Sole Debater

This life, so far, has been about discovery.

Everything has been a very big question mark. I mean, big questions. Like why are we here? What does it all mean? Why this set of circumstances and not a different set? Why me? Why now?

Everything around me changes.

Sometimes there are cages full of chickens strapped to the tops of cars.

Sometimes there are thick grey clouds that bury landscapes in snow over night.

Sometimes there are frijoles fried on hot slabs of metal and folded into wheat tortillas on street corners.

Sometimes there are conbinis open 24/7 staffed by sleeping high school students who aren't allowed to have jobs.

Sometimes there are bicycle rickshaw drivers resting on the seats of their rickshaws.

Sometimes there are cities so congested it takes hours to walk a few blocks.

Sometimes there are faces that blend into one another and become unrecognizable from strangers'.

Sometimes there are trees and bushes so thick there is no path.

Sometimes there are smiles carved so deeply in my memory, I am sure I will remember them in lives to come.

Sometimes there are sand hills and cacti.

Sometimes there are rocks reaching up to the sky.

Sometimes there are clouds reflected in an expansive glass that shatters with rain and rolls with wind.

Sometimes there are stars.

Sometimes there are beams of colour that dance ballet across the sky.

Sometimes there are families, biological or otherwise.

Sometimes there is loneliness.

Sometimes I wonder if travelling through space also means travelling through time. I wonder if any different place on earth really is a different place or if it's all just the same place at a different time. That doesn't mean forward or backwards time, just different.

I wonder if every story is the same story just from a different perspective.

And all the people are me, but with a different set of circumstances.

I don't care about money or cars or clothes or popular kids or being cool. Maybe that means I will never have or be any of those things. Maybe it doesn't. Maybe it means I will be a hypocrite one day. Maybe it means I already am one. I don't really care. It's important to know both sides, I think. . .somewhere deep inside of me. You can't really say anything about any side if you don't know both. And you can't know anything. So really, you can't say anything either.

I think this life has been about discovery. I'm not sure why. Maybe I'm a reincarnation of a very old soul. I sometimes feel that I am. Why the heck would I be so concerned about how I'm living otherwise? Why the heck do I feel so old all the time? Why am I so bored and unimpressed by all of the shiny things the world keeps trying to throw at me? There's no explanation that I can come up with. I've always been bored of it. It's not my parents and it's not my friends and it's not that I'm a rebellious insolent punk rocker on purpose. That's just how I feel. And I don't even like punk. . .
. . .anymore.

I'm much more interested in the unmatched originality that exists in the bark of each tree. The contours of the earth from the top of a mountain. How the sky ever got so blue and how gigantic and tiny the world is at the same time. I genuinely don't understand why other people don't appreciate each moment and the fact that they are breathing air and thinking thoughts and hearing sounds and tasting the inside of their mouths (or maybe gum or maybe the lingering smoke of a cigarette or cup of coffee, or maybe the saliva of their lover's mouth) faster than they can comprehend and that this. Moment. Will. Never. Come. Back. Ever.

It's gone. And it keeps going. So quickly you can't catch it.

AND YET, we live. We make plans. We do things. We fall in love. We die. And so do bajillions of other people, plants, animals, civilizations, planets, universes, etc.

How are we not in a constant state of wonder?

How can anything else be more important?

How can we think we have even an ounce of control?

How can we not bow down in amazement. . .at life?

If I feel that my hard work will pay off, I'm not totally sure what kind of pay off I'm expecting.

The hard work that I've been doing has not felt that hard and has not been any kind of work that most people on this earth would acknowledge or respect.

I have not contributed that much to society, at least not yet, or not in a measurable way. I have not held a long term 'job'.

My work is much more about examining myself and trying to be a better person. It has been about learning more about the world and the people in it. It has been about learning how to be compassionate and love people better. It has been about serving the world. It has been about trying not to be selfish.

I'm not sure what the pay off for this is. I'm not sure I believe in an afterlife or heaven even though earlier I talked about reincarnation. I do think that reincarnation might be real but I'm not striving for good karma. I'm not trying to have a better next life. . .at least not intentionally.

I'm striving to have a better this life. I'm striving to learn more about myself so that I can determine where I would be most happy, what I think, who I am, why and how to best live in this world based on that. How I can best change the world to help others be more happy too. But maybe that just means I am a trouble maker.

Today I was thinking about something that I think I want to do. . .and that is to make things more levelled. To try to show the beauty in even the most ugly of things. To try to show the hope in even the most despondent situations. To try to show that seed in which the next moment will grow.

I think that needs to be an important part to my expression and my art. To try to show something horrible or a character at their worst point and how that worst point leads to the birth of something new. I think that will be a theme over the course of the next few decades, probably. At least hopefully. . .or I feel that we're all in for big trouble. So probably good to start with that.