counting stars

lately I've been
I've been losing sleep
dreaming about the things that we could be

hello world

Woke up 29 and feeling fantastic.  Happy birthday to me!

code blue

The Last Bookstore in LA, 2013

Medicine
is sucking
the artistry
out of me.

deus ex machina

James:  literature is just different people telling different stories.
me:  literature is different people telling the same story.
James:  that's complexly simple.

ennui.

Musician in the Rain (1957), Robert Doisneau

This day / this month / this year, I feel jaded / restless / uninspired.
Life feels redundant and I need a change.

hark!

Not a whit, we defy augury: there's a special
providence in the fall of a sparrow.  If it be now,
'tis not to come; if it be not to come, it will be
now; if it be not now, yet it will come:
the readiness is all.

- Shakespeare's Hamlet

through the looking glass

UCR campus, 2013

I went on a date last night.  I arrived horrendously late because of traffic.  We opted for a hole-in-the-wall place, my favorite, where we talked of travels and art and school and travels again.  I'll never understand the need to elaborate (unprompted) on all the places you've been to like it's some sort of feat.  But with the night still young, we walked over to a nearby pub.  The lights were dim and all the tables had newspaper for place mats.  Live music echoed from the front of the bar as we made our way to the back.  He told me more about his job, about his mom being a psychologist, about his former best friend and the friend who's now taken his place, how they met in college at Chapel Hill, how they both wanted to go to law school, how the guy used to be a staunch conservative until his trip to Bangkok ... I sipped my Guinness as the band crooned its rendition of Marcy Playground's "Sex and Candy"in the background.  You always drank Black and Coke.

You did the night of our anatomy midterm when you dragged me out to Bananas for a quick bite that ended in us coming back at 4am.  You wore a green V-neck t-shirt with those cargo shorts with the faint floral print with brown sandals.  We were sitting on the bench in front of SD5.  The air was crisp and I was tipsy and rambling, but you were looking at me like you could listen to me forever.  You then launched into the confession that will forever be ingrained in my memory where you'll always be out on the balcony, looking out against the evening sky.  It survives alongside the splash your feet made in the water when I flooded our apartment, the face you made when you tried that bitter black drink on our layover, our countless grocery lists, the hum of our transformer, the feel of your hand across the table at Aquarium, the curl of your hair against my cheek on rainy nights, the look on your face at JFK the last time you were mine and I was yours.

Everyone keeps asking how I'm handling your recent big news.  I tell them how much I support you.  I explain that it never would've worked between us, that we knew this would happen from the start, that I want you to be happy.  And I do, so very much; I love you more than my need to be selfish.  I love you enough to never see you again.  But the ugly truth is that I'm a mess, and all of this is breaking my heart.  When did being with people become so lonely?

summertime sadness

I think I'll miss you forever

like the stars miss the sun in the morning sky

later's better than never

even if you're gone I'm gonna drive

kiss me hard before you go

- lana del rey

in case you didn't know

the juice
it drips and drips,
the heart
it beats and beats,
the lines of your fingers
the way your scent lingers
I fall and I fall and I fall.

purple does something strange to me

Crossing the George Washington, 2013

I've been in an introspective mood lately.  I suppose it's natural when your life solely consists of work and study.

I spent half of this year surrounded by people.  I was texting constantly, seeing friends often, dating someone across the country and yet I felt so lonely.  Something was missing and I just couldn't seem to patch the hole.  In the last month or so, I've stopped returning phone calls.  I ended my short-lived never-should've-happened relationship.  I did it for pragmatic reasons of studying, but I think part of me just craved the solitude.  I've been using external band-aids to fix internal wounds.  Is 8 years too long to find forgiveness?  Maybe it was foolish to think it could've taken anything less.  Either way, this must be what metempsychosis feels like.  Something familiar is coursing through my veins and it feels like the crisp air at 6am, like the glow of late night lamps, like James Joyce and I are friends again.

albatross

Lately I've had a storm in my heart that can't be quelled by any deep sigh, any good book, any loving man.  It follows me around, is across from me at coffee shops, in the corner of my bedroom, in my ear with every song.  I know I have to put it out myself; I just haven't a clue where to start.

there is a place in the heart that
will never be filled

a space

and even during the
best moments
and the greatest times

we will know it

we will know it
more than ever

there is a place in the heart that
will never be filled
and

we will wait
and wait

in that space.

:: Charles Bukowski ::

hellooo

I stopped writing because I stopped taking pictures.

But that's a lame excuse.

My most pressing thought currently is that New Jersey's fickle weather has my sinuses doing somersaults.  And I am not an acrobatic person.