The third one this evening
It used to be simple. Or so it seemed. I got what I wanted - sometimes. Or if it was that I just stumbled upon it and got lucky. Still, it never went as I wanted it to. Some things did, though. Some things did.
A tied up goat, waiting in the clearing, just moments away from its fate. What would it do if given the chance? Would it live its life differently? Would it know the difference?
Now and again there are fleeting rays. Of what, I do not know. Sometimes they seem to be like rays of the sun, but only for a moment, then they're gone, like they were not there.
I get off the bus and walk away. The city is dark, wet and noisy. I walk home on the silent back streets. There's rain, but I hardly feel it. A street light flickers and dies. The third one this evening. I close the door behind me, walk the few remaining steps and lie down. I breathe slowly and try to feel something good. I try to make sense. One breath at a time. Slowly, deeply.
Losing it and getting lost
Unfortunately I’m not all that well at the moment. I sleep badly, I eat poorly, my sugar levels are almost through the roof, and I’m not going to the gym as often as I want and need to. Of course, I know that it is all connected and that all I have to do is to straighten up, but… There’s always this “but”. It’s really annoying. I am changing all that starting today. I need to be well.
I was going to start a new job today, but all the red tape is not done with yet, I’m afraid, so I stayed in bed later than usual. My memory seems to get worse as well (a side effect of high sugar levels, no doubt), because I cannot remember if I had any breakfast. Since I am not particularly hungry, I must deduce that I did have breakfast.
Paris by night in the 20's and 30's - Photo from Bruce Silverstein Gallery
I’ll be on my way soon, to pick up my new passport. I’m going to Paris next week and I get quite childishly joyful at the thought of it. I love Paris. I’m going to stay with my dear friend Bojan, who has invited me over for Christmas. It’s going to be great to see my friends again. Also, I’ll bring my camera and my notebook and try to get some photography and writing done while I’m there. I do not know how people celebrate Christmas in France, but it will be fantastic however they do it. Besides, it’s practically a done deal with all that marvellous Bordeaux and good food.
I’m looking forward to get lost on the streets of Paris and not know where I am at all. Something I hope will happen almost every day. To be completely lost is always the best way to get to know a city and its people. I love that.
Dipped in tar and rolled in feathers
It's a hard task being a humorous man with important things to say about life. When I am trying to be funny, people take me too seriously, and when I am trying to do good things for other people, I get criticized as a person (not my deeds, strangely enough). I'd hate to be in Santa Claus's shoes in this town. He'll probably be dipped in tar and rolled in feathers before Christmas.
The questionable combination of spinach and fish sticks
Today I’m a punk rocker – amongst other things
As everything else in life, my preference for what music I like comes in cycles. Today I'm a punk rocker (with a few sweet exceptions). I just checked the playlist on my phone (a HTC something-or-whatever, I never can remember the model) and here's 60 albums that I love right now. This music really gets me in the mood.
3 Doors Down "3 Doors Down" 30 Seconds To Mars "This Is War" 3 "Revisions" A Day To Remember "For Those "Who Have Heart" Allstar Weekend "Suddenly Yours Anberlin "New Surrender" Angels And Airwaves "Love" Anti-Flag "The Bright Lights Of America" Augustana "Cant Love Cant Hurt" Better Than Ezra "Paper Empire" Blind Melon "For My Friends" Blink 182 "Enema Of The State" Blue October "History For Sale" Bowling For Soup "Sorry For Partyin" Breaking Benjamin "Were Not Alone Here" Brian Howe "Circus Bar" Bullet For My Valentine "Scream Aim Fire" Counting Crows "Aural 6" Cute Is What We Aim For "Rotation" Dead By April "Stronger" Death Cab For Cutie "Codes And Keys" Fazeshift "The Everyday Broken Heart" Fightstar "Be Human" Five For Fighting "Slice" Five Times August "Brighter Side" Funeral For A Friend "Casually Dressed And Deep In Conversation" Gin Blossoms "No Chocolate Cake" Good Charlotte "The Young And The Hopeless" Green Day "Awesome As Fuck" Hedley "Go With The Show" Hoffmaestro "Skank-A-Tronic Punkadelica" Hoobastank "For(n)ever" Jimmy Eat World "Bleed American" Lifehouse "Smoke and Mirrors" Linkin Park "A Thousand Suns" Madina Lake "Attics To Eden" Maroon 5 "Hands All Over" My Chemical Romance "The Black Parade Is Dead" My Dying Bride "An Ode to Woe" Needtobreathe "The Outsiders" No Doubt "Everything In Time" No Use for A Name "Keep Them Confused" One Night Only "One Night Only" Panic At The Disco "Vices And Virtues" Placebo "Battle For The Sun" Plain White T's "Every Second Counts" Rise Against "Appeal To Reason" Set Your Goals "Burning At Both Ends" Simple Plan "Simple Plan" Sister Hazel "Heartland Highway" Skillet "Awake" Snow Patrol "A Hundred Million Suns" Staind "Chapter V" Sum 41 "Screaming Bloody Murder" The Academy Is "Fast Times At Barrington High" The All-American Rejects "When The World Comes Down" The Brains "The Brains" The Paper Chase "Now You Are One Of Us" The Real Deal "Fun" Toad the Wet Sprocket "Fear"
