MOONLIGHT MELANCHOLY

(I love alliteration.)

There are certain conditions about my being that haunt me; there are times that I am kept awake by them.

This is of course one such night.

These invisible specters also serve as the pillars that hoist the vast majority that I am, and their silent voices keep me awake.

While knowing these stoic and cold beams gives me solid constitution for the man that I am, and all pride emanating thereof; I cannot admit that there is a great measure of sadness in this self confession. In such feelings I seldom give voice, but for the brief explorations that I make through my writing; things that go largely ignored.

But for grief and the touch of melancholy, I would not be the man I am today. What airy flights would have I known; what vaunted heights would I have soared but for? What ceaseless deeps, cold and dark abysses would I have fallen and met, should that I had then floundered? That is in another reality — all but removed now to mere hypothesis.

While bitterness yet resides, I will do my utmost to apply wisdom learned from long years of introspection and silence. Yet — there is a vast difference in my life now. As Frodo has sailed off into Valinor, so have I left the shores of my own Middle-Earth, into a ‘far green country with a swift sunrise.’ Hope — a word then only as a shriveled and hollow term, was reduced to the rubble of useless youthful idealism. And now — in this brave new world, I begin to slowly allow its droplets to form a steady trickle. Perhaps there will be a day in which a washing tide floods the cracked and parched basins of this soul, so long deprived.

But in this moment of moments: in this mote snap-shot in time, I am taken by an ill-humour as the very concept of my being is made in contest by the eclipsing shadow of the world.

I understand the price of being different: and I continually pay its toll. All in spite, when so assailed; when I find myself so helplessly mired in misery I ask candid rhetoric : “Will I ever find that which I seek?”

(I’ll be okay in the morning.)

First-World Problems (FWP!) – The 1/4 Life Crisis

It’s a funny thing, this gratitude bit; I was speaking with a few just a day or two ago — some late evening about a Quarter Life Crisis.

When the conversation began at the pub (or “poob” as the Britons say), they took a look at me as a point of interest and maybe an intellectual challenge and asked,

“Hey how old are you?”

It was too loud to really say to two people at once, even at a distance of a foot. So I motioned with my fingers. Three, and then one.

Apparently, they were blown away. I look twelve or something — but they were generous and claimed that I looked about 22.

“Goddamn Asian genes,” one of them said. Or something to that effect. I assure you, I was not wearing denim that evening. Yeah, terrible pun — but at least I’m consistent with them!

The conversation went on and on, about how difficult it is to come to terms with your age. And those of you who know me, and care enough to follow my writings know that I am having some issues digesting the passage of the past decade.

Intellectually, I grasp the notion. But for some cause unknown, I am having difficulty coping with that sense of loss emotionally. Loss may be used liberally, or perhaps literally in a grave way. I teeter and totter, I am here and there. Some times it does not bother me, but most times, I think that it does. I think that things will be easier as time progresses and when I distance myself from my old life, day by day.

Ah, my old life. When I told me Aussie mate at work about my old lifestyle (he cared enough to venture to ask), he said, “That sounds rather sad,” Yes, I think that my old way of life was sad. But these are First World Problems.

First World Problems has been a recurring joke between me and my good friend Daniel Tsang for the past week, perhaps two. Hell, let’s go with a month! This kind of tongue in cheek humour is a great reminder of how swell life is even for those of us who are down.
It often begins with:

“Don’t you just hate it when…”

For example:

“Don’t you just hate it when your movie is NOT in 1080p?”
—
“Don’t you just hate it when you’re too full from gorging at a big meal and you feel sick?”
—
“Don’t you just hate it when driving and you’re stuck in traffic?”

In my best Napoleon Dynamite voice, “Gosh!” Such suffering! I wail endlessly over the travesties that befall on our souls.

No, not.

This is the nature of First World Problems. And pointing them out in a joke form gives me that sly tongue-in-cheek expression, usually ending in a wide grin from yours truly.

A similar but starkly darker Third World Joke is like:

“Don’t you just hate it when a War Lord forces you to shoot your own family, and if you don’t he will rape and then kill all of you?”
—
“Don’t you just hate it when you are forced into breaking rocks and mining salt in a labour camp?”
—
“Don’t you just hate it when you get leprosy and can’t afford the pills?”
—
Life is so HARD for us first-worlders isn’t it?

But on a more serious note, and perhaps tinged with irony: what I said earlier about a quarter-life crisis is indeed a strange plight to befall our generation. What is it about us? Are we too entitled, are we too soul-less? Four generations ago, I would have sired a child by now, and have had been working in some coal plant for 15 years already. Yet today, in this time of marvel while living in a land of plenty, I have difficulty letting go of my childish ways. I still watch cartoons, play video games, have toys and develop this horrible rash when I think about commitment.

Milestones. Accomplishment. Individualism. Personal and financial success seem to be subtly drilled into us through years of soft boring. The hole goes so deep, and yet we never once peak down into the cavern. We’re not even aware of the hole — until we hit a land-mark age. 25, 30, 40, 50 .. and so on.

Speaking to my young friends that night made me realize how prevalent this type of identity crisis is today. I think that I had it rougher than most on the social front, and perhaps more economically as well during those formative years. But I did have stability, so that means for something. The fact that it had a popular coined name like “Quarter Life Crisis” should have spoken volumes about its prevalence today, but I was still surprised to see such young and professional people being afflicted as I was a few years prior.

“What do YOU have to feel bad about,” I half wondered? This wasn’t malicious, discriminatory, nor even marginalizing. I just had difficulty understanding. From my Frame of Reference [Physics Drop], at the surface they are more successful than I am, and have more of their “shit together” than I do even today — and at a younger age. But we all struggle in the river of life, trying to stay above the current and move forward, lest we are taken by some cold waters and swept back, and worse yet, even drowned.

