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Sep 19 2012
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photography, poetry, Travel, world

Grand Canyon

Photos by CB

I want to go back to the Grand Canyon. Where the light touches the earth and shadows the valleys. Where home dives steep into the rocky floor. Where you are left breathless and sweating and sick from the dips and rises of elevation. Where you look over your shoulder hoping to find someone else on your trail…

I want to go back to hear the scratching of my dry throat plead for water.

I want to go back where the trapped dust settles on my boots and crosses me over to the ancient ones.

The people of the giant curved river.

The people of the jagged sharp sunrise and sunset.

Sitting on the edge of  a devastating cliff, the darkness below me is out shone by the sun. The vultures pierce the sky and perch atop half broken rocks without fear.

I inch my toes bit by bit to see how close I can get to the edge without falling.

All I feel is the beat and pull of the setting star,

All I hear is the cool wind dancing,

All I can see is possibilities.

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Aug 25 2012
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life, music, photography, poetry, words, world

Beauty

photo by: RJ Shaughnessy

The beauty of intimacy is devastating. It is a wretched and pitiful wonder. Intimacy shouldn’t be idolized, it is the slow death of the one only to rebirth a mutation of two.  Unnatural comfort, awkward tongues and predictable touches. I fight and wrestle with it everyday.  With strangers on the street asking for spare change.  Check out clerks asking me politely if I have any coupons.  Drive through speakers loudly crackling, “would you like to super size that for only five cents more?”

A look deep into the eyes is all that it takes to shatter your boundaries you have worked so hard to construct.  A touch at the right time, a song in the right tone, a beam of sunlight peaking through the dark shadows of your room.  Hope.  Hope that somewhere, someday, someone can prove you wrong.  Someone can provoke you to see beauty again.

Nov 11 2011
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life, Positivity, world

Fearless: When There are No More Straws Left to Pull

(Fringe-credit:CB)

I’ve been to hell and back, then back again.

I don’t have any respect for authority anymore. I respect people for who they are, but  people  who hold positions of authority–I could care less about, let alone be intimidated.

Everyday I wake up and think about bad things that could happen to me, just to feel a reaction. But I don’t feel anything but relief. I don’t fear being jobless, alone, robbed, assaulted or dead. When I think about the potential calamities that can shake me at any moment, all I can visualize is myself standing there with a smart-ass smile on my face saying bring it; inviting the fear to do its worst. Don’t construe this post to be apathetic. I know exactly what apathy feels like. With apathy there is a sense of hopelessness. But I don’t feel hopeless. I feel even more open to the world, because without fear holding you back, anything is possible.

What I am attempting to describe is a sense of fearless, not recklessness, but being able to fully acknowledge the consequences of life and invite them with a smile. If someone pointed a gun at me I wouldn’t beg for my life. I’m going to die, or I’m not. I’m not afraid.

This is what a person sounds like when they realize they have nothing left to lose. It is actually quite freeing psychologically, and should not be viewed negatively. It is almost a Nirvana like emotion.

I feel enlightened and crazy at the same time. But I’m kind of thinking that craziness and enlightenment is one in the same…

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Jun 03 2011
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education, life, world

Now What?

Fireworks--by (me)

No more pencils, no more books, no more teachers dirty looks! Okay, so now what do I occupy my time with? Actually, that question in itself makes me smile about the massive uncertainity of my future.

While some recent grads may be petrified about the fuzziness of how their post-college lives will unfold, since the safety and structure of school has vanished, others, like me, feel elated and completely excited by the ambiguity of tomorrow; for it has taught me to live in the present.

While in school, we never really live in the present. Everything is surrounded by tomorrow: I have to do this, complete that, go there. But now, the world has gotten a lot bigger since then, and it is exciting. Especially when you know what you want to do and where you want to go.

This elated state may be a temporary one. When I start working and begin making my student loan payments, the world may get smaller again, but I’m prepared for that. All I know is that I’m excited because I know my abilities and believe in myself, and good things will come my way.

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Mar 25 2011
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independence, life, world

Apartment Living

Sometimes I feel like I'm living in a beehive (google images).

I have been away from my apartment for a week now, so I have had some time to reflect on my current habitual status. The up’s and down’s that come with this new community oriented territory are sometimes annoying.

This year is the first time I have lived in an apartment, so far, I quite like it–since I don’t have to deal with  psychopathic roommates from craigslist. However, I can’t shake the feeling of always being around people in such close proximity and literally hearing them cough (more like hack up a lung) through the walls.

Now I really do appreciate the fact that I am able to have my own apartment, and quite frankly, I’m extremely lucky and feel totally undeserving of it–but time to time, I just feel as if I’m a barn animal locked up in a corral with all the other heathens.

Although my apartment complex is pretty awesome, since not a lot of your typical, beer guzziling, Ke$sha fanatic’s live there. So in that sense, it is a miracle in itself.

BUT…

Yes, I have that neighbor,

You know the one right?

The one where I can hear loud breathing combined with strange yelping’s at 1am…I cringe even thinking about it….must I explain further? I think not.

Anyways, I’m sure anyone who has ever lived in an apartment has had the same kind of neighbor that I currently have now.

I think that apartments are not natural settings. People constantly coming and going, awkardly trying to avoid talking to other people that cross their paths in common spaces. Maybe its just me, but I kinda get freaked out seeing people that I have never seen before taking a dip in the pool; strangers.

