On My Mind

Honey, you've been in my head,
Like homework on Sundays when I've been laughing instead,
Cigarettes for cool kids behind the garden shed,
Love for lovers and the elephant by my bed,
And pearls for those girls,
Who always have their hair in pretty curls,
And football for English boys,
Who always had the latest toys,
You're on my mind.

Is This Happening To Anyone Else?

You know that point in your life when the home you grew up in isn't really your home anymore? All of a sudden even though you have some place to put your stuff in, that idea of home is gone. It's all familiar--from the entrance way to the kitchen to that shitty toilet that wouldn't ever flush right. Even that bathroom mirror that you'd scrutinize yourself in every single day and never notice a change from the day before even though you've been doing it every morning of your life. All of it's the same, but somehow that security and sense of satisfaction of home is gone.

Maybe it's just one giant cycle or a rite of passage. Once you move out for a long time or even forever, you won't ever find that feeling again until you create a new idea of home for you know, yourself, your kids.

And then again, maybe I've been looking at it the wrong way. 'Home' isn't your bed with Ninja Turtle sheets or the yard you learned to played catch in. Maybe it's the people you've filled yourself with... acquaintances, co-workers, friends, close friends, family members. Maybe that's all that family really is...just a bunch of people who miss the same imaginary place when really it's each other they miss.

Leaving just in time
Stay here for a while
Rolling in the ocean
Try to catch her eye
Work hard and say it's easy
Do it just to please me
Tomorrow will be different
So this is why I'm leaving

Au Francais

There is something especially poignant about the way the French say "I miss you". Actually, I should correct myself, they don't say "I miss you" or even " 'I miss you' ". They express this feeling by saying "Tu me manques" or simply "You are being missed by me". Brilliant. The sublte change, putting the person you are talking to in the front of the sentence (and in doing so, making them the most important part of this sentiment) allows the message to be a lot more about who you are talking to. After all, communication is all about the "you's" and expressing yourself to someone else. Just another thing along with A.P.C. jeans, Lacoste polos, croissants and aerospace innovations that the French got right. Heh, maybe the only things.

One last thing that is French and cool--J.Crew commercials.

Rebel Styling

I came across this picture while checking out some vintage photography on The Sartorialist's blog. To say that this person's sense of style is "rugged" is like saying that getting your leg amputated "stings". The subject, Russian futurist poet, Vladimir Mayakovsky, personifies his own type of rebel styling. Not just because he's effortlessly wearing boots with a suit or because of his don't mess with me--I'm a POET way of carrying himself. But look at how he manhandles his three-piece suit, adapting it to the rhythm of his life. Check out his breast pocket that's filled with pens and pencils--tools of his trade. No dainty pocket square or otherwise extension of a supposed elegant and refined choice of attire. Functional. But not in the way cheesy cellphone belt clips are. True rebel styling at its finest.

For My Father

Under Control

Frank Sinatra once posed a thoughtful if not obvious question--why don't people sing, like they talk? (Cue in "I've Got a Crush On You"). While admittedly not an avid listener of his, I do love The Strokes and this song...one of my favorites.


I don't want to change your mind,
I don't want to waste your time.
I just want to know you're alright.
I've got to know you're alright;
You are young, darling
For now, but not for long
Under control.

A Story

They all loved her--fans, people of all elks, her peers, photographers. Even the light that flashed from their cameras seemed to love her judging by the way that it chose to display her beauty. But no one loved her more than the only man who got to follow her around--to Paris, Milan, Tokyo, Chicago--wherever adoring fans waited. The man, whose official title was her personal translator to international countries, never grew tired of saying "Thank you for having me, you are very generous" for his employer and made sure his accent was perfect each time. He almost never spoke words that came from his own head however, or is heart for that matter. His words were chosen by those who spoke to her and of course the lovely words she chose to reply with. Left to his own devices, he could not pick any phrase from the many languages he was trained in at the University to convey how he felt. And by the time he finally discovered the perfect combination of words to match his admiration, he was heart broken for they had been spoken by the gallant and dapper gentleman sitting across from her--to him. The gentleman ended it with "I only hope that my affections not be lost between our two languages." Humbly, he translated it for her.

