Posts tagged with "memories"

Meet Me In Montauk

I admit that some movies, some scenes, some songs, some moments, still rub me the wrong way. In gen­er­al this is a good thing: the hard­er it is to let go of some­thing, the bet­ter the expe­ri­ence it was. I’m also giv­en hope in under­stand­ing that these things will pass, as all things pass, and every­thing will be put in its right place. Fortunately, this is easy to accept because of the fact that I’ve already gone through a full cycle with oth­ers. Perhaps I’ve also become accus­tomed to some resid­ual emo­tions, kept alive by the mem­o­ries of the ori­gins of lessons learned.

But all of this still does­n’t detract from the fact that some things still rub me the wrong way, as if my skin was peeled and every con­jured sen­sa­tion was a salt water burn. I can feel that sound in my ears, feel the pris­mat­ic danc­ing of light in my eyes, feel her say, “pris­mat­ic”, explain­ing the colour of her hair.

It’s not even the per­son with which I share these expe­ri­ences that makes it impor­tant, it’s the expe­ri­ences them­selves, because they mean some­thing. A change in my life. A change that may have not have hap­pened oth­er­wise.

And I real­ize that it’s not that I can’t let these mem­o­ries go, it’s that I choose not to.

Heavy Snowfall Warning

Winter view from my apartment

A strong Alberta clip­per will track south­east over south­ern Ontario today into upstate New York tonight. Snow heavy at times has spread right across the Ottawa Valley into Québec and will con­tin­ue through­out the day.

Snowfall rates have often been 2 to 4 cm per hour with this very strong clip­per.

Freezing rain and ice pel­lets have moved into the St Lawrence Valley area east of Brockville late this after­noon. A sharp Arctic cold front will blast through the regions this evening as the clip­per sails into north­ern New York state. Temperatures will plunge up to 10 degrees to well below freez­ing with­in the first hour after the front goes through. As a result: rain in the regions east of Lake Huron and south­east of Georgian Bay will change sud­den­ly over to snow or flur­ries with untreat­ed sur­faces quick­ly becom­ing icy and very slip­pery.

Elsewhere the snow and freez­ing rain will pull out of the regions this evening as the clip­per and sharp Arctic cold front moves into north­ern New England and south­ern Québec. Snowfall amounts of 15 to 20 cm are like­ly in the snowsqualls along with white­out con­di­tions from blow­ing snow.

Dangerous trav­el­ling con­di­tions are expect­ed due to very low to at times nil vis­i­bil­i­ty in heavy snow blow­ing snow and icy con­di­tions. All trav­ellers should exer­cise extreme cau­tion and adjust plans accord­ing­ly.

My most vivid mem­o­ries of the spring are from high school. About a month before exams began, every guy would start spend­ing a min­i­mum of thir­ty min­utes look­ing out the win­dow every day. On the south­ern side of the main build­ing would be a small foot­ball field, and two soc­cer fields, as well as the ten­nis courts, hock­ey rink, and large swim­ming pool. Three more fields used for var­i­ous oth­er sports, such as lacrosse, crick­et, and field hock­ey, could be seen on the west­ern side. At the north was the base­ball dia­mond, as well as the small pool, and more ten­nis courts. The main gates of the school prop­er­ty, what many con­sid­ered a tri­umphant walk away from the main build­ing after a day with no spares, was at the east.

What male teenag­er would be think­ing about any­thing but run­ning through the wood­en halls, throw­ing off their tie, and rolling in the lus­cious­ly green, well-man­i­cured grass? In a school with a lack of females, no less. Add to the fact that a sig­nif­i­cant por­tion of alum­ni pride is put into a well-fund­ed sports pro­gramme, and the result was class­es of boys bot­tling testos­terone, encour­aged by teacher and coach alike to be released in the form of phys­i­cal activ­i­ty. (I find sports metephors very use­ful for mak­ing veiled sex­u­al ref­er­ences.)

I could see it in every one of them, how dif­fi­cult it would become to con­cen­trate in class, instead of imag­in­ing how the hours after school were to be spent. But it was nev­er like that for me. While every­one else was wait­ing for the fields to thaw, I’d be wait­ing for the snow the fall. It’s days like these that make it hard for me to con­cen­trate.

All I want to do is stay at home wrapped in a blan­ket, watch the snow col­lect, and write.

Critical Emancipation

Sometimes it feels like I’m wait­ing for inspi­ra­tion when I write. Like I’m wait­ing for a spe­cif­ic mood, or a spe­cif­ic song to come on and guide me through an entry. Lately, that inspi­ra­tion seems to avoid me. I keep try­ing to write about things that I feel I should write about, instead of the things I want to write about. Every time I search my head for the prop­er mood or mind­set, it’s only mem­o­ries that appear.

