Oblivio.

Photo Credit: Paul Souders

We all find oblivion at some point. At the bottom of a bottle. At the end of a long night out with friends, when the happiness is all gone and everyone has gone home. When we find ourselves alone in our room while summer drags on and on and we find that we have already done everything we’ve wanted to do. Or we’ve lost all we can lose.

This is when we find out who we really are. Find oblivion and you find yourself. We can find a place so deep and hidden away that we cannot help but face it, like a grizzly bear gnawing at our heels as we skip and serpentine through trees and thickets.

Don’t run. Face that grizzly bear because it is in that moment we realize that this is not oblivion. We have meaning. We are not food for the weak. We strive for against actual thought and the need for finding something humanistic and beautiful in everything.

When you have reached oblivion you have found yourself and that could not possibly be oblivion.

The west was won...

Hope Vs. Everything Else

Dear World,
You are slowly killing me.

Between talks of wars in countries far away, the economy going into a recession, gas prices rising, gang wars starting in the country, divorce rates going up, children being abandoned, polar ice caps melting and the salmon are going extinct… I cant keep up.

I must be too soft.
Maybe I try to see the BIG picture too often all the while trying to pay attention to the details.

I’m not good at worrying about you World. I’m much too selfish, much too naïve. Tell me that polar bears live in Africa, I may believe you. Shit, they had them on “the Island” in Lost. Who is to say that they aren’t in Africa too?

We all believe what we see on TV anyways.
“Tuberculosis outbreaks are on the rise.”
“By 2025, 95% of the world’s water reserves will be polluted.”
“Oil prices rose today, because a refinery blew up in Texas.”
“The president had no choice but to go to war with Iraq and Afghanistan, and attacking North Korea would be a good idea too.”
“Did you know that communism is bad?”
“Everything is a crime.”
I’m sorry, World, but I don’t know how much more my little brain can take…
“Robbie is dating Lisa who fucked Kevin at the party where Josh got really high for the first time.”
“Life is meaningless unless you have someone…”
“I’ve been alone my whole life…”
“Death is something you just have to face.”
“Both her mom and her grandma have cancer now. I don’t know how long they have left to live.”

Oh, World… if only you were like the internet so I could filter the results.

No more “love” on the same page as the cop who hired a hit man to kill his wife. No “bright sunny day” with “young woman shot on highway by another driver.”

And if things get too bad online you can always hit that box with the “x” in it. Like how Mario finds surprises in the blocks, one click, surprise, it’s all gone!

But that’s right, we can’t. Isn’t that correct World? Unfortunately I’m stuck for now.

In the end you will win.
I promise you that, World.

Hope… wouldn’t it be terrible if all people could feel it too? Scary it would be.

What would you be like if people could sleep through the night without having to lock their windows and bar their doors? Or if we could drop our kids off at school and not question whether they will cut class and get stoned or their gym teacher will molest them during detention?

Wouldn’t it be nice if we could wake up in the morning, turn on the tv, and not hear the words “soldier died” or “genocide” or “raped in her car” “job cuts affect over 1,000 families”?

How would you be World? Without hunger, or violence, or homelessness? Would it change people?

If somehow everything bad about this place could change, would people change? Or does it take all the people to change first? What about inherent change in people’s souls? Is it possible?

World, is there anyway to change this place? I’m only one person. I can barely get my laundry done and my bills paid. How can I help?

Tell me World, tell me.
You are killing me.
We are killing each other.

If each person I knew took one second to help someone and then that person helped someone…

Wait. That’s from a movie called “Pay it Forward.” The kid dies in the end like every good ending.

So what do we do? Keep on living our lives? Ignore everyone else on the planet?

That’s what you would tell us to do, wouldn’t you oh World?

Because no matter what you have to win.

And you always do.

You kill us through us. You make us miserable using our own hands.

Maybe we shouldn’t blame you, but ourselves?

We let you in, let you win.

I sometimes wonder what it would be like to be blind. Not because I don’t want to see the world around me, but because I would notice other things with so much more clarity: smells, sounds, things I touch… Being blind would open up a different world and I think going blind after being able to see would teach a person lessons about paying attention to the other details in life.

In a destiny far far away…

I’m watching JtBM put together a book. Not design one on a computer or staple pages together. I mean really, honestly, and with his bare hands build a book. I watched him cut the paper for the end pages, using an X-acto knife to slice thick cardboard-esque sheets for the covers and then slowly glue it all together. I can’t name the last time I created something. Not with my bare hands. Not something beautiful. Not something that I could hold and cherish and love. JtBM creates like this all the time. He would tell me that it’s never quite enough and second guess his efforts. Like the hardbound journal he made me with a tiny printed song lyrics on the cover and blank, lifeless pages that I can fill with words and pictures and glued in scraps I find in my day-to-day life. He never thinks it’s enough. Or that I don’t like the art he creates with his withered hands. I do. I envy his ability to amalgamate his thoughts, emotions and love into projects. I envy that he has something to hold on to.