I just watched Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind since it came highly recommended by rottentomatoes.com and was listed under many "top romantic comedies" list. Something about the plot really bothered me though. Why would you want to erase your memory of someone especially someone you once cared about? To that I'd either say "Come on, man. Life goes on." but more likely that for every person you hit it off with and subsequently mess up with, it becomes something that you learn about yourself. And if you met someone and never learned a thing about yourself from them, then truth is you probably never cared about them in the first place. To erase someone from your mind...to try and forget someone...that's not only retrogression, it's kind of cowardly isn't it?

I love how...this is my blog. This place in cyberspace is like a grey sweatshirt. You know how you throw on a grey hoodie--not a red or blue one--and you put the hood up, it's like you're in your own little space. It's not a fashion statement, it's a means for mulling things over, disabling your sensibilities to the outside world, and elevating your sense of self-awareness. It's warm, cozy and private. It's said that when Bob Marley was in the studio, no one was allowed to talk to him if the hood was up. Pretty serious. That's how I feel when I write here. Lately though, I don't know. I hate how...this is my blog, but I still can't write everything I feel. And I have all these drafts written down on sticky notes, but they'll never make it here. Thank goodness I have something to concentrate on next week instead, even if it is...matlab.

The Strokes

.

"Hard to Explain"
.
I say the right thing
But act the wrong way
I like it right here
But I cannot stay
I'm watching TV
Forget what I'm told
Well, I am too young
And they are too old
Oh, man cant you see
I'm nervous, so please
Pretend to be nice
So I can be mean
I missed the last bus
I'll take the next train
I'll try, but you see
It's hard to explain

There is nothing like walking on the quad on a beautiful day. Just watching the campus turn into a wonderful array of colorful dresses, Frisbees, footballs, and just happy people is nothing short of bliss. It's especially refreshing that you see all these half naked people tanning and taking in some sort of ethereal energy from the sun (and being so carefree!) right before the week of finals as if studying for those could ever be a higher priority than making yourself a lovely bronze. It's on days like these that we remember that we are still kids and that this is still just college. The real world will never be as good as this.

I don't even know what to say. This is all just a huge misunderstanding.

For some reason these past few weeks have revealed to me an unknown side of my psyche. This hidden persona surfaces every night usually after my long and protracted search for contentment and validity--be it in my schoolwork, relationships, friends or personal growth--ends in complete and utter failure. If life is really this tapestry of sublime events supposedly culminating into my own personal Calvinistic plan, then so far I've only managed to accrue meaningless accidents and irreversible mess-ups. I need to work on being a better person.

I have decided that I have neither the time nor energy to actively search for love. If I find it, I will have fallen into it by chance. This is so because no one should ever actively search for love or companionship. That things as delicate and precious as those, which can never be created in one fell swoop, is the reason for patience, "taking it slow" and my current state. Just wish I had realized this earlier.

The conversations I have with my myself always boil down to one thing:

Me: "Why aren't you...I mean, why are you the person you are?"
Myself: "What are you? Life? You can't say that to me. Only life can say that to me. And does."
Me: "And what do you say to that?"
Myself: "I don't know"
Me: "You don't know? Or 'I don't know'?"
Myself: "I guess...both"

Safe to say my college life--personally, academically, and all other things considered--is at a trough. Nowhere to go from here but up I suppose. Or maybe just simply, nowhere to go.

