Don't worry. My self indulgent, self important, self expression will soon end.

The Snare of Preparation

There is never time for learning.
There is never time for life.

Only time to exhibit a remarkable ability to achieve greatness in all our endeavours.

Woe Is Me

Why settle for anything less than the best?

I have dreamed too big. I have wanted what is beyond me.

There was never a guarantee. I was foolish to hope. Now I feel the harsh stings of failure.

Maybe I could have succeeded if I had aimed at a more attainable goal...

Why should I accept mediocrity as a worthy attainable goal?

A Scene In Time

Go.

I am running, almost out of breath. Don't want to miss my flight. Running. Keep running.
Out of breath.
Stop.
I read the screen listing arrivals, departures. Gone.
I missed my departure.

No where to go. Now where to go? Now. Here.

"Stephen! Stephen!". I hear a voice from across the airport. My lover.

I cringe. Exhale.

"Stephen."

I turn to see a bright face. The face of my lover happy not to have missed me: Happy to see me before I go.

"Stephen! Happy Birthday!"

"It was yesterday," I say with an echo of empty disappointment.

The way regret reflected in his sad eyes.

I shake my head. "No. I don't love you anymore."

Now there is nothing left.

A force hits his lover in the back of the knees, knocking him back, into the air. His lover is flying. "I am flying", his lover thinks to himself in the instant before he makes the discovery of an inevitable result of his flight. "This is going to hurt."

There is a crash. Something is broken.

He still has nothing left but to go.

I Feel. You Feel.

You feel things, often beyond your control. Why would we choose sadness if we could choose to feel happy? (I Don't Do Sadness - Or I wouldn't if I could choose not to...) To feel is inevitable: The beauty of an integral experience of being human.

I feel things, often extreme things. Such extreme feelings loose their potency quickly. In retrospect, extreme feelings seem irrational and unreasonably silly. But those feelings were true. Those feelings were provoked by real circumstance. Those feelings were not drama. Or at least not for me.

So I must claim ownership over what I feel. I will not be ashamed, no matter how irrational or unreasonably silly. I will not be ashamed, I will claim ownership and responsibility, but how can I deal with extreme feelings? Is it enough just to let time pass?

The Worst

I want to go to Grad school. I really do.

The worst is to have only one chance left.

So I got into the Tisch School of the Arts at New York University. Sounds good? No. Not that good. I got in. They "recommend" me to pursue a Masters of Fine Arts at their institution. But I can't afford to go.

The worst is to get in and not be able to afford to go.

The worst is to doubt your achievement because they can't provide funding, like universities do for other programs.

I got rejected. A lot. From Standford, Duke, Berkeley, Brown, and Northwestern. Rejection is never easy. Another university says that my application is not complete. Not the same as the other rejections, but still a rejection. So only one chance left. That's the worst. Especially when the other option is just not possible. To be accepted but not be able to enroll. That's the worst.

The worst is to know that an eager audience will find satisfaction in my failure.

The worst is to fail in public.

You will say that it is fate I am forced to stay in Toronto (I don't know if I can afford to be here even). You will say that it was just bad luck and I should try again next year. You will shower me with flattery to brighten my spirits. Your words do not change the fact I fail.

The worst is to feel, in the depths of who you are, that you will not be able to endure this failure.

So I wait. With only the smallest glimmer of foolish hope for that one chance left. Waiting for the predicted final failure. A failure that stings like the cruelest of tragic fates: Not a complete failure, I did get into NYU after all, but rather a failure at the mercy of circumstance of my life and my condition; not merely a failure of lack lustre grades, test scores, recommendation letters and other application materials, but a failure born of my poverty as well as my academics and intellectual achievement. No matter what kind of failure it is, complete or partial (Can there really be a difference?), it is failure nonetheless.

My only salvation is the smallest glimmer of foolish hope.

The worst is being a fool.

The worst is failure.

Enough

It is inadequate to be good. You must be good enough.
It is inadequate to be smart. You must be smart enough.
It is inadequate to be attractive. You much be attractive enough.
It is inadequate to be interesting. You must be interesting enough.
It is inadequate to be sensitive. You must be sensitive enough.
It is inadequate to be talented. You must be talented enough.
It is inadequate to be engaging. You must be engaging enough.

It doesn't matter what I am. I just have to be enough.

Bio/Graphy

Always thinking about how I will be written into biography.

Fictional Truths

"The difference between reality and fiction is that fiction has to make sense"

We all write our own stories to explain to ourselves who we are, what we are, and what happens in our own lives.

I. I. I. I. I.

He has nothing to hold on to. He is cold and poor and uncertain. And happy. At least for now...

Holding a fork in his freezing hand, stabbing romaine lettuce of a Caesar salad he stole from work, he speeds down the dark street. He has no time to enjoy the comforts of sitting and eating at a table.

His room mate hates him. His room mate has told him so. Casually, without much thought, accomplishing the menial tasks of living a student life in an urban apartment, he has found a way, unknowingly, to offend. Trying to navigate his way through minor (and not so minor) transgressions, trying to 'talk it out' (though he may not be as good at communicating as he would like to think), trying to adapt to new living mates (if he only knew what they were thinking!), has proved itself to be much more complicated than previously thought. He wants something positive to experience within the walls of his home. He doesn't always get what he wants.

He was dumped. He has found new lovers. He has learned he can not trust what's old and familiar. He knows he can not trust what is new and unknown. He has someone to hold, but no one to hold on to.

Change happens. Tragedy and hope are always found when the inevitability of change is embraced. People (friends, lovers, room mates) come and go. So does he. Will he move to New York City? Or Chicago? Or Texas? Or to the far too familiar home he finds in his parents basement? And what awaits him at these potential destinations? What next?

He has nothing to hold to. He is cold and poor. And happy. He sees beyond the incidental disappointments to the hope of something fulfilling, satisfying, and positive ahead of him.

The world is always new again.

The Blog Paradox

I want to express myself through this anonymous online forum.
I don't want to bore the reader.

I want to access the human, the universal (if that's even possible), through my own experience.
I don't want to seem self indulgent.

I want the freedom to express myself without fear of judgement.
I know so many are far too happy and eager to express negative and frankly mean criticisms of my blog and my person.

Does it have to be one or the other?
Isn't there a way to negotiate these opposing forces?