First World Problems.

Because you know, I can say this: My parents lived through Communist China. 30 million people died to famine during the Cultural Revolution. Who knows about the fraction that died due to murder? My parents told me about children being sold, slavery, bandits and of farmers boiling tree bark in order to stay hunger. So really — what AM I to complain about?

In the past two years, I have become more of an atheist than ever: eschewing all mysticism, and the capacity to believe in “something greater” (unless presented with empirical evidence). In spite and in irony, I find myself more … how do I say, spiritual than ever. It’s an odd dichotomy to house in the mind of a man, I know.

I have made mention if it prior: the mathematical majesty of the Universe, our Galaxy, the Solar System, our Planet being in that “Sweet Spot” with a gravitational mass that is ‘just so’ that allows for life to form. There it coalesced in its nearly infinite improbability to make who we are today — and then, a distillation of chance upon that more, creating me. Precipitated at the very end, filtered out by the passage of three decades do I write this article, in its long winded but somehow transient and insignificant brevity about MY Quarter Life Crisis. Or what had been. Maybe.

GOSH, how self centered AM I?

In any case, I told those young and vibrant people how I overcame it, as best as I could iterate myself in a succinct manner in a loud bar-club like atmosphere.

I said:

“I realised that over time, being here is a gift and that life is majestic. It is grand and wonderful and the most difficult thing is to realize this on a true and emotional level. It is one thing for me to say this, and you to nod about it, it is another to feel it, embody it.”

Something like that. It probably wasn’t nearly as poetic in prose (I think that I write better than I speak), but I beg your indulgence. I don’t think that they understood it, though.

I continued in my wise man ways, stroking my wizened white beard, wearing my long and tattered robes. I was suddenly on that high mountain top, starkly backed by the golden glow of a full and setting sun. In those deep and long shadows I was a black form, but my words were luminescent with insight when I said:

“I can’t say that you go to sleep one day and, “Oh!” you wake up and suddenly life is better. When you know this, day by day, life gets less-shitty, and your pain becomes easier. ”

I also wanted to say, “And then one day, it’s gone.” But I can’t, as I have not reached that point yet.

I am happier as a person, though. I am more solid, more stable and more whole. I’m good; I’m good! But I will not be dishonest with myself in saying that I have left behind all semblances of human suffering.

The Buddha said that suffering comes from the human creation of Desire. So what is it that I desire? And should I, as he suggest, set it away? I struggle with this philosophy, as otherworldly wise and freeing as it could be. In my ignorance I say, “But what about self improvement, what about ourselves as a society, as a people and as a culture?” Surely we must desire and yearn for more in order to attain the betterment of myself.

Mayhaps it will come that one day, and I hope none too far from now, that I will find an answer to this question for myself. And when I do have an answer, I will probably feel like a dumbass for not having it fifteen years sooner.

[HUMBLE-BRAG]

I AM pretty wise you see, I’m not very smart; for if I were, I would have found my answers many years ago without having made so many an error.

Between fretting over library late fees, public transit wait times and which cell phone to buy, life is better than any of us CARE to realize. After all, when WAS the last time that you were under the muzzle of an AK machine gun?

First World Problems FTW!

So this is what freedom feels like.

 

For the first time in my life, I have had some time to simply relax and enjoy. Yes, I have had responsibilities that are still yet unfulfilled. My aim to come to Toronto and find a place to live in this new neighbourhood has been unrealized as of this writing. Blah! I had no idea that it was such a landlord’s market. It seems absolutely impossible for me to find a place. But as we all know, I am an empirical, scientific thinking motherfucker. So with a wounded pride, I concede to admit that it’s just more, “improbable” that I should find a place of abode that suits my needs in a satisfactory answer. Perhaps in the selection of a home, one should embrace it on the same vein as selecting a mate: hope for the best and settle (most times) for second and (hopefully not) third-best. Cynical much? Nah, no, no! Just realistic. It’s life. We can either hold a grudge, or just roll with the punches. Can you just imagine Winston’s lucky lady? God help you, because I sure can’t.

Anyway, before I boggled myself down with technicalities and semantics, I was saying that I am free to do what I want for the first time in my life. I do not even claim to know how long this would persist. Of course, the hope that I dare to make part with by words is that it should endure. But this hope is faint and frail, so I dare not even whisper of it. Even so, whether this freedom is naught but an illusion, or a real transitional period between jobs is open for debate.

I was raised very old-school Asians My father would constantly spout and rant about not having enough money. Growing up with the idea that one could not eat without working is a deeply seated idea. Living in a cardboard box, sleeping on sewer grates; being toothless unkempt and unbathed. That was always my notion of transience. And yet – here I am.

“Unemployment”.

Sorta. Yeah, I know, I know – I’m just “in between” jobs. Ladies, be sure that you date at least four losers that say, “Baby, I’m just ‘in-between’ jobs.” You’ll be set for life, believe me.

I’m so free and unfettered! I rub my sore wrists, as the flesh still remembers the deep cut of cold iron shackles. I know that now my arms are lighter. Maybe this is what being on welfare feels like. Not having to do anything, living from day to day on a mattress right on the floor. [Let’s admit that my living circumstances are actually far better than most on Welfare, but y’know, that’s splitting hairs.] I can’t for long though – I refuse to stagnate. Even with employment, I will always want to be more than a gestalt of my upbringing and circumstance. Such that, my moral code (while negotiable!) rigidly stands against going on Social Assistance. But I don’t pretend to be some God; some man of who’s ideals sets him above worldly comprehension. Nigga’s always gotta keep it real. I know that right now I am a man of modest means. Alas, I have failed to live extravagantly and truly pushed the limits of self indulgence. But one day, mark you, one day; I will pursue my own mid-life crisis. T’will be a sad attempt to win back lost years in a denial, before the flame of my youth wanes before my longing eyes. And nestled in my vision, the flame will flicker, sputter, snap and squeal as the last sparks of my days vanish into an ashen puff, taken by a breeze of time. I live such a sad life. I’m great at the self pity and consoling so here goes: But at least there will be a puff, right?

