there are actually only a handful of people who know that i truly care about homeless people. i could go on for hours about exactly why, but for the moment we'll just leave it at the fact that my heart goes out to people who've had really bad things happen that have left them in such a state of despair, those who are left quite simply empty and frantic. i will add a disclaimer that i do draw a distinction between the truly 'empty' and those who are lazy.
but that said, i'm always curiously drawn to the homeless who talk to themselves. who've been on the streets, or under them, long enough that they've begun to live in a world all their own, and speak to themselves since only they know what's really going on.
i think sometimes we're all like that and just don't know it. we're some how operating under the delusion that we're sane, but in reality, we all live in our own worlds, and are walking around muttering to ourselves. we're just hoping that maybe, just maybe, someday someone will come who sees our world too. some one who'll hear us muttering our unintelligible babble, and it will some how miraculously be their language too.
some how out of our emptiness and frantic searchings in our world, they can see in and it will have meaning to them too. they'll 'get' us, our natures, our language, our vision of how things are. from then on we can go on babbling and muttering, still crazy in the eyes of the rest of the world, but delightfully crazy together. finally not alone. i can see the scene unfold on the street...
the man bent over, hat drawn low over his eyes, not having made eye contact for years. scruffy beard, shoulders rounded as if carrying the weight of the world-like a boy wearing his father's coat, much too heavy, sagging over him and it's dragging him down. as he takes slow strides down the street, muttering under his breath, a woman approaches 'his bench', her eyes dark and lonely as she searches for a place to rest. pushing her shopping cart full of cans she's scavanged from the bins in the alley near by. she whispers as she limps towards the bench and for a minute she glances at the man, and he in a territorial offensive move, looks up at her wanting to scare her off. but their lonely eyes meet and they hear the other's words. and in that moment their worlds over lap. for once, neither of them is in their own world, but they're together, hearing-and understanding-each other, truly seeing each other, and it's a small dirt and scum covered miracle right there on the street.
they'll walk off together, him pushing her cart for her, letting her lean on him. they'll keep muttering nonsense the world will never understand, but they will both know that he walked up a beggar and walked away a king. a king who after a life time in solitary, has found his queen.
people truly in love never make any sense to the rest of the world. the way they talk to each other, how they see each other, what they do, think and feel. none of that makes sense to the rest of us, they exsist in their own world together. we even joke about them, 'it takes someone like her to love someone like him...' people who only love each other, but are not really in the 'crazy' sort have a much harder time of it. for us, we are still beggars, we are still crazy. muttering to ourselves in our language which to the one we're with is still meaningless gibberish. to people like us one of two things may happen, we may remain 'crazy' and eventually be convinced that that is what we really are and that there is no one who might see us for the kings we could be. or eventually, when you least expect it, and maybe no longer believe it's possible, you might find the one who brings you the hope of your sanity.
and it for some of us, it may be too late.
Thursday, July 16, 2009
to fall on love or concrete
falling really isn't so bad, well, at least not the first time. usually that first time, it catches you off guard, you're not expecting it and you're down before you even know what happened. it's really not that the fall is bad at all, it's the landing that leaves the marks. the first time you fall you normally don't even notice right away, it comes later with the bruises, aches and pains that remind you that you even fell and didn't just have some happy ride which ended on the ground.
fall number two, now that's a whole other story. your reflexes are a little more engaged this time and you might actually try to catch yourself. this isn't second nature yet though so undoubtedly you still end up down, but certainly more aware of what just happened.
after numbers three, four and five you definitely begin to develop those reflexes and refine them, catching yourself nearly all the time. rarely do you end up down, except occasionally when it might happen just a bit differently and you can't quite pull it out in time. but for the most point, you've learned your lesson and it's certainly no surprise what's happening, and it begins to occur in slow motion.
as you approach the tenth fall, things begin to change. you start to realize what circumstances surround these trips and begin to safe guard yourself against them, avoiding the precarious and in general being more cautious. situations that would have lead to falling begin to fade since you're now avoiding getting to close to the ledge and are far more calculating.
