" the slience, the silence "

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now that i've gotten a little older, people have started to expect things of me. expect more from me. there is an idea of this ideal yet average person that just exists, with variations based on the various cultures of the world. but they all have one.

you're 30, and have a job, or at least a dream with part-time job, or going to grad school, or graduated from grad school and working on a phd. and wiser, funnier, more handsome now that there are single strands of gray and silver interlaced with your  more youthful-colored hair.

and am i any of these things? and i better for having hardships in my short and average life? have i made a lasting good impression on those that i love? have i made any difference for being in the world? will i pretend like i'm not affected by the things that hurt me, for fear of not being empathetic to real collective human pains?

and these attributes of the average man seems sullied by reality. it seems unattainable; just as unattainable as the ideal man - that glorious tall dark handsome virile successful bastard that gloats and preens and becomes a golden version of what a man is.

that lie. that false apparition. and is there any comfort in the fact that it is not you, and you are not it?

the silence in the air expands as she speaks, and then i can't feel anything anymore.

my artwork, by sorrows, my pains, my hungers, my aspirations, my good deeds, my heart, my everything. it goes dark.

they all grow dark for a moment, like an eclipse slowly caressing the light from out of your ability to see anything at all.

and now 30 seems too old to make something happen in your favor, and too young to give up. all of a sudden i want so much more, both from my self and the universe at large, and is there any harm in wanting more?

what does one do, when you're now the one that needs guidance?


tonight's homework:

do one good and real thing that will bring one person an overwhelming feeling of elation and joy. bring a light into the dark of someone who doesn't know they needed illumination.

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" calculations of your impact "

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heartbreaking, unyielding, devastating love & devotion to the memory of those past.

i was listening to the radiolab podcast on the platform yesterday. i was listening, and i could hear he echoes of trains recent-past, ringing in the space between my earcups and the thin foam material of my children's, noise-limiting, plastic headphones. it was all that i could afford that day.

the sounds coming from the podcast were coming from the daughter of henrietta lacks, a woman whose cells are the most famous in the scientific community. her daughter, roberta, was in pain. her mother's cells were removed while getting treatment for cervical cancer, and those cells had some of the most unique properties that the world has ever seen or seen since. resilient, strong, audacious, and ever-evolving.

roberta was in pain, writhing and on the verge of a stroke. she was heavy with the burden of these cells. she was not a scientific woman, and couldn't quite understand what the scientists meant when they pointed and presented to her a culture tray and said, this is your mother.

roberta bent closer to the tray and whispered to the cells, so that her mother could hear her.

at the height of roberta's agony over the weight of the meaning of the cells, a family member began to sing gospel and praying for her. his booming voice overpowered my tiny insignificant headphone speakers, and i too for a moment, felt like her woes were mine, and he was now singing into my heart's pains.

i looked around at the people on the platform thinking,"how very lonely are we all?" i was looking into the person behind the faces. i was looking into the collective human experience. i was looking into outer space, galaxies, and distant cosmos bodies thinking, "how can we be so small, and the ache be so large? is there no respite?" it was a profound sadness that swept over me in that moment.

all of a sudden i missed my mom very much. then i missed everyone's mom that i ever knew and loved. then i missed everyone's mom on the planet, and felt myself floating further and further away from everything. past the platform, up through the earth to the street, past the buildings and trees, past the atmosphere, burning and exiting orbit, past the stars, past the immense darkness of space, and i was for a moment, the furthest away from my body i've ever been, and i was alone.

and then after the singing and preaching stopped, and i relaxed and calmed, all of that hurt dissipated, and came back into myself.

i was standing on the platform, alone amidst a quiet sea of strangers in the heat of an underground station. those reverberating train echoes rippling against my frame, and i found myself shaking while the tears just fell.

tonight's homework:

tell them you love them. tell them how much they mean to you. tell them now. tell them close and in person, if at all possible. hold them, comfort them, be honest with them, and find yourself vulnerable and filled with strength in the same moment. we have such a little pocket of time together, and it would be a pity to waste any of it.

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" break out the white pants "

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wellsir,

summer heat, summer rain. summer picnics in the park, summer music in the park, summer sleeping in the grass in the shade in the park.

summer roadtrips to the water, summer sitting inside at home with the fan on and a spritz bottle watching the neverending story. summer salads, summer eating out al fresco.

summer drinking steel reserve tallboys at BBQ's which cause you to pass out two hours later only to wake up from sleepytimes to rock on for five more hours.

summer walks, summer bike rides in the darkness without a helmet on. summer laughs, summer sobbing. summer wearing flip-flops and boardshorts.

summer writing furiously and photographing prolifically. summer making your mark, summer going for the glory huck!

summer art shows with cherry pie and ice creams, summer at governor's island with those houses turned into art installations. summer cheese and chilled muscato in a cobalt bottle.

summer looks and glances.

summer breaths and chances.

summer hopes and dances.

i'll see you there.

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