YOLO, bitches.

With my Weekly Metropass for $40 dollars, I squeeze all the juice that I can out of it. So I do what I could not for the last decade: I go out. I see people; faces all so unique, and the denizens of my new world. I take great peace in knowing that I am one of them. For the first time in a long era, the wave has broken and I feel at home. I am no longer reduced to a simple gimmick, and my existence is not a quirk, an anomaly or a curiosity. I am just me. It’s relieving and at times unsettling. I have been so used to being stared at with a sense of disapproval that I expect it. Now that I get this unexpected reaction of no-reaction, I am almost, almost disappointed. Well, sometimes, I actually am. My little ego will get over it. I know that I am not the center of the universe. Hell, we aren’t even the centre of our solar system.

Did I mention that I see other Asians? Like, a lot of them! Maybe enough to fill a boat illegally! I know, right? Crazay!

Freedom. For all of my adventuring, do I know what it is? No, I don’t think so. Perhaps I will uncover more about the meaning of this word as time wears on. Are any of us truly ever free? Perhaps it is not the freedom to be omnipotent that I seek most, but freedom of the heart and soul. But lets break the fortune cookie type of answer; I’m an ass, but not cruel. I will not deny you of a satisfaction. It may be only temporarily filling, like a bowl of rice. Useless and full of vapid carbs that just add to your waistline. Even if hollowed in nature, dear reader, my words are of a Wise Mother Fucker. In other words: profound and golden. So I take the noble gesture and make this feeble attempt:

I feel light, and without burden. I feel now at peace, and a subtle and permeating calm takes my spirit. It is a feeling that was echoed previously only by the silent night beneath the eyes of silver stars. What is it to be a man without a name and without a label? I think that I know now. I should think that this is my hour: I am no longer bound to do what is expected or right, but by the only rules and boundaries that I draw here, softly in fair white sand.

On this far green country with a swift sunrise.

Toronto; in such bombarding light, in such ceaseless noise; do I find peace. In this hard and polluted concrete, glass and steel jungle; inhabited in clothed beasts, does this one man find his nature.

Deep shit.

Lost in my home-town. Country Bumpkin, I be.

At 10 PM, I arrived at Union Station. It was a jumble and a mess. Coming from the GO section of the station, in my path were things were being torn down, cement revealed and plywood covering many of the walls that would have otherwise made the station recognizable to me. I wander about briefly, trying to find the entrance to the TTC (Toronto Transit) entrance. I’m lost, of course. I don’t blame myself on this one: I’ve never departed off the GO Transit end of Union in my life.

Wandering about, seemingly aimless, I appreciate the rustic look of the Edwardian style architecture that adorns the roof and rafters of the main atrium. It’s soft yellow-white stone, carved in tall columns and a vaulted ceiling with decorated tiles. I see a huge window that would look outside maybe; I can’t tell though as the cubes of glass that are nestled in the crowded checkered glass motif is all ripply and artsy. I stand, gazing up and about – the weight of my burdensome luggage ignored. The architecture! I am very impressed at this call-back to a more rustic and simpler time. Part of my imagination runs wild, and I think about old fashioned locomotives funneling in from the outside, billowing smoke and steam with a loud hiss as the driver lets loose a scream from the horn.

There in the corner, chatting among themselves are some construction guys. Guys quite unlike me. Some contractor types hired by the city to renovate and perhaps upgrade some decaying blocks of cinder and brick enjoying a sandwich coffee. But perhaps I’m unlike anyone here, even those fobby Asians that went past. With my grey-and-blue hair and my peculiar style of dress, just standing in the middle, admiring it all.

At length, I carry on. I finally find the entrance to the TTC, hinted at by the sudden change of tasteful earthen slabs to glossy red, white and yellow enameled Chiclet-like patterns, grungy and stained after many years of enduring. Walking past the spiny and rotating steel pinwheel that allows only entry (but no escape!) Before me, the space opens up and I’m taken by these new machines all aligned in a neat row by the wall. They seem ATM like, but much more curvy, smaller and high tech.

Touchscreens!

Apparently, they are used to buy Metropasses. I go through the menu system, ignoring the over-loud volume apparently adjusted for the hard-of-hearing. I look over the price of $40 for a week and disassemble the cost per trip on my phone’s calculator like a good Asian. I step aside for two fobby Asian girls that confirm my suspicion of being Japanese. I debate, deliberate and hesitate. I walk back to the machine. I need to make seven trips in total to break-even with buying regular trip tokens. Not at the ten-dollar cost, but at the twenty-dollar cost as I get one additional token on top of the default price. That’s a lot of trips, and I only have a week to complete it. Then still, who knows how many places I will view, and how many places that I will visit? Maybe this will remove the worry, and allow me to explore the city at length!

Maybe I should be doing just that instead of writing this article!

Eventually, I opt for that weekly pass that seems just a bit too pricy for what I get. I’d have to be working seven days a week at a normal type of job to break even with that fare. I wonder who’d use that? And out comes the card with a magnetic stripe and holographic sticker. Week 33 it reads. It’s a white card with a purple stripe. It is probably colour-coded and the “33” will help any TTC employee know that I’m giving them a run for the money if I try to use it for more than just a week.

These clever devils!