quite a substantial amount of time can go by with zero falls, and almost no indications that they were even possible. life gets really comfortable, you might even realize you carry no bruises if you thought to look. old scars even begin to fade, receding white or pink lines that bear hardly any resemblance to the monstrous events that earned them. it becomes so easy to forget the safeguards, to ignore the instincts that taught us to brace ourselves, or avoid danger.
then out of no where, bang! after such a long hiatus, we take a wrong turn, lose our footing and in the nanoseconds we watch as the ground comes crashing back up to meet us. and this time, slow motion or not, it hurts like hell.
yes, our brain kicks in the minute we start to go down, but it's too late. with no safeguards, no precautions, we're left with nothing but the hope that our previous experience with learning to fall will kick in some old instinct and maybe we'll hit bottom in such a way as to do as little bodily damage as possible. remembering not to put our hands out so we avoid a broken arm, we sacrifice the knee and roll into it. this fall, more than any others, is definitely going to leave marks. scrapes, bruised bones and the general wounded ego-that we could have allowed ourselves be taken down so easily. no one wants to be caught down on the ground, picking up the pieces of themselves, having to brush off and some how manage to laugh it off and say 'well, i didn't see that one coming...'. we all know that in general, there is nothing worse than taking an epic fall, long and hard, plummeting like an idiot face first into concrete with all the world watching. all of us prefer to take our falls in private, where we can keep that shame to ourselves.
all of this considered, it is entirely and uniquely fitting to me that we call it 'falling' in love. although i'd have to say, if i had to choose the scars i'd rather live with, i might choose concrete over love.
fall number two, now that's a whole other story. your reflexes are a little more engaged this time and you might actually try to catch yourself. this isn't second nature yet though so undoubtedly you still end up down, but certainly more aware of what just happened.
after numbers three, four and five you definitely begin to develop those reflexes and refine them, catching yourself nearly all the time. rarely do you end up down, except occasionally when it might happen just a bit differently and you can't quite pull it out in time. but for the most point, you've learned your lesson and it's certainly no surprise what's happening, and it begins to occur in slow motion.
as you approach the tenth fall, things begin to change. you start to realize what circumstances surround these trips and begin to safe guard yourself against them, avoiding the precarious and in general being more cautious. situations that would have lead to falling begin to fade since you're now avoiding getting to close to the ledge and are far more calculating.
quite a substantial amount of time can go by with zero falls, and almost no indications that they were even possible. life gets really comfortable, you might even realize you carry no bruises if you thought to look. old scars even begin to fade, receding white or pink lines that bear hardly any resemblance to the monstrous events that earned them. it becomes so easy to forget the safeguards, to ignore the instincts that taught us to brace ourselves, or avoid danger.
then out of no where, bang! after such a long hiatus, we take a wrong turn, lose our footing and in the nanoseconds we watch as the ground comes crashing back up to meet us. and this time, slow motion or not, it hurts like hell.
yes, our brain kicks in the minute we start to go down, but it's too late. with no safeguards, no precautions, we're left with nothing but the hope that our previous experience with learning to fall will kick in some old instinct and maybe we'll hit bottom in such a way as to do as little bodily damage as possible. remembering not to put our hands out so we avoid a broken arm, we sacrifice the knee and roll into it. this fall, more than any others, is definitely going to leave marks. scrapes, bruised bones and the general wounded ego-that we could have allowed ourselves be taken down so easily. no one wants to be caught down on the ground, picking up the pieces of themselves, having to brush off and some how manage to laugh it off and say 'well, i didn't see that one coming...'. we all know that in general, there is nothing worse than taking an epic fall, long and hard, plummeting like an idiot face first into concrete with all the world watching. all of us prefer to take our falls in private, where we can keep that shame to ourselves.
all of this considered, it is entirely and uniquely fitting to me that we call it 'falling' in love. although i'd have to say, if i had to choose the scars i'd rather live with, i might choose concrete over love.