We are all strangers living together.

That idea is just a little odd, thats all.

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Dec 31 2010
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holidays, Korea, life, world

Reverse Culture Shock, Car Accidents, and the Year of the Rabbit.

2011 Year of the Rabbit.

Well it has been almost three weeks now since I have been home from South Korea. Being home is great and all, but to tell you the truth, I really didn’t expect it to be this hard.

It is kind of hard to explain…

Looking back now it was completely stupid and naive of me to think that I could come back from living in a foreign country for four months and just pick right up where I left off; I can’t believe that I actually thought that would be possible. Now, it’s not the fact that I went through some unimaginable change of character  or epiphany while abroad, but I just  had a lot of trouble readjusting  to the life I left behind. The day after I arrived home, I felt as if molten lava had engulfed me over night and left me hard and stuck in place. All my problems, responsibilities, and obligations came rushing back to me… and I didn’t want any of it.

After being by myself for four months with no one telling me what to do or where to go; I was extremely irritable and a bit hostile…well, a bit more hostile than I usually am. Also, I had an idealized view of my home-coming where I would be surrounded by friends in the sunshine and warmth and everything would be hunky-dory. But I actually only set myself up for disappointment because once you leave home, home looses a bit of its magic and you begin to realize that it is just a place, and life does indeed go on without you.

As if that weren’t enough, diving back into American culture was a bit rough as well, I felt slow, apathetic, and bored. Nothing was new or exciting anymore, everything just seemed so mediocre. Additionally, my driving skills have suffered greatly, I’m now really jumpy when I merge, I got into a fender bender the other day, and barely avoided another car accident a few hours ago. The horrible driving practices of Korea must have rubbed off on me!

Despite some mild depression, jet-lag, and near death experiences on the 805, I think I am finally getting my foothold back. However, I still feel like I have no home, that homey feeling that came so easily before my trip has seemed to have all but disappeared; I hope I find it again someday.

Anyways, enough of this nonsense, since it is New Years Eve I can’t very well spend my whole night spilling my guts out, I have a party to attend.

2011 is the year of the Rabbit (Chinese New Year) and I am scared shi*less. This year is supposed to be a year of uncertainty  for me (Dragon) and nothing could be more true. I have so much anxiety and have no idea where I am going to end up. But I have to remember to take it one day at a time, it may not be the most original of mantras but it works, it got me through culture shock in Korea so it sure will get me through anything this year.

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Nov 26 2010
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Korea, life, world

The World.

North Korean children (Google images)

This week I have found myself in a strange introspective mood.

Recently you may have heard of North Korea’s hostile attack on the South Korean island of Yeonpyeong, resulting in four deaths along with injuring civilians and destroying property. Even though I am living in South Korea, I was not immediately concerned or too worried because these acts of aggression unfortunately occur often, since technically the two Korea’s are still at war with one another. I guess you could say I was somewhat apathetic about the whole situation,  it was not the fear of a possible outbreak of war that bothered me, I was actually more worried about the North Korean people.

Maybe it was my very recent trip to the DMZ (just last Saturday) that made me think deeply about the way other people around the world live. It amazes me to see how people can continue to survive in a country were they are constantly in fear of their own government and are forced to basically perform  manual labor until they either die from old age or starvation; which ever comes first.

Anyways, just thinking about North Korean refugees, strangely led to me think about the other sad atrocities that are plaguing the world right now:  Cholera in Haiti, African genocide, Uganda mountain gorillas on the verge of extinction…everything hit me like a ton of bricks all at once.

Cholera stricken children in Haiti (Google images)

This was a strange feeling for me, mostly because I know about all these things going on in the world and yes, I  have thought about them deeply while at home in America, but I guess I was just too caught up in my own routine and problems to actually realize and understand the true calamity of these events. I  hate to say this and sound like a sob, but I really have felt like crying everyday…and for the most part I have.

West Point Monrovia (Liberia) , one of the worst slums in Africa (Google images)

Maybe it is the fact that I am in a different country, and in a sense, am closer and able to see the world clearer; free from the blinders I usually have on back in California.

There are only about 700 Gorillas left in Uganda, coffee plantations and civil unrest, along with poaching are threatening the Gorilla's habitat, jump starting extinction (Google images)

This week the blinders that I usually carry around with me in order to protect myself from completely breaking down and cursing this cruel world we live in— I believe have been permanently lifted. I realize now that it is important to feel depressed, shocked, disgusted, and upset about the realties of the world we live in. Maybe some people will call this pessimism, but I believe pessimism is the only thing we have left that forces us to realize the harsh reality of a situation and do something about it. I’m not trying to dis optimistic people, but sometimes optimism leads to delusion and delusion leads to ignorance.

Try taking your blinders off sometime…

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Hiking Photography

THE LITERARY MAN

Say Something, Anything

English 247, SDCC, Spring 2013

The Spirit of a Writer

A writer perservers. A Writer endures. A Writer writes because they must

A Canvas Of The Minds

A unique collaboration of different perspectives on mental health and life

HarsH ReaLiTy

My goal with this blog is to offend everyone in the world at least once with my words… so no one has a reason to have a heightened sense of themselves. We are all ignorant, we are all found wanting, we are all bad people sometimes.

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