I follow the only trail present to me, knowing that I need to head westward. Go down a short flight of tiled stairs, grungy and dirty. I have arrived at the Union platform; an island in the shape of a rectangle for subway trains to move in either direction. North or South? Which way do I go? I look around the platform trying to find a map. Most of the advertisements are being torn off of the walls, the cement flesh unskinned beneath it. Some of them read, “1 m underground,” ; “conduit”; “2A”. The cracking tile not seen in many spots and the guide maps are not to be found either. After some searching, I finally see one. It’s in the shape of a “U”. But the one on the other side of the platform is not to be found. Which way is the most efficient? Aren’t I aiming to go Westbound?

I walk back up the stairs as I miss the boarding of a train. I am determined to find a second, more deeply nestled tier of the rail system. Union must be one of those special stops that have the East-West and North-South lines both. I search around, I go up, I go down. I see nothing of the sort. Then it dawns on me: I am a fucking idiot.

I think that it’s excusable for anyone who has not lived in the GTA. And perhaps, if I am more forgiving, I can be excused. But let’s not: for the sake of amusement. I must be converted into the most soybean planting, flannel wearing, John Deere riding, Camo-donning country bumpkin. I no longer know my home city! I have become assimilated into small town culture and I have lost my own roots, as deeply buried, treasured and guarded such as they were!

This is Union Station. There is only one direction: north. One can only go north. I am at the bottom of the map, at the troph of the “U”. Any more down and we’d probably hit the lake. There is also no East-West, as those stations intersect the U at a higher spot.

I am such a dumbass.

I now determine which line north to take that would get me to a junction station (but not Union!) most quickly. The train comes in its ribbed steel glory. The door dings and I walk inside, and I ask to sit beside a young woman reading. She seems a bit hipster-like with her flower pattern dress and her alternative earrings. She has a star-fish clip in her hair. Neat! But she allows me by acquiescence and does not at all acknowledge my presence.
Maybe it’s true: them big city folk are ruder.
I ride along nicely, finally taking in the details of what I see around me. It’s always been clear that my observational powers are low: I miss the small details easily. I’m more of a dreaming, big-picture type of guy. Because the car is striking.

Absolutely striking.
It’s so… new! I feel a bit out of place, out of mode and obsolete – just like the car that I had ridden in a few weeks ago along the Bloor-Danforth line. This North-South line has this high tech, flourescent lit-looking shit all over the place! The brushed steel bars are now adorned with some red texture. Hell, the damned thing is mostly red now: the steel is just more of trim and afterthought. It is bent to a bow-curve. The seats are bulbous in shape, and instead of the cold steel that adorned the inside of the cabin before, the colours have gone mostly over to the enamelled white camp. White, red and steel. The buttresses that thrust forth from the walls are soft and rounded. The inside seems roomier, less industrial and more comfortable. I liken the entire look to a 1960’s era diner. The whole thing actually looks like the Ghostbuster’s car in all of its retro glory!

Notwithstanding, there is a sense of futuristic about it. The automated voice of a pleasant sounding woman has replaced the crackling static announcement of a bored conductor. And the ambience: I can’t quite point it out but there is something Apple inspired about the look. Most especially, the LED lit map that tells us with a blink where we are on the route.

Blink, blink, blink!

LEDs have been around since the 1960s, I think: but this touch is so strangely futuristic. I can’t get over it. The future path is entirely lit, the stations behind it are dimmed. The up and coming stop is flashing.

Blink, blink! Oh brave new world! I’m so taken by the futuristic curves and the bright blinking lights!

God help me!

For all that I have resisted the monotony of small-towns, for as hard as I clenched onto my own heritage, culture and the dream of big city life; I find now all my reservations in spite:

I have become a country bumpkin.

BACK IN TORONTO (1) : A vision of distant shores.

Even though I am only looking for an apartment for my new place of employ, and even though it is a “not-really” more than “actually”, I feel as though I have returned.   And it’s a strange thing to be back.  I feel as though it is new, and yet — not.  It’s a different side of the city than what I am used to seeing.  It’s a bit slower, and it’s nice.  I find myself wanting to wander about at night and just bask in the feeling of euphoria.  

I feel as though I here belong.

I have never been an emotional person, and so when people ask me, “How do you feel to be back?” I have no real answer that satisfies.  I am glad, of course.  There is a joy, of course.  But it is dull and subtle.  Happiness does not arrive so easily: not without a great struggle.  You can argue that the past decade has been just that, but I feel as though it needs be more.  In those dark years, I had fallen.  It is now that I struggle to climb into a world that I have made my own.  I am back — but I’m unsure of what I should feel, or even do feel.

The atmosphere is wonderful and I find things most enjoyable.  I don’t have the amount of money to carelessly spend on unnecessary and decadent things, such that I have not been able to buy temporary happiness.  However, I can enjoy the more simplistic subtleties.  I stop to enjoy the view of the clouds, the gush of wind as it ruffles my coat from under the bridge, and the night glow of the city.

But how I miss so dearly a view of the stars.

That in spite, I am at peace and I feel no longer so antagonized in being myself.  In a small town, I have always felt so insular and my being reduced to a curt summation of gimmickry.  “That weird blue-haired who runs the Chinese restaurant.”   And while I am very visibly different, even in Toronto, I can stand to have a few adjectives knocked off of my descriptor and start to be taken more seriously as a person.  I say this tongue-in-cheek — just a bit; I mean, I do have grey-blue hair, right?  But there are crazier looking people, I assure you.  Like, just today, I walked past a strange looking girl.  She had shoulder length aqua-green hair, parted down the middle and pin straight.  She was riding a retro bicycle leisurely, (on the sidewalk like any horrible person would do!) and she was wearing these sandals and a black on white floral pattern dress.  A bit like a reverse Mennonite.  

^__^

But get this:  she had some weird steam-punk googles on.  Not just goggles, but BIG ASSED GOOGLES. They were these large lenses, tinted deep brown; circular and thick.  They were rimmed with thick black plastic and somehow, it seemed to be glued onto a pair of hipster glasses beneath.

