So here I sit in morbid anticipation, waiting for the long night to swallow my indifference and make my halting words clear. It will never be the same, I guess. The plaintive cry echoing out over the stereo calls to me. The sounds of Gavin Friday drowning out my seemingly endless problems. “I walked on the moon to touch the stars, a legend in my lifetime…” Humming the chorus to myself and imagining I were the subject of a song, even if it were a poorly done song, lyrically obsolete, complacently dull… just knowing that someone other than me thought I was infinitely memorable enough to dedicate a small piece of art to the world, an honour really.
“I’m not me,” but I’m not really sure who I am. I’m just sitting here tapping my pencil against the side of the large black desk, staring at the people as they come and go. All these people with purposes, with places to be, with vastly informed views of who they are and where they’re headed. And all I can think about is that beneath the suits and ties, beneath the sweaters and plaid, beneath all of that, they’re just like me. That makes me smile, even though I’m still confused and a frown is just below the surface of my tentative happiness. Conditional happiness, I should say. Provided the world stays exactly this way for a long, long period of time, maybe forever. But forever is a metaphor for brevity, it’s like taking the whole vastness of the universe and time and life, and everything contained inside the barrier of that concept. Perhaps because there are no barriers and it confuses me even more.
The music keeps playing in my ears, the driving rhythm keeping me anchored in reality and yet floating me further from the known and leading me deeper into the hopelessly unknown. “No, I’m not myself today.” And I’m watching the television, no, not the soap operas that I adore so, they devoid of any true meaning and yet structured so as to imply a sense of chaotic repetition trapped inside a box that I can switch on and off. Sometimes I wish my life were really like that, a toy that I could put away when it bothered me, or a playmate I could send home when I tired of them. And the TV fades into the haze of my subconscious. I think I did know myself a long time ago, maybe before I was born, maybe in the womb, maybe when I was just an idea… because at least then the idea could be contained, a reason for existence. But now there is no reason. I just remain “me” and it gets more frustrating each day… wishing I could de-evolve or revert to an earlier one-celled state. No worries.
But the worry is here, and it’s keeping me awake… I should have gone to sleep hours ago. Waiting here for some more inspiration, watching my veins rise and fall under the thin layer of my sweat-soaked skin, and still the music plays. “I’m standing next to you in the supermarket, you are obvious, I am oblivious.” How many times have I listened to this same song? I think I have the CD player on repeat. I must. Unless the album has gone around and around and I keep arriving in this one place for a reason. Yes, that’s it, a reason for existence. To sit here and debate the color of my walls. They’re green, you know.
Sam
Sam's Online Journal 