Pain in the... neck

- Writers are not very fun people to be around from what I’ve heard, is that true?
- Should I read it as a “subtle” hint that I’m not fun to be around?
- No-no-no, it’s just that...
- It’s just that whoever told you that can’t write and envies our awesomeness.

...Just one of our weird small talks in between tea sipping/page flipping/people watching at a coffee shop. Your straightforwardness is amusing. You like to ask strange questions, provide controversial arguments and lead conversations into dead ends. I don’t mind it though, because you unknowingly teach me to handle the uncomfortable and the not-so-friendly, which comprise the majority of the real.

Image credit: arwenita
Currently listening to Cain's Blood by the awesome Lucas Kellison

True friends stab you in the front

Why are you making it so hard to be friends with you? I tape the cracks in this relationship and pretend that I don’t see the mess they create, acting as if it’s whole again. But there is only so much fixing one can do before finding the thing completely useless and throwing it away, right? Is that what awaits us in the end?

Why do you have to pour acid into the drink you are offering me? Do I really evoke that need in you? Do we have to put this strain in our conversations? I force my mind into giving this situation a comical angle (think Coffee & Cigarettes by Tom Waits & Iggy Pop).

Why is this happening, out of competition, jealousy or pure lack of understanding? I was containing myself all day yesterday, but at the end, the emotions I stacked on top of each other reached the tipping point, and I responded to your bitter remarks with my own. It didn’t make me happy. Whenever negativity boils up, I close my eyes and think of the good things you’ve done, reminding myself that minor conflicts should not ruin the major trust we’ve built over the years.

Why don’t I just let this one go? When in doubt, I reach for that (hopelessly naïve but intentionally so) belief that people are inherently good at hearts, but the situations they face in life sometimes make them act, or more often simply appear, adversely. I know you’ve been going through a hard time lately – another reason I should have just let your remark slide by, but I didn’t manage, and there goes my darker side.

Why don’t I write to you? I read somewhere that the best rule of friendship is to keep your heart a little softer than your head. I reach for the keyboard but find that you beat me to it. You feel me, girl, and that’s another reason not to throw us out of the window.

* * *

The title of this blog entry is a quote by Oscar Wilde
Image credit: vassiliki

Clarity

Friday night’s conversation felt like a bunch of needles in a chair. It caused major discomfort in certain places. “No. I like talking about this,” I kept stubbornly saying each time when offered to change the subject. I think questions that are easy to answer are strings of wasted words. It’s that timely uncomfortable query that can make a difference between safe inaction and daring to take a chance.

* * *

- Why do you care about people starving or getting killed thousands of miles away? What is it to you? Why don’t you just want to live your life and build your own happiness?
- Wow. Um. I don’t know. I never thought there has to be a reason. Maybe… Well… I guess… I think there are two worlds. One is carefree and comfortable, where you live for your own good. Another one involves the choice to open your eyes and see the evils of your time and find the strength within you to act upon them. And once you really see that other world and experience it at least once, there is no coming back to that comfortable yet meaningful nothingness. Because… I am not sure how else to word this. Wow, that is such a deep question. Nobody has ever asked me that.

- Have you ever taken care of anyone?
- My younger sister. My parents both worked full time so I looked after her when we were growing up. That’s about it…
- That doesn’t really count.
- I know.

- Would you be able to give something up to help someone? Would you be able to pass your own plate to someone who needs it more?
- I think so. I believe so. Not that I ever had to…

- Ok. How about this: Would you be able to stay in a place where people don’t like you? Racism exists everywhere, you know.
- I know. That’s a tough one. I guess I’d just have to work that much harder to deserve their trust and maybe get them to like me…

- You’ve never done anything like that before. How do you know that you can make it there? Why do you think that you have what it takes?
- I don’t. But I guess there’s one way to find out.

* * *

I needed this, my friend. I want to find out. I am choosing to turn the corner. Thanks, M.