Onward I walk, past the muttering-to-himself homeless man pulling a wire cart with bags as torn as his beard.  I see then later a woman of who’s youthful beauty is marred by the plethora of patterns and tattoos that she over-ardorns all over her skin.  It seemed to be the retreating claw of charred paper being assailed by flame.

I don’t get stared at even once.  Maybe I get a glance, but I keep my expectations realistic.  They must be thinking, “Oh, he’s different.  [pause] Ho-hum.”

So, I’m back!  For a while, I thought that it would have been the end of a story — like the ending of the Lord of the Rings.  Frodo goes into the West; to Valinor.  But it seems now, that a new story has just begun.  I just hope that it is as at least as interesting as my haircut.

So I don’t have friends.

I don’t have friends in T-Town.

No friends?  “Bullfuckingshit!”, you say.

Well yeah, you can part hairs and start picking at the strands with a fine comb and really split hairs about the topic. But let’s not get into technicalities and semantics. I’ll just start off by being very specific:

Although I have been a very public face, managing and waiting ‘front of house’ for my restaurant for the past decade, I have made very few lasting bonds. While some of them will always be fondly remembered, I have made no friends that have chosen to include me in their social circle – and I, them.
So with this specific definition, I have no friends in T-Town. No Jim-Greg that says, “Hey Winston, let’s go for a coffee,”; no Amy-Sue asks, “Winston, there is this new Spiderman movie that I wanna see!”; and there is no Duff McGruff who invites me over for beer.

Being very self-aware of my eccentricities and feeling isolated, I have become perhaps too self-conscious, turning the fault inward. I would list the following reasons for my social isolation to myself.

-I am too well spoken

-I am too well dressed

-I have nerdy hobbies

-I have intellectual interests

-I have very Asian tastes in music

-I am culturally different; coming from a city

-I have no time-off in which to socialize and meet friends

-there is no one my age in town. They are either 13 or 84 and no one in between

While these truths are quite evident and well, true – they play only a minor role to a factor that I had only very recently unveiled in a Eureka Moment when having a conversation with our waitress. She is about my age, and like I, don’t have many friends in the neighbourhood. Regardless of being stationed here with a born-and-bread T-Town boyfriend of seven years, she has met few and is close to fewer still.

“So Winston, how do you meet friends in T-Town?”

I don’t even have to think of a reply. My frame of reference and state of affairs make the answer so simple that a reply is knee-jerk reactionary. “You don’t. At least, I don’t.”
Conversing with her at length, I remembered something.   Queue the flashback music, as I recall a meandering and ponderous tale!  And I assure you, it’s only mildly interesting.

About three years ago, there was a nineteen year old having a very late night beer at my bar. It was well after closing, and I wanted to go home. He looks like a young John Lennon, big round glasses, long curly hair and all. He talks like a modern day hippie married with a surfer-dude AND dresses from a wide and colourful assortment of bright mish-mashed clothing that screams Hippie. He’s a strange kid with artistic talents and a particular penchant for music. Ultimately, none of that is really important save for this one fact: he is young, and he likes to drink. He invites me over to a party later that night.  By this time, it’s Saturday. I have swepped, mopped, cleaned the bar and worked a full day.   Socializing?  I really didn’t fell like it, especially with a bunch of kids ten years my junior.  Aren’t there laws against that?  Old Man Winston wants to be left alone; I’m old, socially awkward, and well – just goddamn tired.  Yet — this young man likes me enough to invite me over.

I realize that it’s a once-in-blue-moon event, and that I could stand to mingle with the locals once in a while. As some of you may know, every time I decide to mingle, willingly jump into a pool of regret. Notwithstanding, Winston is a man who has social grace. Naturally, I accept his invitation warmly, internalizing deep reservations against it all the while in my heart.  He wants to head off right away, clearly excited.  I tell him that I still have some duties to attend to – closing up the place, cleaning out the cash register.  He pays and leaves, taking a head start on his night of gallivanting.
It’s probably 1:30 AM by this time. I make it over after I tie up the till for the evening. Shutting off the lighting, I engross the restaurant in shadow, dimly lit by the yellow lamp-post outside, I remember to lock the door – just in case some drunkard tries his luck at the handle bars. Not as though T-Town is a dangerous place; it’s actually hella safe.
Walking over by myself, I make a quick diagonal across the main street. I go across the breakfast place with its re-used Italian upper-end style decor turned pan-cake place. I walk past the equally glassy Insurance Brokerage and the Nail Salon next to it. The Nail Salon has one of the very few Asians in town running it. In fact, I don’t even think that she lives in town; I don’t know much about her, only that I don’t ever see her. She must be one of them self-hating yellow people. It’s a very quick trip though, being only 300 meters or so from my own store-front, and easily visible. The glass door, foggy with dirt is brightly lit with an incandescent yellow. I pull on the flat aluminium handle with some hesitation.

Shit, I’m actually here.

The door opens easily, and I see a tall stair-way with wooden steps, white paint chipping and worn to the grey wood below. It’s pretty steep, and frankly – pretty ghetto looking. Why am I not surprised? Up the stairs, I find the door easily, the plain veneered thing of brown. I knock on the door, and one of the youngsters greets me with his whole nappy head of long 1980’s style hair that is so prevalent in T-Town.

“Hi, is Steve in?”

Yeah, that’s the name of the kid who invited me. Forgot to tell ya. Anyway.  The tall and lanky John Lennon could-be jumps up from his wooden chair with energy, and makes it through the crowded apartment.

“Winstooooon!” He greets me with such genuine energy. “They were all so excited to hear that you were comin’ man!” The group of ten or so young friends about him are smiling and do seem genuinely excited and welcoming. They come on over to greet me.   I am, of course, abused with the usual questions that I need to constantly avoid with deftness.

