Show me Bach, she said with her hands.
Show me love, I said with my lips.
Show me Bach, she said with her hands.
Show me love, I said with my lips.
There’s so much to say, and not enough time to write. It’s obvious that I haven’t been sticking to any kind of posting schedule lately. The benefit is that I don’t feel the pressure of having to write something every day, the drawback being the fact that things I want to get down are often lost. When I do get a chance to write, it’s like I’m perpetually writing about thoughts, feelings, and events that are a month old.
I used to write my thoughts quite often. Things I had to figure out or get off my chest. Now, it’s mostly things that happen in my daily life, and something random here and there. It’s like I’m moving beyond my confused adolescence into some sort of reflective dotage.
The entries from the first year were written with so much more frequency — roughly three times a day. Then that changed to once a day, then every other day. A few times, I tried to write less frequently, without a set schedule, but that never really worked. The writing itch was always there. At one point I took a month-long hiatus.
Sometimes I don’t even know what I’m trying to say.
The thing I particularly miss are the entries written late at night. Spilling my soul out in words, with the music, the sky, and the empty streets guiding me. As tired as I would be (I swear, sometimes it was the exhaustion that brought it out in me), I always went to bed after feeling satisfied.
Now, I’m not sure what this all is.
Last class, Mike asked how I was doing, and as a somewhat phatic response, I told him I was doing well.
He told me, with a chuckle, that if he didn’t know me any better and went only by my writings, he would imagine me to be like Joe Btfsplk, with a perpetual rain cloud above my head.
So I went home and read through the last couple pages of my entries, and found that they painted a somewhat lugubrious picture.
I’ve always contended that happiness is too hard to write. When I feel like expressing myself, it’s often because of a problem of some sort, internal or external, that I need to figure out. Writing has always been a way for me to get my thoughts in line, and off my chest. Not much of a peaceful, detached, care-free Taoist, am I?
Perhaps I’ll always lead a Cohen-esque life, where love, sex, philosophy, and depression are the dominant themes.
The funny thing is that my life has improved tremendously after therapy. I used to be a very dark person. After gaining the stability of a house and a career, along with separation from my mother, not much else has changed. I’ve come to realize that it’s not so much the things in my life that’s improved in the last few years (aside from the struggle with anxiety), as my attitude. To be honest, I have nothing to complain about.
That doesn’t change the fact that my entries have been somewhat depressing.
Perhaps I’m still not truly happy yet.
Or perhaps I’m still not looking at things the right way.
Over the last while, I’ve been receiving some very nice letters and comments.
Two, in particular, touched me. This one:
I stumbled upon your blog a few days ago. I’m reading all your archives right now.
One of your entries moved me so much I had to pass it to my best, most initimate, most sensitive/sensual girlfriends. It wasn’t a big group, but a group I felt could hear what you were saying in your entry. It was about finding the spot on a woman that should be kissed.
I read your blog every day because I can’t believe there is a man out in the universe who is this intuitive, in tune, so aware of himself emotionally and physically. I wish you had gone to my college — you would have been so loved and admired.
So this entry distresses me, and I don’t even know you. I understand lonliness — I’ve never had intimacy, or rather, I’m very afraid of it. I don’t even know why I’m telling you all this because you don’t know me either and you won’t care, but this entry hurts. You must know by now that someone thinks of you everyday. Maybe it is your mom, maybe an ex-lover or girlfriend or male friend or co worker.
I think I’m more in shock that you can write so honestly and openly. I’m jealous of that.
well, I just wanted to let you know that. And that I have a crush on your blog. Can a person crush on a blog?
Please take care,
Zaira
And this from a few months ago:
Hi Jeff,
you don’t know me and we will probably never meet. It’s sort of interesting the way the internet has changed the way we can know someone.
Allow me to introduce myself, since you have already bore your soul in a very real way that has moved me to write to a complete stranger-something i have never done.
I am a 30 yr old interior designer, a born and bred new yorker currently living in brooklyn. It’s been slow at work lately, so to pass the time I have taken to reading blogs mostly design related, but somehow i read a comment that you had made on a random blog, looking back i can’t remember which one unfortunately, and it led me back to your personal blog somehow.
you see I am not like you at all. I feel similar feelings, and even have similar beliefs, but I don’t have the guts to put myself out there in that way. I dont even have a blog, and i can barely talk to my friends about the way im feeling. so for me your blog is very therapeutic and refreshing.
like most people who blog, im sure, you wonder if anyone out there is reading. Well just wanted to let you know that I really like your blog and will continue to read it.
I have added you as a flickr contact and i see that you have reciprocated-*armadilliz* I am not a stalker / crazy person, or anything like that, just a fan, so rest easy.
Take care,
-Liz
And while people tell me how much they appreciate me being open and sharing myself, it’s nothing compared to what they share of themselves in these letters. I don’t know what compels someone to write to a total stranger, but it’s a warming gesture, something that inspires me when I’m feeling closed and self-conscious.
Thank you to the people who’ve written me. Thank you to the people who share their own problems and issues and lives. Thank you to the people who let me know that I’ve inspired them to start their own journals. Thank you for supporting me when we’ve never even spoken.
It’s your words that make me feel like I’m not so alone when I’m sitting in my house, wondering what to do with myself. It’s your kindness that gives me strength when the world is falling down around me. It’s knowing that I’ve been able to make a difference that keeps me going.
Thank you.
I feel utterly intoxicated.
With a hammer and a ladder, we hung my pictures tonight, carefully deciding where to place each one to balance the colours, the orientations, the shapes, and the concepts.
Amongst the wine and the wood, the kids and the colours, we stopped to admire the art in the house. Adrienne dropped by to share her latest graphic poems with us, along with her alcoholic findings. “From The Desk Of” Penelope was written that day, dense and deep, full of details taken for granted. The words must write themselves, I thought.
Misun and I seem to share a kinship through our appreciation of expression, something I’ve never had with my friends. Not that there’s anything wrong with them, but I’ve always felt like they can’t relate to me when it comes to emotions or creativity. As I seem to be the creative brother she’s always wanted, and she seems to be the supportive sister I’ve always needed, we agreed to be adopted siblings.
In a recent interview, Frédéric said, in his ebullient Parisian accent, that one of the reasons he wanted to open the Salon is to promote dialogue and interaction. Perhaps it’s this hunger for dialogue that connects us. He also mentioned to me he was stressed out about being interviewed; being put on the spot made him freeze up. I told him I had the same problem with pretty girls. “You’re affected by beauty”, he said, something I knew, but not something that everyone understands.
I left, feeling like I was a part of something wonderful, something greater than myself.