In a city of strangers

Met new friends this weekend. Watched the rain. Explored several new coffee shops, one of which turned out to be a really creepy place. Got lost numerous times although the planning of this town is really simple. Was scared by too much rain on the freeway and must have slowed down the rest of the traffic. Experienced local nightlife and had some stereotypes shattered. Walked in the rain and took lots of pictures. Left muddy footprints on the carpet in the hallway. Stuck a political poster to the car. Took it off as it was obscuring the side view. Thought about putting it back on. Experienced a very unlikely outcome of winning a couple of games of pool. Read a book about writing. Went on a hike and saw striking sceneries at sunset. Danced for the first time in a long time. Decided to try vegetarianism and had tofu, soy milk and an overpriced vegan cookie… followed by a steak later that day. Climbed the house to take pictures of the roof, not sure why. Had an informal tour of the local school’s campus. Wrote. Talked the night away. Chased the neighbors’ dog out of the kitchen. Saw helicopters and tanks. Inhaled the rain. Had breakfast at 4 a.m. while listening to some good R&B and some funky 80s tunes.

* * *
Feeling empty inside.
Missing “old” friends incredibly.
Missing that lifestyle.
Thinking of certain things that are better off left behind for good.
Trying to forget and move on.
Trying not to be too upset about still remembering.
Trying to figure out where I’m going.
Trying to find a way there.

Still listening to Chasing Pavements by Adele
Image credit: hungerartist

Letting your art roam free?

I am convinced more and more that words have a life of their own. They have alert minds, unique personalities and quite a rebellious nature, always plotting the most intricate ways of surprising their carriers.

The last poem in its final form (never really final through my lenses) contains only about 20 percent of the words or ideas with which I started. They become so independent once I let that first wave hit, that at certain points I feel little control over them. They develop – some to bloom and some to whither – all in their own ways, and I only add a stroke of a pen here and there to guide the lost sheep of the group; to direct them back when they wander too far off the edge of the paper. It’s as if they know what’s on my mind and they know where I’d like them to go, but they choose their distinctive paths toward that destination. It doesn’t happen often, but sometimes they grow strong enough to change the destination itself, and I let them.

I have asked a couple of friends who paint about their creative process, and it seems amazingly similar. They start with a basic idea and then they let the art take its own course. I am yet to ask my friends who compose music. You know who you are!

Then again, maybe it is similar precisely because we are friends (or we are friends because we have similar spirits, whichever comes first, you get the point). Maybe other people do it differently. Do you normally know exactly what you are about to create?

A little lost

"To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly be broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket - safe, dark, motionless, airless - it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. The alternative to tragedy, or at least to the risk of tragedy is damnation. The only place outside Heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all the dangers and perturbations of love is Hell."

~ C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves

How do people say things as pretty? Can I do that... please? Sometimes I think my words sit under this huge rock in the sea that is my thoughts, ideas, feelings and desires. The category five storm needs to happen for them to be thrown out to the surface, spit out by the waters that are too dark otherwise to tell where the sunshine ends and the abyss begins.

Sometimes I think lack of pain kills inspiration. Sometimes I think pain overdose does it too. I find chapters of comedy and tragedy as I try to frantically skip any prosaic pages in life. Slowing down seems to be a sure motivation killer so I run fast, and bump into walls, and get hurt, and get up again, and keep running, and bump into walls...

I jump between extreme thirst for social life and desperate need for solitude. I think we give up part of our freedom the moment we choose to depend on others, be it for attention, time, means to survive, understanding, kindness, affection... But then, if others choose to depend on us, do we fill that gap with some of their freedom? What right does anyone have for anyone else's freedom? Being part of society automatically means being, in one way or another, unfree. Being absolutely free then... means being unsocial? And then there is solitude, which takes away the freedom to be loved.

The only true way to be free as I found it is to be free within. It is that type of freedom that I seek out and fight for and worship.

* * *

As I get tired of this buzzing world I take a stroll to the land of no emotion, but I get too restless on my way there to ever reach the illusionary destination of absolute personal strength. Few days into my "independence" I feel the prose of reality crawling at me like a giant heat wave, leaving no air to breathe, no shade to escape to on the surface so hot it melts dreams.

That’s when I take a big breath and dive deep into my poetry, finding there the only relief and a place of safety.

Sometimes answers are hidden in words. More often, words bring out more questions. Sometimes I wish I had words when none come out. At other times I wish I could just stay silent for hours... days. I think good words are hard to get and it probably only adds to their beauty. Then there are angry words and words that are empty, and I haven’t decided yet which one is worse.

