Due to the fact that I’m using a lot of these writings in college essays, I’m making some posts password protected so that they don’t google phrases from my essays and think I’m plagiarizing.
The password is my cat’s name in all lower case.
Maybe a story? I’m going to try editing this constantly and seeing what I come up with.
The Wall
Preface
There is a quote I remember reading, “Only a coward looks at a blank wall and sees nothing.” I wonder sometimes if I am the wall or if I am the watcher, if I am white or tie-die, if I am a coward or a hero.
People are never blank walls to me. People are many colors. I have one friend who’s brown with a touch of red. Another friend is a deep purple. My girlfriend is pure, omnipresent, bright-as-the-son, yellow. I try to define people, because maybe by defining people, I can define myself.
One time I thought I was black, but then my mom asked me if I was happy, and I told her, “I don’t know always know- but there is no one else in the world I would rather be.” I cannot be black with an answer like that.
I’ve come to realize that I’m me. I’m Brian. I’m not a follower or a leader. I’m a guy. I live a life. I’m damn proud of it.
I suppose this is going to be my story. Or a story that represents my story. Or a little of both. It’s going to be a story about me but, through me, it will be about the world, for I am part of it. The world cries out for focus so I will give it my eyes.
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The junk I deleted:
That is what writing is after all, trying to come up with simple meanings when forced to contemplate a complicated reality.
I truly wonder where I fit in this world.
I wonder where anyone fits in this world.
Oh ancient-lover-of-my-mind, the prophecy you foretold has come true. It is junior year and it is hard. It is not the double suicide that you experienced. More the singular and overstated suicide of regression and temptation. It is junior year and it’s hard. I want my mommy. It sucks.
Remember that day on the mountain? That day in Starbucks? That day in the rain? Epiphanies all of them. They are why I write. I wish there was something more, something without you would be nice actually, as you would be the first to want probably, but there isn’t much more besides the wonderful person in my previous letter-story-confession. There has been a lot of important-I’m-sure events happening. But there has been nothing like our friendship, which someone really could make a wonderfully almost-cliched movie out of. Nothing much has surprised me like your funk that brought me out of my funk and that saved me from that later funk which destroyed my ex-lover-life. Isn’t it incomprehensible the way memories swirl together? Aren’t my words just as incomprehensible…?
I know the truth today. But I also know that I knew a different incompatible truth yesterday. I’m not talking in the abstract here, I’m talking about memories. The facts in my memories have not changed, but something has. Perhaps the highlights have changed or the effects have affected my view of the memories. Perhaps the way I find memories in my mind when I’m thinking, the way I map and catalog past events. I used to be such a romantic, always believing in the ultimate good of people.
I still am. I love it. I think that it is what makes me Brian more than anything else at the moment. I think I might still love my will to always build myself up jovially but I’m not sure I’ve built myself up lately. I hope I might be starting to again.
I’m sorry to be the ho-of-others-minds that I am. I doubt you’re reading this, but if you are, I’m not sure whether I’m happy or sad about that. Happy but embarrassed if you tell me I suppose. Otherwise this is just another unsent letter that you and I both write so much of when we should just write…letters.
Here’s the obligatory-but-still-true ending that I will keep in my mind because you know it anyway,
Brian
Stupid, evil, ugly, pointy, stalking, blinky curser. I try to satisfy your thirst to stop blinking but it really doens’t work because I can’t stop typing or you’ll stop blinking and then there will be lions and as a possible side note I think when I force myself to type this fast I get some crazy long sentences that may lack structure and purpose but I nevertheless can’t fix that because ol’ blinky will return and then lions and tigers and the world will explode…
If I do take creative writing next year I could write a story about ‘ol blinky the cursor and how he comes to find peace in the blinky world among his cursor brethern.
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Perhaps I’ll have something better latter, I just felt the need to write, to make meaning out of nothing.
There is a small chance this could actually get published, if it gets voted up.
I would also love to hear any reccomendations for what else I might submit. Personally, I believe that is my best however.
I also edited this. Still a litle choppy but I’ll either submit this next or my narrative about hugs and memories.
I remember that it was raining and we were relishing it.
There we were, showering in what we were supposed to be afraid of. Everything was literally falling to pieces all around us and we were dancing, laughing, and hugging. In the median between heaven and hell I found my proverbial her. She was slightly muddy and a little grey but with eyes you have to look in before you see any sort of truth in anyone elses. We looked at each other for the first time that day I think. And then we talked about it for hours and hours on end – probably seconds outside the median, our median. We talked using the silence and manipulating it with our eyes to say something too beautiful and meaningful for either of us to comprehend.
