understand value, or virtue. What teenager really does.
So what is the magical moment where we grow into an adult? What is that defining moment when we change? Many who know me would argue it is still awaiting further down the road for me. More importantly we have to ask where is that moment for us a conscientious animal? When will we grow and surpass our limited teenage experience? I truly believe we are trying, we search for new ideas with amazing conferences like TED, we are exploring new spiritual paths everyday, we are realizing our environment is not limitless, we are becoming slightly less ego centric, we have people out their voicing their opinions, we are holding our leaders accountable. However, we are not doing it together, as an entire species. We need to communicate, work together and find some middle ground. It is time to step out of our teenage shell and start letting people understand us, we need to be vulnerable, we need to trust, we need to accomplish the most difficult task and human has. We need to love ourselves. The time is now, the place is where ever you are, it is time for humanity to hit adulthood!
"We are really just animals" he proudly stated.
This took me off guard, I had expected the typical fatherly story of the miracle of birth. However, in those few words he had truly encompassed the whole experience. He talked of his wife in the throws of labour having a beautiful animalistic natural state of being. She avoided the drugs for as long as she could hold out, then some minor complications caused the need for an epidural. He was so taken by her ability to, excuse the pun I can't resist it, push through.
Now as a single male the whole idea of having a child seems overwhelming to me. I am taken by the natural ability of people to step up and care for this small version of themselves. I have asked a few parents I know how they manage, and I always express how much I respect them. They always look at me and they simply say "You just do it." It doesn't matter how many midnight feedings, or sleepless nights holding a bottle they incur they simply keep going. They make hundreds of decisions that have massive repercussions everyday as they care for a infant. This to me all seems like a responsibility that I find myself both envying and avoiding at the exact same time.
Now, where is all this baby talk going? Well my main concern stems from the two phrases I have heard form these parents lately:
1. We are really just animals
2. You just do it
Look at these two statements out of the context of child rearing. It seems that our ego centric beliefs that we have spent centuries developing about ourselves can boil down to these two points. At our core we really are just animals. Animals that at some point in our existence became self aware and found the ability to reason. Now I am not arguing about any divine intervention that may or may not have helped us along the way. Just look at the facts. We are animals that can think.
What have we truly done with that? In my opinion humanity is in it's teen years. We spent our youth simply using reason to limit our desires. To "child-proof" the world. In our haste to do so we caused massive conflicts in deciding what was the best way to do this. We childishly fought over toys, and the sandbox. We act as both bullies and victims, we are also friends and lovers. We made mistakes, some unimaginable, some that we still don't understand. We used this ability to reason to constantly battle our innermost desires. We want something we took it, then we started to reason out that perhaps we need to share or not take everything. We grew up.
Now we are in our teen years, we look at the mistakes we made as a child and we have to fix them, or at the very least learn from them. However, this takes time and contemplation. A few things we have recently put monetary values on. Time is money and good ideas are priceless. So like a teenager with a liquid income from our summer job we are spending. As a whole we are spending at an astronomical rate. We want the newest shiniest toys, we want the fastest and the strongest and newest toys and we want them now. To top it all off, we stop talking to our peers and parents because as a teen obviously no one understands us.
This is where we sit at the current crossroads in our society. We are teenagers with way to much power. We are consumed with our desires and we will do anything to fulfil or distract us from our inability to fulfil them. We are no longer using reason to advance or grow, we no longer use it to limit our desires. We simply use it to get ahead and find our disposable satisfaction in everything we do. We no longer understand value, or virtue. What teenager really does.
So what is the magical moment where we grow into an adult? What is that defining moment when we change? Many who know me would argue it is still awaiting further down the road for me. More importantly we have to ask where is that moment for us a conscientious animal? When will we grow and surpass our limited teenage experience? I truly believe we are trying, we search for new ideas with amazing conferences like TED, we are exploring new spiritual paths everyday, we are realizing our environment is not limitless, we are becoming slightly less ego centric, we have people out their voicing their opinions, we are holding our leaders accountable. However, we are not doing it together, as an entire species. We need to communicate, work together and find some middle ground. It is time to step out of our teenage shell and start letting people understand us, we need to be vulnerable, we need to trust, we need to accomplish the most difficult task and human has. We need to love ourselves. The time is now, the place is where ever you are, it is time for humanity to hit adulthood!
Sunday, April 12, 2009
The Begining
So I love to write and have found a lapse of it in my life. I have decided that it is time for me to start releasing the words and hope that someone will read them at some point. Perhaps only I will need to read them and that will suffice. I guess the real question is if they really need to be read or is it enough just to free them from me and leave them dangling like a ripe fruit out in the emptiness of cyberspace. This blog will not have any agenda, as I put it in my life everything will be based upon "game-time" decisions. If the words offend anyone then I am sorry that you are that sensitive, they are just words that come to me at the time. Please feel free to respond and I will happily address any intellectual debate.
As for me I am a young teacher who loves adventure and will never stop trying new things. I am very passionate and have a bit too much energy to sit around for overly long. I live life to the fullest and perform everything I do with passion and vigor. This has lead to various nick names for me such as "Chaos Chris" or "Man Child." I choose embrace these as compliments. I am, for some reason beyond my comprehension, still single and looking for the girl who will sweep me off my feet. I seem to have a bad habit of falling for women who are unavailable. I have a hard time understanding love, I think it is due to a false interpretation we seem to carry forward about it. To many times we expect it to be something that falls out of some divine intervention that will make itself perfectly clear like in the movies. However, without background music and lighting to lead us through the experience we get lost and are really searching for a ghost of an experience that we will never find. We need to take the pot of life and stir up ourselves and keep adding new ingredients to ensure that we never get tired of our experience. This blog is that for me a chance to try experiencing life through a new filter. To reflect on my events and see what I come up with. I hope if you read it you enjoy it, if you don't then let me know or just pass along. Have a good one.
As for me I am a young teacher who loves adventure and will never stop trying new things. I am very passionate and have a bit too much energy to sit around for overly long. I live life to the fullest and perform everything I do with passion and vigor. This has lead to various nick names for me such as "Chaos Chris" or "Man Child." I choose embrace these as compliments. I am, for some reason beyond my comprehension, still single and looking for the girl who will sweep me off my feet. I seem to have a bad habit of falling for women who are unavailable. I have a hard time understanding love, I think it is due to a false interpretation we seem to carry forward about it. To many times we expect it to be something that falls out of some divine intervention that will make itself perfectly clear like in the movies. However, without background music and lighting to lead us through the experience we get lost and are really searching for a ghost of an experience that we will never find. We need to take the pot of life and stir up ourselves and keep adding new ingredients to ensure that we never get tired of our experience. This blog is that for me a chance to try experiencing life through a new filter. To reflect on my events and see what I come up with. I hope if you read it you enjoy it, if you don't then let me know or just pass along. Have a good one.
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