* * *

"Why don’t you go blog about it?" I heard last weekend, and thrown into the heat of an argument, it was meant to sound offensive. I'm afraid "it" just doesn't do it for me, my dear boy. Hey, look who’s stronger now. I am on one of those freedom strolls and you’d better not get in my way. I don’t mean to sound amazon-ish but then again, I am so tired of fighting you. We’ve been barking at each other for so long, it started taking a shape of some sick entertainment. Another round, and we might as well start taking bets. At times, it boiled blood. At this point, it tires me. I am not meant for hatred, I don’t like harsh words given or taken, even if, especially if, they are empty shells thrown one's way to offend rather than convey meaning. I am no angel but let me dwell on it some other time. How are YOU going to find your way through such darkness into which you let your thinking wander, such anger with which you let it out? You can’t make a real difference, you can’t right the wrong if you fail or refuse (which is it?) to draw the line between passion and fury. You can’t be truly kind nor loving when you let your pride guide you, wherever it is you are heading.

To my best friend, my dream, my inspiration

We should have never said a word. We spent most of the evening in comforting silence, emerged in our work, feeling a quiet bliss in the air radiating from your art and mine. Your heart and mine.

You swore at me for judging you. You said you love me a minute later and that hurt too, because I felt I didn’t deserve your love.

We won’t remember it as that one night on a curb under a cloudy moon. We won’t remember the quiet music of wind chimes on a dark deck where the only light came from under our eyelashes. We might not even remember working together in a tiny room filled with the air of spray-paint and gentle thoughts. What will stay in mind is how mercilessly we dared to wound each other. Do you still think we aren’t better off keeping some thoughts to ourselves? Forgive me for making your heart bleed. I regret trying to change you in any way, but I also don’t seem to be able to change myself. Where in the world is the way out of this?

I know exactly where you come from and you don’t have to explain a slightest thing to me. I know perfectly well that for every opportunity I was given in life, the door was slammed in front of your face. I made tons of mistakes but I always seemed to get a second chance, even when I least deserved it. You deserve so much more than you were given.

Why does the world put this impassable void between us, these layers of life, this divide that none of us is able to cross? Why is it that our hearts fly over this abyss like two swallows, meeting happily in midair, while our bodies stay put like stones, not moving even to the wind of circumstances? We’ll grow into the ground if we stay, you know.

I don’t want it to be this way. I fall for you over and over again every time I see you or hear your voice. And then I tell you again and again that all I can give is friendship. I quietly despise myself for that. I really can’t think of anything that would give a happy ending to this post. Erykah Badu’s song is all that comes to mind. I guess I’ll see you next lifetime… You know I want to stay around… I guess I’ll see you next lifetime… I’m going to look for you.

I’m going to look for you, my love. I’m going to look after you, too. Hush, no more words, let our hearts sit together in silence.

On the edge between friendship and more

You lie on the edge of the roof, your body stretched on a narrow surface between the short concrete wall and the abyss. You look down, then up at me, then down again. It’s crazy, you say, how it just goes straight to the ground. There are some 12 stories underneath us, and the shoe you were tempted to throw down would have ways to fly.

I trust your words yet I have a strong urge to check it out myself. I lean forward. Careful, I hear from a couple of friends behind, who grab my sleeve as I continue to lean toward the edge. It’s only when my eyes run down the vertical wall below — all the way to the treacherous pavement and the tiny shadows of parked cars and streetlights — that I fully comprehend how high we have climbed and how real the danger of falling is for both of us.

We ran many flights of stairs and climbed some shaky ladders to watch the city lights one night, eager to find adventure on the bleak streets of reality. As I looked down and felt the cool breeze hit my face, the solid roof under my feet started to fade into the unknown, reminding me of my life. I closed my eyes and pictured what would have happened if I leaned too far, the tingly feeling of free fall in my stomach. I’d open my eyes in midair and see you falling right next to me. I’d scream inside, trying to rethink the whole scenario, trying to erase the idea of reaching the ground, because somewhere in the back of my mind, through some inexplicable vision of the future, I knew the landing would be deadly for one of us.

You might say it was your idea to climb up here, but I have to point out you were careful about the ascend, watching your step and mine. I was the one whose walk turned into a sprint as I got excited about reaching the summit. It was me who took you to the edge and it’s me who’s about to take you over it.

Please take the stairs and walk off this roof, down to where we started. Run away from me. Don’t tell me we’ll fly together, because you know neither of us is an angel. Don’t let me pull your sleeve, because I can already see the pavement below.