The world came back as we hugged. It always does. With my arms around her I willed my fingers to somehow transfer my understanding of what this was, of what she was. I said I love you instead and hoped the meaning of those words hadn’t been lost to the world yet. She slowly let go, not fully withdrawing her arms from around me for as long as possible, and started walking toward her car. But then she stopped. She turned around and she said she loved me too. She said it with those eyes though. It was all in her eyes all along in fact. Sometimes you need to listen to the silence to know such things. She was gone all too soon. I hope my eyes said said it all.
I hope I didn’t say goodbye.
Don’t worry, I’m simply reflecting on events past.
I met a girl at a party once. We were outside, it was cold, and she asked me to hold her. As the party died down, I stayed just to keep her in my arms a little while longer, figure out her name, and memorize her appearance. She was exactly the type of girl you want to be embracing. Cute and ever so inclined to lean back on you when you hug her closer. I rode my bike home in a midnight drizzle because I didn’t want to wake my parents.
We’re going to see a movie soon.
Remember last year when that truck took out the power line to our school? We had that glorious “snow day?”
Anyone own an old truck?
The amount of schoolwork I’ve been doing is insane but I have learned a few things. First and foremost is that I love stupid simple love songs. Second is that if I ever have a daughter, I want to name her Camilla after a stupid simple love song. That name and that song speak the the truth – whatever it may be.
You’re in my eyes,
in my head,
in my soul,
I feel you there.Oh Camilla, Light this world again, O-oh.
Thank you stupid simple beauty/truth for keeping me sane.
It should be noted that I haven’t written anything (good) lately, although I did come up with the phrase “Secondhand Twilight” which I declare to be my band name. Incidentily I also wrote a simple little song. If I ever get a chance I’ll finish the lyrics and record it. (Even sing – eventually something good has to come out, right?)
Come to think of it anyone named Camilla would be awesome to date. I can hear myself whispering “Camilla” into the reciever, perhaps with a bit of a Spanish undertone. Camilla is a gorgeous name. Mental note: date someone named Camilla. Decide whether Camilla would be a better girlfriend name or child name.
You know, everything I know about dating I learned from a British Comedy…that might explain a lot.
Rough I know. The more and more they teach me, the more and more I realize how much I know. Call me an arrogant teenager if you wish.
They fill my head with meaningless bullshit about how to write. I know how to write. I know how to express myself and it is not through following their structures and words. They tell me not to use euphemisms. Their whole structure is a euphemism, it is hypocritical, it is demented, and it is pitiful. I know how to write. And it involves passion. I insert myself into this argument because I care about the outcome. There is everything right with that. I know how to write. And it involves freedom of expression. It involves putting ‘and’ in front of sentences. It involves writing the way arguments appear in my mind and not forcing them to take forms that are unnatural. Their structure is a virus, a euphemism. It is copied over and over again without thought. Hundreds of essays that are all the same. Hundreds of students that never learned how to think because they were too busy copying the goddamned structure. Thinking involves creativity. Thinking is creativity. I bet that most people never have so much as one original thought in their lives and it is because of the damned structure because it is a damned euphemism. It is mindlessly repeating the same thing that when you stop to think about it, just isn’t one bit true. Not one bit. It is utter ridiculousness. I can paint but don’t give me this color by numbers bullshit. Give me a piece of paper and I’ll show you something new as if my life depended on it. Because when it comes down to it, that’s pretty much my existence and as free thinking human being. You say that some students need the color by numbers to do anything at all, I say you’re enabling their stupidity. I know how to write.
I know how to write because I once wrote a letter. It wasn’t beautiful because it had elegant language or because it was long or because it was particularly descriptive. It was beautiful because it was true. It was the Truth as I saw it, wholly and completely, and I had managed to relay it with a little note at the bottom that expressed my love. My letter did not contain euphemisms. My letter had no predominant structure to it. I was copying nothing. I was fulfilling the purpose of language: to express ideas. I believe that meaning should dictate structure and word choice and that word choice and structure should not take precedence over meaning. That is what this damned AP Comp is forcing me to do and I hate it. The only joy that comes from writing in it is the subtle smile I get when I manage to subvert the rules. I know that culture evolves, that perceptions evolve, that beauty evolves, that we evolve, but goddamnit I want to be involved in my mind and how I structure what I think. Reality is fluid. It is cold. It is harsh. But it is what is. And I must say so if I can. Without knowing reality there is no Truth and without truth there is no meaning. Fail me if you wish, but I have succeeded. I know how to write.