Wednesday, July 8, 2009
Abyss to Precipice.
it isn't often we get a glimpse of what could have been. those parallel universes, lingering like shadows in light of our reality, revealing in their mystery the potential 'could have beens'. typically when one door closes and the next opens, the former door remains closed. usually that is the hard part, but often it is for the best. for who wants to move through these doors, making these choices, and then looking over their shoulder see a crack in the door, seeing what lies behind, that reminding them of what they had to leave behind to move forward?
the bigger problem is that for many of us, we will never have a great degree of certainty that our decisions made were right or wrong. living with the consequences, good or otherwise, is something we all must do. we cannot go back, there are no handles on this side of the door, and even those which have been left with a crack cannot be reopened, we could more easily rip open the universe than move back through one of those doors. and of course there can be no guarantee that the alternatives which were once there even remain.
i wish i believed that somehow life and these choices were some how linear, that each door opened in front of another, that there were some sort of reason, order, pattern, or distinguishable cycle to it all. that there could be any potential for anticipation, that it might be possible to foresee the outcome. so many people seem to have a plan, choice A, choice B, outcome C, then choice D and so on, and eventually the fruition of their plans, hopes and dreams brings them to a place, similar or better than for what they'd been shooting.
so often i've found that this cosmic sense of order and structure will have no practical application in my own life. i do not have two doors from which to choose, when choosing one and going through it i do not in turn find two more. instead, i am lost in an m.c. escher maze, with doors that open to nothing, stairs i have to climb only to reach the base, walk ways that i will eternally walk up and end no where. and each door that does not lead me to to the false beginning, or to nothing, leads me to a precipice.
what hope is there for one such as i when i stand at that precipice then? what am i to do? when life has given me these, i've jumped. jumped head long into the abyss below, falling into a beautiful disaster. most often, yes, left in broken pieces on the ground, but once put back together i bear scars as badges, reminders that at least i jumped. at least i didn't just cling to the rocks and stay there, not experiencing life for fear of being dashed upon the rocks below.
and for those who wonder whether or not it's been worth it, worth the pain, the scars and endless stairs i've had to climb to reach the next cliff, i say 'yes'. for with each climb i reach new heights, and the light of this reality scatters the shadows of mystery and brings me closer to where i know eventually i'll find myself supposed to be. better and beyond what i'd hoped for. i say 'yes', all the falls and the beautiful disasters are worth it, because as long as i keep jumping there is still a chance that one day, instead of a fall, i'll grow wings and fly.
the bigger problem is that for many of us, we will never have a great degree of certainty that our decisions made were right or wrong. living with the consequences, good or otherwise, is something we all must do. we cannot go back, there are no handles on this side of the door, and even those which have been left with a crack cannot be reopened, we could more easily rip open the universe than move back through one of those doors. and of course there can be no guarantee that the alternatives which were once there even remain.
i wish i believed that somehow life and these choices were some how linear, that each door opened in front of another, that there were some sort of reason, order, pattern, or distinguishable cycle to it all. that there could be any potential for anticipation, that it might be possible to foresee the outcome. so many people seem to have a plan, choice A, choice B, outcome C, then choice D and so on, and eventually the fruition of their plans, hopes and dreams brings them to a place, similar or better than for what they'd been shooting.
so often i've found that this cosmic sense of order and structure will have no practical application in my own life. i do not have two doors from which to choose, when choosing one and going through it i do not in turn find two more. instead, i am lost in an m.c. escher maze, with doors that open to nothing, stairs i have to climb only to reach the base, walk ways that i will eternally walk up and end no where. and each door that does not lead me to to the false beginning, or to nothing, leads me to a precipice.
what hope is there for one such as i when i stand at that precipice then? what am i to do? when life has given me these, i've jumped. jumped head long into the abyss below, falling into a beautiful disaster. most often, yes, left in broken pieces on the ground, but once put back together i bear scars as badges, reminders that at least i jumped. at least i didn't just cling to the rocks and stay there, not experiencing life for fear of being dashed upon the rocks below.
and for those who wonder whether or not it's been worth it, worth the pain, the scars and endless stairs i've had to climb to reach the next cliff, i say 'yes'. for with each climb i reach new heights, and the light of this reality scatters the shadows of mystery and brings me closer to where i know eventually i'll find myself supposed to be. better and beyond what i'd hoped for. i say 'yes', all the falls and the beautiful disasters are worth it, because as long as i keep jumping there is still a chance that one day, instead of a fall, i'll grow wings and fly.
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