And they sur­face like pho­tographs, each one a still frame cap­tur­ing an expe­ri­ence, expressed in sound, warmth, light, and odour. I’m on the streets of Hong Kong again, sur­round­ed by peo­ple, brows­ing through the knick-knacky stores with the heat of the sun soak­ing through my shirt. I’m skat­ing on the Canal, map­ping the imper­fec­tions of the ice as I glide across them, the night sky burn­ing with the orange of win­ter. I’m won­der­ing through the mall of my home­town, enjoy­ing the strange famil­iar­i­ty of a place I fre­quent­ed so long ago, hop­ing I don’t bump into an ex. I’m in uni­form, clutch­ing the lapels of my blaz­er, as I step out from the heat of grandiose wood­en doors into the snow-washed quad. I’m on the bus to New York, try­ing to fig­ure out which pas­sen­gers are com­ing or going, won­der­ing where my own jour­ney would take me.

I fight against these mem­o­ries, try­ing to write about some­thing more rel­e­vant. In the end, I write about noth­ing, and I can’t fight against it any­more. I have to write the things I want, inspired by the things I think. I have to let go one more time.

From myself, instead of oth­ers.

Memories Of Manson

I was lis­ten­ing to Manson’s sec­ond album, Antichrist Superstar, for the first time after a sev­er­al year hia­tus on the bus to work this morn­ing. I was remind­ed of how much I went through with this album, for most of high-school and near­ly two entire rela­tion­ships. How com­fort­ing this music was for me, on the jour­ney home from my exhaust­ing class­es and elit­ist class­mates. It’s the only good album Manson ever put out, and also hap­pens to be the only album that Trent Reznor pro­duced for him. I’m will­ing to bet that it isn’t sim­ple coin­ci­dence.

I nev­er real­ly get a chance to lis­ten to these songs; even though I con­sid­er the music to be met­al, the songs are too dark and moody to fit into my met­al playlist. It’s the same thing with Tool. Aside from Opiate, which was just an EP anyway,Tool’s music has nev­er fit into any spe­cif­ic genre to me. They have a met­al feel and pro­gres­sive rock ele­ments, but are nev­er enough of one or the either to fit into any of my playlists.

Life On Contract

I remem­ber once when I was younger, say about nine or ten, my par­ents took me for a car ride. I had no idea where we were going, because I nev­er ques­tioned them when­ev­er they told me to get in the car. I’ve always been a vic­tim of hum­ming engines, and even today I find it hard to stay awake while rid­ing in a car. I fell asleep and even­tu­al­ly woke up in a parked car with my seat­belt still on, uncer­tain of how much time had passed or where my par­ents had gone. The sur­round­ings were unfa­mil­iar, the park­ing lot, half-full, even more so. I sat there, expect­ing my par­ents to come back any sec­ond.

Not know­ing how much more time went by, I start­ed to ques­tion whether or not they had pur­pose­ly left me there, some decade-late, do-it-your­self, abor­tion. “No”, I thought, “They would­n’t just leave the car, it’s too much mon­ey”. When I could­n’t fight against my sus­pi­cion any longer, could­n’t con­vince myself that they would­n’t just leave me in this lot like a baby on a doorstep, I start­ed to cry. I did­n’t know what to do. I gath­ered up the courage to leave the saftey of the car, and locked the door, know­ing that in doing so I would­n’t be able to get back in, but too scared of get­ting in trou­ble if my par­ents were ever to find out.

Wandering around the adja­cent plaza, my face a com­plete sob­bing mess, I looked for them through the store win­dows. Excuses, apolo­gies, promis­es to be a good kid kept rac­ing through my mind as I won­dered from store to store, being care­ful not to let my eyes off the car. Eventually, I found them in a light fix­ture store, chat­ting with a sales clerk about some wood grain ceil­ing fan. I went in, approached them, and all I could say was, “Where did you go?”. They told me, mat­ter-of-fact­ly, that they went shop­ping and that I should have stayed asleep in the car. After fin­ish­ing their con­ver­sa­tion with the clerk, they left with me, and we all went home. I was shak­en, but hap­py that I was­n’t dis­card­ed because of poor marks of bad piano form.

And even though I wish that the entire inci­dent did­n’t hap­pen in the first place, a part of me won­ders what it would be like if I had nev­er found them. Perhaps a res­o­lu­tion.

An end to the stip­u­la­tions of a con­di­tion­al life.