In between

I found two great friends this summer. One corrupts me. Another one tries to save my soul.

One tempts me with new experiences, unconditional freedom and the joy of surpassing conventional wisdom. Another one refuses to repeat any irrational ways of mine but does not judge me either.

I sense animosity between them. Each one thinks of the other as an extreme, and I am caught in the crossfire.

I need both of them very much. I grew so close to them, I care for both, each one gives me comfort that only a good long-time friend can give, and I feel I can keep my balance as long as I have them both in my life. But I also feel that the darker side is so much easier to fall to. I would like to go there, it seems, stay for just a little, and then come back. When I look that direction, however, I don’t see a turning point. I try to stay on the safe side, but I easily get bored.

I believe people don’t have to adjust their characters in order to be good friends. Minor improvements are good; becoming something you are not isn’t. I feel like I need to stay where I am, in the middle, and I hope it won’t cause losing any of them. I need some moral incentives though, and I need them bad.

Friends who are

It’s how we treat people around us that they will treat us back. It’s how much we really care about their responses to our questions that they will open up to us. It’s how close to our hearts we let them that they will let us to theirs.

I am so happy to lend you an ear, my friend, even if you won’t shut up for hours :) I learned more about you last night than I know about myself, it seems. You are worth every minute of it though, because it’s you I run to when I need to get heard.

Friends who were

I think sometimes we are too scared to renew old bonds. For one reason or another we lose connection with people whose company we actually used to enjoy some time back then. We lose a common place or institution — a school, a job, a neighborhood or a city… We lose common friends or a hobby. Sometimes we lose people without even getting a chance to know them better, thinking regretfully that we might have actually become friends, if we had just taken a little more time to find a common thread… before we lost each other.

We are so used to losing we don’t give much meaning to it anymore. There is no time in our lives for writing letters or attending reunions. We are too busy seeking for the new in this world to remember and appreciate the old.

The soccer game this weekend is my major attempt to reconnect with those old friends whose company I used to enjoy, but whom I lost to moving, time, work and other excuses — just go through the list of what you say when you don’t keep in touch for too long and you will know exactly what I am talking about.

It wasn’t easy to invite them, it’s never easy to make that first step to reconnect, but now that I did, I am eager to see what comes out of this.

One art

The art of losing isn't hard to master;
so many things seem filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster.

Lose something every day. Accept the fluster
of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.

Then practice losing farther, losing faster:
places, and names, and where it was you meant
to travel. None of these will bring disaster.

I lost my mother's watch. And look! my last, or
next-to-last, of three loved houses went.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.

I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,
some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent.
I miss them, but it wasn't a disaster.

— Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture
I love) I shan't have lied. It's evident
the art of losing's not too hard to master
though it may look like (Write it!) like disaster.

~ Elizabeth Bishop

Friends who may be

You can hold my hand if you want to… But at the end of the day, I really need to be with myself. Reminds you of a silly summer song, doesn’t it? I had to borrow its words though because it reflects my life all too well right now.

It’s a small place, he said, we’ll run into each other. We did, of course. It’s a fake attraction, I told myself. My head gets light when I sense free spirit and creativity and he, too, is free-spirited and creative. But I need my space more than anything right now. I need to straighten things up within me before I can give again, and it might take time. Is friendship an option or do things not work like that in real world? Maybe I live in a fairy tale because that way I don’t have to lose anymore. I only hope I can keep my newly found friend.

Blame it on summer

Summer to me means a lot of linen, which I love to wear but hate ironing. It also means swimming pools, the smell of sunscreen, colorful flip flops and chatting with girls in one of the sidewalk cafés, enjoying the warm wind’s kisses on our cheeks.

Summer brings an excuse to take random candid photos “just because it’s nice outside” and to stay up late “just to listen to birds chirp at dawn.”

Leaning back leisurely and watching people pass by the coffee house window counts as a viable activity in summer. Sitting inside – be it an office or a home – while the sun is burning holes in the pavement counts as a crime on my heart’s watch.

I blame it on the season when social ties seem to become of utter importance, overshadowing other, more serious (who said?) things in life. I think it is completely the summer’s fault when my heart and mind suddenly decide to walk in opposite directions, pulling me apart persistently, with the heart scoring points toward victory two thirds of the time.