There’s something about her
Woman Eating Apple - photo by Ambro
I've been thinking about my female characters. Or any male author's female characters, for that matter. Commonly I, and perhaps everybody else, as well, see what we want to see. Some ten or fifteen years ago, on a sunny spring day, I walked through a small town. Having walked through the whole town, I thought that there seemed to be a disproportionate number of females in that town. Unusually attractive as well, I thought. Strange. That didn't seem statistically correct. So I walked the same way back, but this time with my eyes a bit more objective. It wasn't true, of course, there were an equal number of women and men, and there were, of course, all kinds of beautiful and ugly, just like everywhere else.
How do we portray people we never see? How does a man portray a female character and vice versa? Supposedly men are from Mars and women are from Venus and we don't even speak the same language. When it comes to me, I don't really understand any human being fully. But then again, I'm from Earth. The point is: who are these people? What do they not tell me and what do I not see?
So, how do I portray other men and women convincingly? Do I really have to understand all the motions? Or can I just simply describe what everything looks like to me and hope that it is close enough to get away with?
I'm a man. I do not have a vagina and I cannot give birth. I'm raised as a male, and all what comes along with that. As a boy all my friends were boys. However, I had a mother and I have a sister, and have had a few girlfriends and a wife. I have three daughters and most of my friends are female. Still, I know less about the female mind and of women's true feelings, than I know of the male psyche. Or so I believe, anyway.
In an attempt to rectify this, I read a lot of female authors these days and preferably literature where the main character is female. I need to know the character I am writing about. I cannot write about someone I know nothing about. Well, I know some things, but not nearly enough. So I study.
Meanwhile, I'm still writing her. I will get her right sooner or later. It may, or may not, be a fairly accurate account of a woman, but she will be there.
An expanding universe
It's the 11th of May and there's a tree in full bloom outside my window. The sun makes it stand out against the building behind it and I just want to climb up into the tree and be there. Nothing else but just to be there, sitting on one of its branches, watching the people pass by and catch a few rays of sun between the flowers and the leaves.
I used to do that a lot as a child. Sometimes when I got fed up by being with my friends, I would climb up a tree with a book or something else to read and sit there for an hour or two. I'd watch the people walk by; I would listen in on their conversations and really love the fact that nobody knew I was there. Like a fly on the wall.
That feeling never went away as I grew older. It still comes back now and again, but it has been a long time since I climbed a tree. Instead I go to a cafe, which is much like sitting in a tree, except they all see me sitting there.
Perhaps some would say that it is bad listening in on other people's conversations, but I look at it as a class room, a place for research. Without life and other people, I would have nothing to write about. Of course, I could write about myself and what happens to me, but that universe is not in itself big enough. This universe of mine (we each have our own) is a product of many things, including the people around me and I am the main explorer of it. However, even though almost endless, it's not big enough.
The explorer in me wants to travel to every part of that universe which holds all our individual universes. My life is not going to be long enough, of course, but I aim to explore much more yet. For every place I go to, my own universe expands.
A Single Quest
Quest. Windmills. Love. Pain. Fears. Caution. Masks. Opportunities. Moment. Passed.
Suddenly, and again, all the world's a stage... I'm a really bad actor.
Be. Love. Simple. Hero.