“Make me some chicken balls man!”

“Yeah, get me some free food some time!”

“Can you hook me up with free booze at your bar?”

They’re excited to see me in this grungy and crowded apartment that is really, honestly, pretty fucking ghetto. There is a nice-ish round oak table there, in the white incandescent kitchen, but it’s now a ruin under the spilled beers, up-turned SOLO cups and the sticky mess of careless drink mixing. I’m invited to sit at that very table, and I take an awkward seat; being unsure of which area to occupy with the table completely wet and strewn with half-consumed bottles and cups.

I honestly don’t remember much.  I recall a kid with a blue shirt and a backwards-turned red baseball hat getting into a fist-fight that evening. I also remember seeing a shirtless guy coming back into the apartment, panting. Apparently, the frenzied cries of earlier down-below were of him streaking. I regret to say that he was in his boxers (better for me, worse for you) as I didn’t get a view of his junk, but it doesn’t make for quite as good of a story.  What I do remember very well is the texture and the smell of the carpet. For that evening, I was invited over to do one thing: and one thing only: to drink. Being the an Asian person of social grace, I would have offended my well meaning young hosts if I had declined their hospitality. However, my indulgence in hard liquor while being tired, coupled with my intolerance quickly lead to my marriage with the dirty, cat-urine stained carpet in Mom’s bedroom.

Mom owned the place. She probably has an adopted son, a step-son or a real-son or something. He very regularly has his friends over, and it’s this weekly shindig that they all do. She’s a wreck of a woman; probably 42 but looks about 62. She drinks, she smokes and she parties with her children. She let a few of us into her room to get away from the crowd outside. She was watching a movie on a huge hunker of an old CRT TV. Some VHS action movie was on, and I don’t remember what. I don’t even remember who was with me in the room. Some kid on the bed, some girl in front of the TV, and Mom on the bed, too.   I just remember the grey carpet. I put my head down, and I think, “God fucking damn it, I’ve over-done it. I’m so tired, so tired. This is filthy. I know it is. I’m sure that I’m getting cat hair all over my black coat. I’ll look like a used lint-roller tomorrow, and one that smells like cat-piss and butt-hole. Oh, and cigarette.”

I can only imagine that I fell asleep for something like two hours and walked home in the twilight. But here is the final rung of the bridge being laid down in this anecdote:  Thereafter, should any of these youngsters see me anywhere, I am greeted with lively adulation and enthusiasm. They like me. They love me. I’m in, and I’m cool.

So we phase back into the present day as I end my trip up memory lane.  And here comes the Eureka moment; a bit of wisdom about living in a small town.

“You know what our problem is?” I ask rhetorically to Megan,  “We don’t get smashed with the common folk.”  I’ve nailed it.  TAP, TAP, BAM.  Neither of us really partake in drinking, and we certainly don’t “party”.    Which is why we’re so isolated, so sequestered and so — frankly, lonely.

I know now that I could have served in the Forces with them; saved their heads from being severed, or carried them back after a land-mine took a leg. I could have worked with them at a factory for 33 years. I could have been a friend of a friend, or a cousin. I could have fought space-aliens alongside them, or travelled back in time with them to save their great-grandparents. And the thing is – none of it would have mattered. My race, my blue hair, my cosplaying hobby, my writing or my love for physics and the city life – none of these matter to these kids at all. And that’s wonderful: I’m pleased in the most genuine way.

All that counts is this:  I got drunk enough to pass out on a filthy carpet.

That’s it. That’s really it.

Holding each other’s hair while praying to the Porceline Goddess, streaking across the neighbourhood, setting things on fire, breaking glassware, eating cold pizza and waking up not quite remembering the day before. Each of these are special bonding-moments that are catalysed with this one simple thing: getting shit-faced drunk.

If I were more of raging drunkard, I would have many more friends. These small town kids are simple white folk, and accepting white folk. I like them, but sadly, I can never be one of them. At the core, I am just too different; my interests and dispositions too divergent. I prefer the company of geeks, the sight of the stars, or the glow of an LCD screen. I don’t often drink, and more seldom so get blitzed. Because I’m responsible, you see. And an altruistic mother-fucker. For I know that the world doesn’t need an Asian Jack Sparrow.

LONELINESS

The nature of loneliness is one that I understand in its utmost. I have lived a long and very difficult life; one rife with solitude. Through these burning years in a crucible, I have come to examine myself and the human condition repeatedly, and finally now – in an ironic sense, I am able to make a meaningful stride only on the verge of freedom.

Perhaps all but the most popular of us know what loneliness feels like at some point in our lives. And perhaps for us in the geek circles, we Beta/Gamma/Delta/Epsilon types know it more than anyone else in society.

I don’t often speak of topics of the heart, as it is something that is very personal and requires the baring of the soul more than most. Perhaps more so, it is an admittance of shame: the fact that I bear some human weakness in spite of all the looming and cold, hard walls that fortify me so dutifully. Mind you, these words come out with great difficulty. As I type, I am constantly re-evaluating my choice in whether to publish or not. I can only take solace in these thoughts: not many of you know me, and fewer still will bother to read this post.

Tonight hooded and enshrouded, I make with you a secret meet the gate. Tonight, let you know just a bit more about the man behind the words. I first make this disclaimer: My words are not intended to incite your sympathy, nor do I need your empty words of comfort.

For so many turns of the silver moon and the arcing of the golden sun, I have had a wish that remained unfulfilled. For so many years have I been burdened with an ache not of body. My wishes yet go unanswered, and the deeply rended wounds in my heart go yet unsalved. I realise now that this feeling of pain and endless dark help form an integral part of me. For without them I would not be who I am today; these feelings help assure me of what I am, and harden my heart against the world about me. Most of all, I am proud of the man I am become.