On another note, I just wanted to post these sweet pics of John Mayer since his tour is coming through Illinois this week. What he didn't know when he disabled the "ctrl+c" function on his site's gallery was that you could just take a screenshot. That is, if you're desperate enough.
(Click to enlarge)







Picture 1: 20,000 people in Chicago feeling safe. joyful. content.
Picture 2: John Mayer, Michael Franti, Michael Franti's dreads.
Picture 3: Slow Dancing in a Burning Room
Picture 4:

NY-Z

Jay-Z rocking Persol 649s while jamming with John Mayer on "DOA" and expounding some soulful wisdom about the epicenter of the epicenters, Madison Square Garden:

Perspective Check

Nothing you can play or sing or do can ever be good, and you can never play a single good note--unless you have lots of love in your heart. And love for things that are pure and beautiful. I mean, even if you aren't a guy who is pure and beautiful himself or a girl who isn't pure and beautiful herself, or maybe if you've done some things so that your soul isn't as happy as it should be, if you keep a love in your heart for things that are righteous and true, then you can be can still be a great musician, writer, pharmacist, mathematician, engineer, businessman, friend, person. But unless you're all those things and have love in your heart, you can't.

T Bone Jackson, the great trombonist, once said that the word we all have to remember is "generosity". And even if you're great at something or you're really bitchin' at being the best theoretical physicist in the world, it means next to nothing--or it could mean so much more if you're able to get together and do it and share with other people. But you can never go into a laboratory or band or choir or church or gym and expect to achieve the next degree of spiritual, musical, professional or scientific enlightenment unless you love those people you're with. Unless you have really true, sincere love. Because you can never even have true anger if you don't have true love, and neither of them will ever have their full impact if they're not realized with one another.

And if someone says something to you or you find yourself in a situation where you don't feel like yourself, then just don't deal with it. Just be yourself as hard as you can, and be true to yourself the best you can. If you want to be pretty and pink like the softest rose growing in the spring time, then be that as pretty and beautiful and slippery as you can. And if you want to be the ugliest monster, then do that as best you can. Or if you want to be as free as the spirits of those who left--I'm talking Malcolm, Coltrane, and my man, Yousef--then I guess you, me and Common both have the same dream. But the most important thing is to always be true to yourself. And care. If you really care, you'll get somewhere.

So that's the deal with that.

Nothing like the smiling fucking face of mediocrity.

let a man be lost
for once in his lifetime
to live out his whole life
all in a night's time
to sit in his own mind
stare out at the skyline
to know that he's got plenty of time
left in his lifeline.
.

Fish Vol. I

(click to enlarge)







We are all connected.
.

Meet Fish

.


Vonnegut used the written word. Marvin Gaye used rhythm and blues. But I don't think anyone has ever used a fish to express social commentary, daily observations or just personal insight. Enter Fish. More to come (hopefully) soon.
.

I Pity the Heirs and Heiresses of Huge Fortunes.

After all,

what does someone,

who has nothing to do,

do?

The Great Wave at Kanagawa

"The Great Wave" by Katsushika Hokusai is one of my all-time favorite paintings and there is so much to be said about it. One could make the comparison of how ruthless and menacing the wave looks against the stillness and tranquility of the distant mountain. Or notice the wave that is directly beneath the larger one which is covering the boat closest to the observer. Its small bump and angled peak instantly reminds any native of Mount Fuji which is a timeless symbol of Japanese culture. It's almost like a subliminal joke that Hokusai carved in (it is a woodblock painting). But I'm no art history major nor am I pretending to be anyone other than someone who looked up all these facts on Google.

What I first noticed when I came across "The Great Wave" was how claw-like and threatening the wave looked especially in the face of these waif-like boats. Imagine how it must look from the sailor's perspective! But as the snow line on the distant mountain indicates, the painting takes place during springtime and specifically during the first harvest of the "Benito"--special tuna that will fetch half a years worth of a commoner's salary from royalty who will buy this delicacy as a sign of prominence.

So as much as these fishermen are going "oh shit" in the face of such chaos, each one of them knows that they have half a years salary worth of "Benito" in their cargo and no wave of any stature is going to stop them from getting to the marketplace.

Everybody's trying to figure out where their problems lie in the overall continuum from bad to good, right? And whether they're big or small..although, we don't have that perspective. All problems feel the same--like things we have to get over or around or through or across. Who knows what the next "Great Wave" in my life will be or how many times I'll go "oh shit." But you know what...I have my own damn "Benito".

Cheers, mate. Happy 2010!