quotes

He allowed himself to be swayed by his conviction that human beings are not born once and for all on the day their mothers give birth to them, but that life obliges them over and over again to give birth to themselves.
- Gabriel Garcia Marquez

life isnt that long

There was a fourteen year old girl that didn't live too far from here that got killed last night. Both her and her cousin snuck out to go meet friends. They decided to cross the freeway to get there faster. She didn't make it and the car kept on going.

It got to me when my mom looked up her picture in my brothers school yearbook. She was a skinny girl with a shy smile lined up with all the other students her age, in black and white boxed frames.

Current M

her tennis shoes are tied
in the grasses around her
soccerball held at her hip

ponytail
to keep her hair out
of her face

smiled like she used to have braces

out in the field of
my old school yard

maybe she would have had married early
had two girls
who would
need ponytails

to keep the hair out
of their eyes
who would never,
ever sneak out.

How do you choose books to read?

Hit and miss. I take the time to browse. I make sure to spend time walking between the library shelves, aware that I could miss something. I let the titles run through my head.

They always say don't judge a book by its cover. Half the time doing so I find an interesting read. Whether it's by the font of the title, or the artwork it can say a little bit about the author.

Share a letter you've written. Or, write a letter to someone you miss.

It's been a while. Times have changed, and we have right along with them.

I will always remember you, the first person who taught me how to think and reason. You made it evident in your actions that things could be made different. That compassion and hope must be outside religion first. No matter what the situation were came to quick defense of the ones you loved. Ready to defend what people deserved. You still remind me of a lionness.

I've learned how complex interpretation can be. I've learned how sometimes certain actions represent pieces to a situation a person is facing, and people become not people so much as symbols.

You were always a go getter, when we were younger you asked me not to let you drown yourself in work again, it happens when you get upset. So when I saw it happening again, through what others were saying who still knew you I asked you to stay open, let people in still. Maybe you wanted to defend it. Maybe it was too strong of a message from someone you were straining to stay in touch with.

I accept that our lives are apart, and have been for years. I would try to contact you again, but I have to prove I don't need to be proved to you, even if its an invisible thing. The difference is, I know how to do these things by myself now.

I see glimpses of you in the people I meet. In difficult situations I sometimes recall what you've said, use as a sort of distant advice. The passion you had for life is still a source of inspiration to me, and I still use it as a fuel.

I miss that friendship. But here we are in the middle of forging lives for ourselves, the time period where now no one has time, keeping in touch is a chore, and it's a little late for repairs.

I just want to say I understand, or at least come closer to, the complexity.

please trip them gently they don't like to fall

I'm avoiding looking up articles on the Omaha mall shootings. Funny that it happened, on a week like this.

How do we get this complex in the first place? It can't just be emotion and instinct, animals run heavily on that and overall they seem to be balanced. We have more needs I guess.

So what is it the third time this year we've had a public massacre like this? Virginia tech, Trolley square here, and now a mall in Omaha.

The kinds of things that I've seen and heard have been hard to take in this week. To be human is to have limited control, and I've been learning this. And this, really adds to that.

Even in youth I feel aged, like my life could end any moment now. This world isn't ours, a thousand years ago it was the same.

The life we're all living is a fragile, fragile thing. I've never felt this mortal.

________________________________________

_____________________________________

"please trip them gently, they don't like to fall,
there's no room for anger, we're all very small
we're painting our faces and
dressing in thoughts from the skies, from paradise
but they think that we're holding a secretive ball
won't someone invite them,
they're just taller children
that's all, after all

man is an obstacle, sad as the clown
so hold on to nothing, and he won't let you down
some people are marching together and
some on their own quite alone
others are running, the smaller ones crawl
but some sit in silence, they're just older children
that's all, after all

i sing with impertinence,
shading impermanent chords,
with my words
i've borrowed your time and i'm sorry i called
but the thought just occurred that we're nobody's children at all, after all

live your rebirth and do what you will,
forget all i've said, please bear me no ill, after all

in touch

I need to work harder to keep my loved ones an active part of my life.

I work pretty well with most of my close friends. We do our own things, now and then theres a phone call even a night out and it comes out good, like it was before. With some though, the time spent away does make a difference, and we don't talk as fluently as we did before.

It was a normal, sleepy day yesterday. Up until I heard a car accelerate well above 40, tires squelch, and then a crash. It's something not so normal on a small residential street like mine.

I called 911 immediately, though outside I could see at least 3 people already making the call. I ran inside, grabbed blankets and gauze hoping to help out where I could, but my neighbors were already there.
'
A 15 year old took two other guys out for a spin in his moms car. When he went around the street's curve he hit the wrong pedal, and accelerated in seconds. They came over the curb, ripped up part of the lawn and hit a tree. The air back came out but only on one side, and the car was totaled. By the time I was out, in what, only a minute after - they had already been laid out on the grass. People had blankets and pillows. Honestly there were too many helping there and not much I could do but watch. Luckily a nurse lived down the street.

Two of them had cut their foreheads pretty bad, one was shaking probably from shock or the cold despite the blankets. The youngest, was acting cool, riding the hype in his own precocious sort of way.

I hope they are okay.

I'm crashing my classes. I have been learning loads of new things, and I wish there was another outward way to show that. There is a point where challenges of this nature ceases to be a good thing, and if you don't take a moment, can make you go backward.


I'm hanging there. And biting down the arrogance of the college system. With the time that I have I want to take in whats real.

I compare Tori Amos concerts to my first times exploring the ranges of her music. There is a lot of shock value to begin with. When you come back to it after listening to the more experimental songs, you begin to like it.

I really liked the second half of the concert and wouldn't mind trying to listen to some of the songs from the first part. I guess it was because she was her darker 'identity' - Pip. It blew my ears out, some of it was very close to Nu Metal. I kept on begging her in my mind to come back to the piano, instead of letting her music be ruled by base guitars.

I couldn't contain myself when she began to play 'Mother'... She can be so delicate with the piano. But mostly it was to be there with these songs.

Now I want to try it again. I can understand now why people see her several times a tour.