One of these warm summer nights brought a fight between me and you, one of my best friends. I don’t really want to know at this point whether it was our foolish youth running through out veins, a couple of beers or a mere misunderstanding fueled by a thing or two left unsaid. Let’s just blame it on this hot season and the overdose of emotions it throws at us, breaking the weak defense that is out reason.

When I saw you through one of those coffee house windows parking your bike at the curb, I thought it was meant for us to make up today. Why else would summer want us to run into each other like that in a city with abundance of places to go lick our wounds?

I put my pride somewhere deep in the back pocket and I came to you, my hands shaking, trying not to let go of some fair trade sugar I just grabbed. I apologized although I didn’t feel like I deserved your negative attitude. Would you come to my table, I asked, if I didn’t approach you first? No, you said proudly. I felt that you were unfair to me and our friendship and I thought that you, the older one of us two, should have acted more mature. I was angry inside yet I could not afford to lose you. The thought of this summer without you crept into the back of my mind as you were standing in front of me, paying for your coffee. I was scared to death that you’d turn around and walk past me, throwing our friendship away coldheartedly. I pictured bumping into each other awkwardly in little downtown restaurants and trying to share friends most of which we had in common. I saw the boring pool parties without you, that bottle of Sangria I bought to share with you left unopened, tedious shopping trips with other less fashionable friends and not having you on the phone late at night to laugh about our latest girly adventures. I was afraid of not being able to see you across the table from me – like tonight – leaning toward each other to share happenings at work, our sappy memories, grown-up dreams and random things like those few lines from your book on the history of rock.

It would be my last attempt to approach you, I knew, and you must have felt it. Which one is my table, you asked, following me. You accepted my explanation, and deep in my heart I felt that you were sorry too, although you wouldn’t say it. As we walked out onto the sleepy summer street after chatting for hours, you said you wanted to see me tomorrow. You pulled me closer, hugged me and kissed me, and in my mind I answered, “Don’t worry about saying a thing, my friend, because I already know.” I smiled, turned around and felt a touch of that playful warm wind on my face. It felt like summer.

On the same page

We talked last night, opening our hearts to each other.

The world span around you and me, our friends’ chatter and screeching of passing cars silenced by our voices, the city pausing for a moment in a small quiet alley to listen to our hearts find a common beat.

We were throwing passionate words at each other, catching them in midair, fascinated by the similarity of our thoughts, by the tragic beauty of the situation, by the light summer breeze tickling our minds, making them lightweight.

You and I have found a perfect world in each other’s arms, a world so full of life, beauty, laughter, new acquaintances and old long-lasting bonds. Our paths intertwined so quickly, every piece of the puzzle falling into place so perfectly, your friends and mine, art, music, humor, walks, sleepless nights, turning crazy ideas into life… and the rain.

Our world is meant to end abruptly one day and — aware of that — we leave no time for arguments, jealousy, misunderstanding. I wonder if any relationship would be this perfect if two people always acted as if there were no tomorrow, with only today being theirs to enjoy and live to the fullest. One perfect day at a time.

Friends and lovers

You came into my life like a light summer rain. You washed away my troubles and you helped me become myself again.

I wish this beautiful summer romance never had to end, but even knowing that it will, I am eager to take the most out of it, savoring every moment with you, every moment of you.

We have 12 days to do as we please, no regrets, no looking back, no prying into the future.

Thanks for showing up in my life and thanks for being so wonderful.

Betrayed

I cry. Then I am angry for a moment. Then I am sad… devastated. I cry again. I am angry at myself for letting my emotions loose like that. Oh well, at least I am a female.

I am angry for being trustful, for opening myself to people. I want to shut my world down, hang a huge lock and never let anyone in again. I feel miserable. I feel vulnerable.

A friend has just betrayed me to the furthest possible extent the betrayal can go. I trusted him with a secret and he broke it into tiny little pieces, shuttered like some useless glass on the floor, and then walked over it and jumped over it. I haven’t yet decided what’s worse, the consequences of his betrayal or the very act of it.

I haven’t yet decided what to say to him once we talk. I haven’t yet decided if we are ever going to talk again. How can you trust after that? How can you believe in people? I try to pull my thoughts together but they run away, they sip like streams of sand through my fingers, they don’t belong to me any more.