Words aren’t as easy to grasp.
But that’s what I tend to be the best with.

And then he switches to making a card for his dad. The whole look on his face changes, as he picks out scraps of paper to create something beautiful. For a moment I wonder if the person he is about to make something for deserves something crafted with those two amazing hands of his. I question what he’s thinking. The light behind him casts this weird, fake halogen glow across the bare scalp that is his head and casts the side facing me in darkness. I wonder what those hazel eyes would tell me if I slid across the carpet and tilted his face up towards the light. What is he feeling at this exact moment? I may ask. I may not. It’s all about timing.

And sometimes I just wonder if I should butt out all together.

Every day life some times seems stagnate. Not in a bad way, it’s as if contentment has settled upon me like a layer of dust in the warm attic where you stored the Christmas ornaments and your son Jimmy’s old Legos. [I would never name a child Jimmy, FYI.] It’s comfortable. I don’t have much to do, except live in this desirable, content state where I just enjoy myself and not worry as much.

What does a 22-year-old college student with a vague future, no job and classes out for 3 months do with their time?

I’ve watched TV.
I’ve written to-do lists.
I’ve enjoyed laying on the couch and frolicking in the sun and playing with animals.
I’ve had a few drinks, had some delicious food. Enjoyed people.
There isn’t much left for me to do.

Except write. Tell the world about sunsets and the silliness of things from my side of the world. As if someone honestly gives a damn.

Currently, I’m watching Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back completely full of the delicious nachos JtBM and I made earlier. [Let me say, best nachos I've probably ever had a hand in slopping together and then chowing on] I just had a laugh over the scene in Clerks where they discuss how Episode V is the best, because it ends on a depressing note.

As I typed that Darth Vader worked his way into Luke’s head and proclaims “Luke, my son, come to me” in that drilling, baritone that every nerd remembers. Then Mark Hamill, with his broken and torn face sits up a bit, his hand hidden by the sleeve of his shirt, though we know it’s not even there, and says “Why didn’t you tell me?” He reminds me of a monk or something having a revelation. Then as if Vader is really God he proclaims, “Luke, it is your destiny.”

Cue Lydia laughter.
Why do I love Star Wars?
I mean, absolutely deeply and truly love Star Wars?

Fuck, if I know.
It’s cheesy. The special effects blow. It’s ass backwards when it comes to storyline. Yet, it’s amazing.

Maybe it’s that in a galaxy far far away is where I feel I belong.
Or maybe it’s just the nerd in me saying “Lydia, it is your destiny.”

(Corny right? Damn right it is.)

Do you believe in God?

I believe in something greater than myself. I can’t look at the world around me without believing that there is something more than just chance. So yes, I do. Maybe it’s just nature. Or maybe it’s some form of God. I don’t really know. What I do know, is that in my heart, there is something bigger than just my life.

If you could be anything in the world (animal, place, thing) what would you be and why?

Not a memory.

The weather man says it’s gonna rain tonight….
The kind of storm where the basement floods and you lose the lights….
Should have thought of that before….
‘Cause I’m not your blue sky anymore….
No matter what I did, or who I was. It was never enough.

Even when I broke my skin and lost my breath while giving you the world…
You were once my fallen star. I caught you and kept you, my wish coming true. The first person I felt like I could stay with. The first person I gave everything I could to. The first person I said goodbye to, instead of the other way around…

I took care of you.
I gave you a home, everything you asked for…

Once upon a time I would miss the taste of the sparks on your tongue, the sweet lullaby of your voice, drowning in the bright ocean in your eyes. I would miss sifting the golden sand that made up the smooth skin stretched tight across your face with my fingertips. I would miss your soft breath on the back of my neck, your arm draped over me, holding me close so I felt safe. Once upon a time I would miss that…
But I don’t miss anything.

I remember the day I thought I fell in love with you.
I remember that day, because for the first time in my life I thought that I had finally found a place I wouldn’t be pushed out of anymore. I thought you would hold me forever. You once said it yourself “I’m yours until you throw me away.” Who would have thought you would throw me aside, with the misinterpretations, lies, unanswered prayers, and broken promises. You wouldn’t wait for words, for explanations, for chances. You wouldn’t wait for me to catch up to you… to understand… You wouldn’t give even an inch to me… you wouldn’t give anything.