For all my eccentricities, I have garnered perspective and knowledge about the world within that many can never accomplish given fourteen folds of life. Yet the once-sharp pain remains as an echo of itself: like the reverberations of a pebble in a still pond; the dull ache of need remains. In days gone I had wished to meet a kindred soul; someone in which I would have a deep friendship; a rapport beyond mere words. Maybe it would be a beautiful bridging of the spirit, beyond even the reach of poetry. Other such sentimental, soulful stuff.

But it never came. Of course it never came; that’s the reason for this whole writing. Dutifully, the agony of unanswered prayer ground my spirit in a slow, deliberate churning. In throes of defeat and desperation, I resigned to ask, “Will no one ever understand me?” Am I truly that different than others that I should be condemned to a life of darkness and doubt?

Looking back, the Universe has provided me an answer in its silence: Yes.

No longer do I wish to be understood, and no longer do I wish to have fair company. I have long forsaken such childish ideology. No longer does this old man have the heart for it.

It’s an almost-fond memory as I recall the idealism in which I approached life and the relationships in it. I was so young and spirited that I sought relief and salvation through the company of others. I am a man to my own now.

Loneliness.

Once, I prayed for relief and found no rescue; not even brief respite. When I found no answers in others, I made one for myself: I adapted by steeling my heart. Let this be the measure of this petrified man: by his strength and honour alone.

Loneliness.

The word conveys such beauty in its simplicity of sadness. Oh how it mauled the spirit and tore at my heart years ago! And now, so many years later, it follows me still. The years between have made it toothless. It is now a weakened phantasm that can only rustle the leaves as the gentle summer wind.

Night has again fallen and the world sleeps. Are my dreams asleep too?

Loneliness.

This is the price of being different, and dare I risk a bit of pride: of being intelligent. And that’s fine, that’s fucking fine. These sheer, cold and looming stone walls provide the only buttress to which I can lean on. This castle of the spirit, this stoic keep houses the remnants of my humanity: so fragile and beaten. This is the only comfort that I can afford myself. While it is cold, hard and rough – but I break no complaint: it is all that I have.

THE BIG BANG on your TV

Unfortunately, this does not contain scenes of five midgets spanking a grown man in Thousand Island dressing. That’s another kind of Big Bang.

If you tune in to ‘snow’ on your TV using those old aerials (“Rabbit Ears”), roughly 1% of that static that you see on the screen is Cosmic Background Radiation. This radiation is remnant of the Big Bang; the photons that were unleased in the explosion that created everything 14.5 billion years ago.

One percent of that annoying, useless gibberish that you see and hear is the echo of creation. Think of it. You are the first observer to see, to witness and experience this static in 14 and a half billion years. You are looking back into Eternity’s Past.

It makes me feel my mortality, and the immortality of everything at the same time. Deep shit.

This radiation is no longer in the ultra-visible or visible end of the spectrum. They have been long since stretched out from the exponential, and almost instant expansion of space. From ultra high energy Gamma rays, pulled into cold oblivion into the micro-wave and millimeter-wave range.

This stuff is passing through us all the time, and it serves to remind us that we are Star-Stuff. We, on this mortal coil, are an everlasting part of the universe.

AM I HOVERING YET?

I am an Introspective Motherfucker.   I know this and now, you know this.

You’re welcome.

It’s not easy being a thoughtful person.  I am not talking about the, buying a friend flowers when they’re feeling down, or remembering everyone’s birthday.  I’m very poor at those things; I am downright terrible.  That’s because I lack most human faculties – but that’s really a long post for another day.   But the thoughtful that I mean is being pensive, being brooding and being analytical about the Human Experience.  Some people play sports, some people fuck their girlfriend or fap to Internet porn.  Others play video games or collect stamps.  While I do some of these things, I also do one other:

I ponder the nature of existence.  What is it to be alive?  What is the point of all of this?

Shit like that.  In the past, it caused me more pain than gain.  But for all the unanswered questions, feelings of not belonging, loneliness and angst; it was all for the better.

I will likely not take a University course in philosophy anytime soon.   This is because I agree with Steven Hawking: modern science has gone so far beyond the realm of common understanding that its application does away with most philosophical trains of thought.   Things such as, “Where do we come from?  Is life predetermined?  Do I have free-will?  What is the point of life?  How did the Universe begin / how will it end?”  Scientific theories offer cold explanations for these questions.  While they are not always right, they become right-er over the course of history.  That is the nature of empirical thinking and critical reasoning.

Win for Science.

But there are some questions that I explore for myself, unassisted by a $5000 tuition in an accredited school of academia.   I have pondered the nature of the Self, of the Others, and of Being.  I have taken it all relative to me, and set to wonder what meaning I can instill into my own life.  Perhaps those of you who have taken a course or read a book or three can chime in now and save me some wasted time.   Yet for all the effort, I am glad to have done it.  Realizing that this is going to sound as Hokey as Fuck, I say you this: It is not the answer that matters so much as the journey.

Do I sound like a fortune cookie yet?  Yeah, I hang around fried rice way, way too much.   Don’t rub it in.
No, but seriously:  to intellectually appreciate something is rather quite different than emotionally and spiritually knowing it.   Shit like this doesn’t matter on a math and science exams, but it matters deeply in the matters of the heart.  A few years ago, I was in a very deep and dark era of my life.  I don’t want to recall too many details as those memories are still very near to my heart.  But what I will say is this:  analyzing the problem, thinking about my situation and finally coming to an epiphany is what made me what I am today.

What did I learn?  It doesn’t matter.  Because, again, it is the journey that counts, and not the destination.  The fact that you fell into muck, suffered and struggled, and then climbed out of your bog with an answer all to your own is what is important.  But at risk of sounding vapid and circular, I’ll offer something more substantial, albeit not-tangible:

Happiness is something that you have to allow yourself to be.  Being grateful and having perspective is what ultimately matters.   It was a glorious realization.  It was as though the entirely of the Comos reeled itself before me and expanded.  Something like going into Hyperspace in Star Wars – but without the 1970’s graphics.   I mean prettier, more beautiful, more savage and profound.  It was absolutely liberating.   Mind you, it is not a magical fix-your-life solution.   All of my previous cares and aches were still there, but the suffering was eased.  And while I didn’t wake up in a magical candy-land or learned to dance across the spectral arc of a rainbow,  life did begin to get better.

For the first time I appreciated being — simply being.   I came to know then what a hidden majesty resided in the province of existence; of the profound power of the mind.  I discovered a wonder about everything that will never be sated.

“Blah blah blah.  ”  You think.

I’m smart enough to know exactly what you did there.  You read those words, you’ll finish this article and forget all about it.  Nothing in your life will change.   But I want to help you help yourself.  See how much of an Enlightened Motherfucker I am?

But in the most absolute sincerity: take some time to explore the nature of your life, your world and your universe.    That’s all that I want you to do.

What was over a year ago now, that snowy drive home changed me forever.  I transcended the human condition.  Perhaps it was only momentarily, but I did it.  From that point on, I continued to reap the benefits of being a wholer, more learnéd and wiser person.  I could have read a How-To manual, or some generic Wiki-How Guide on, “How not to be an Emo Bitch,” but it is not so simple: it is one thing to Know and another to Understand.

I pray you, make the effort to Understand.

I want you to be a Smart Motherfucker.  I want you to be a Philosophical Motherfucker.  And unlike me, if you can, to be an Educated Motherfucker.   So — explore the limits of this world, of space-time and most importantly — yourself.

And you know, for all of this free advice without telling you to buy my book [which doesn’t exist] , you could say that I’m some kind of otherworldy, transcended Buddha Motherfucker.  And given all of this introspective, wise and deep shit that I spew; I’m sorta pissed that I’m still not hovering, teleporting or shooting fireballs.

Enlightenment: what a fucking sham.

Why, Black Dynamite, Why?

Why indeed!

So with the repeated encouragement of those around me in a figurative sense, I have come to create this blog.   Being a completely new medium to me, I hope that you can forgive its shortcomings.  But as you are on the Internet, you are most likely bereft of your real-world decency.  In which case, I am prepared to offer the Soul of my First-Born in recompense.  But not their blood – I’m keeping that.   Whether I intend to have children or not is notwithstanding.

Take what you can get; after all, we all like FREE things.

If you’re concerned with the exploration of the Human Experience, and you enjoy quirky, dry and sarcastic humour, with a few touches of the ridiculous, I think that you have come to the Write Place.

Get it?

I’m not sorry.  I can never, ever refuse a pun.  Bad or good.  In fact, the worse it is, the better it is for me.  I will let you in on a secret: I get to watch you suffer through it.  Figuratively, of course.

So what’s up with this site, and what’s up with me?  Well, not my penis — at least, not currently.  Quite succinctly, I am a person that has lost a significant portion of his time to the duties and toils of life.  Now that I near the end of my proverbial tunnel, I find myself in need of Wisdom.

“Why, Black Dynamite, why!?”

Why, Black Dynamite, why?”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fykFpD6snX0

Because I now know how short life is.   Intellectually, I have always known this.  That’s because I’m a Smart Motherfucker.  And if you’re reading this, you probably aren’t half-witted either, so give yourself a pat on the back.  Just be sure that you don’t have anyone else in the room, or you look like a complete retard.

But it is more than an Intellectual appreciation of my mortality that incites me to pursue the best out of every moment.  It is the emotional trauma of the past decade, now distilled into fading memory that propels

me make whatever years I have left the best.  In short: I emotionally realize my mortality.

Wisdom will allow me to, “Do things right, the first time around.”  Of course, there is going to be variation in that phrase, and there will be failures and faults.  Due sometimes with the random nature of the Universe, and mostly due to my own stupidity.  Yes — a man can be a Smart Motherfucker and make ultimately stupid choices in the end.  Being Smart is having the ability to learn from your mishaps.

So I am smart.  But are you, are you?

Over the past decade, I have learned for one:  never, ever go into the restaurant business.  See how I’ve learned?  Can I have my gold star sticker now?

But I want to be a Genius.  What means it, Precious?  Well: I want to learn from the mistakes of others.  So I ask, and I listen — and I hope to learn.  Gleaning what wisdoms and experience people distill into the form of an anecdote, I hope to be able to equip myself with a better set of tools.  And not all of this is base and selfish, either.

There is something majestic and wonderful about existence that I have only realized when I transcended the human condition a scant two years ago on a snowy drive home.  I realized then the deep and unlikely chance that I am.

I am.

What a profound gift existence is!  And more so kingly the blessing of cognitive reasoning and self awareness.  So few of us ever learn to use these Life-Given tools of ours, and toil endlessly with the mundane.  The button pushing at the factory, the T.P.S. report at the office, the line-ups at the grocery store.

We squall, we grow, we meet, we mate, we copulate, we raise, and we dwindle and die.   But what does this mean, and is there anything more?

I firmly believe that there is.

Within each of us it already is gifted, but I have begun to realize the deep ability of exploring the human spirit.   Such that I write now.  I would explore through text the deepest facets of Existence.  It’s depths of joys and sorrows in all its glory.

But I do hope to minimize sorrows.  Hence, the pursuit of wisdom.; noble, isn’t it?  Well, maybe — but more likely, maybe-not.  Just selfish, I think.

While I don’t seriously think that I am a Smart Motherfucker, I hope to be.   So talk to me, tell me how to do this right, and do it right the first time as I grasp with the trauma of years lost, and struggle with my mote mortal existence.

Expect some deep shit to be had here.