I feel like the waves are flooding the shore and I’m standing at the base of the cliff waiting to be washed away with the debris. You are the tide, always turning and eating at my sandy footprints, leaving only wet sand and a mere memory. But like a tide, there isn’t much to remember the next day. You are not a storm. You are not a sunny day. You are just another grey day that will one day fade into the rest.

I have nothing bad to say about loving you. Not anymore.
Love isn’t always enough.
And I’m sorry if I ever let you down.
But I know it’s okay. I know I did what I could.

I will probably always care for you. No matter what you say or do. No matter how many times you pushed me away and drove me to the ends of my sanity. No matter how stupid it is. I will always hope you are doing well and taking care.
I will remember the first time you said you loved me and how I believed the curve of your lips as you said the words. I will remember that and only that, because once upon a time I believed a lie. That’s what I will remember.
Because from everything that ends something begins. You are the fertilizer in the soil that I will grow something new from.

Erwachen.

Awake. Not because I’m ready to be, but because sleep faded and I tossed and turned and awoke into the same nightmare I was just dreaming about.

I have two eyes, two feet, and two hands.
My heart was alone, but there was another out there willing to be it’s mate. And I’m not the only heart holding on to what may be anymore.

I cannot be a savior.
All things end.
Some questions don’t have answers. You have to live with never knowing. You can sit back and wonder forever what you are doing wrong and why you aren’t good enough. You can wonder why he didn’t love you enough or whether he loved you at all, but there is no right answer. The possibilities grow exponentially outwards until you will suffocate on the growing cloud. You can play the what if game. You can keep on asking. You can be curious and wonder in the still of the night what happened and why. There is no way to know.
The hardest part is to stop asking the questions.

The only time words come to me is when I’m alone. It’s as if in the darkness my lips can speak, the words do not need a mask, the person I am can be free.

The sweetest words I’ve ever heard fell from the lips of a man I never saw coming. He just appeared like the sun after an Oregon rain storm, the clouds pulling back from the grey-blue sky and letting the light in. He was the sweet bright rays of celestial love that warmed me to the core of who I am, his warm touch enriching the soil of my soul. And in that dark place I planted a garden, the sprouts now blooming and bearing fruit. And for every blossom that blooms, there are two. One for me and one for you. Because everything is better in twos.

(When do I wake up from this dream? When do I wake up to realize that my dreams haven’t come true but I was sleeping in a dark trance of my own imagination? And if my dreams are coming true, I’m glad it was you who was there to help them become real.)

My eyes are the pathway to my soul, where you are buried deep and true.

I should always be asleep when my brain wants to write. It’s always too late, the night long since falling. I always feel like everyone else in my world is asleep and yet I’m not. Sleep is like hope for me, it comes so rarely, like a perfect kiss or the right words.

Twenty-two years old and not even close to knowing what I need and want. Sometimes I wonder if I was wiser when I was younger. I miss the feelings of something being fresh and new, the way cold water feels to parched lips.

My life works in a cycle. A breath of fresh air. Happiness. Love. Complications. Pain. Effort. Breaking. Sadness. Repeat. But there is some kind of beauty in that. Living my life in a circular path that I feel is different every time I start it. Living the familiar over and over again without even realizing it.

People come and go. I let them. I have only bothered to stop one person from walking away from me. If they chose to go, then let them. I should be worth more. But I never wanted him to go. I stood in his way. Even when it meant holes in my walls and being pushed away – physically, mentally, emotionally… Was it love that made me step in the way or fear that I was going to be alone again? Did I hold on because I truly felt that I needed him or was it that I truly hated the idea of being alone with myself?

I find hope in the small moments. The right words flowing from my fingertips. A great photo that just happened. The joy in creating something I deem beautiful. Crazy plans. A long drive down a dark road, ending at an overlook with a dark horizon in front of me. The way my cat hiccups. The smell of freshly washed sheets. The way white and black keys feel when I hit them, the sounds they make, sometimes a broken melody but a song nonetheless. The smile on my sisters face that says innocence and youth all at once.

I cannot exist in this life without the small things.
And though sadness comes and goes, that is part of my life as well.
Life is in the details.

At the end of some road you are there. I don’t know how long it will take me to get there, but I keep on driving forward knowing that each yellow line brings me closer to you and farther from where I have been.

With this soultell smile I’ll blow a kiss to you.

Love is magic.
It’s the song that leaves you breathless.
It’s the perfect note that once you hear it hits you right at your core.
It lasts replaying over and over again in your head.
It makes you dance.
It makes you cry.
It hits every nerve in your entire body like an electric current.
It’s the only thing that can cheer you up when your day has gone bad.
It’s the only hope to make you smile.
It can tear you to pieces.
It can make you feel more than you ever wanted.
Love is the song that lifts you up, strikes you down and keeps you wishing for more.