Getting used to the new meds.

I had a very long and very interesting idea to plug here, but I started on it, and a paragraph in, I felt like it just wasn't quite right. I have these ideas all the time, big and small, important and unimportant, but only so many of them are of worth.

I've been having less as of late. The ideas that usually flood my brain, and the songs that play whether I want them to or not; the need to produce or explode, and that energy that just takes me every once in a while, are gone. I'm convinced my pills are saving me. From a possible suicide, from depression which steals from me months at a time. I'm being saved by these drugs, but the sedation, and the dampening of ideas is such a burden. I was so defined by constant production. I've said it before, I'm not real unless I'm creating. Fitting into whatever this modern mould is doesn't work for me.

I will keep taking my drugs, but gods do I wish for a world in which I didn't have to. I value my life enough to take the slow creation, and effortful work that comes with it, over the fiery passion that it's replaced. If only to continue living and perhaps increase my creation over the longer time I'll be spending here.

I can feel why people don't stick to their drugs. I picked up the guitar today and played for about an hour, but the things that came out all sounded the same. The songs I played were songs I already knew. I've plenty of days where new things come out, but I hate those days where it doesn't happen. I've been having new ideas for parts of stories, and for stories themselves, and I keep loosing them. I keep losing the things that used to keep me grounded.

I feel so disjointed. I still want to drink and smoke and be wild, as if it would bring back the creativity that once was paired with debauchery. I'm not sure if this is permanent. I hope that it isn't.

I don't feel right without some world being created in my head. I don't feel right without ideas flowing so fast that I can't even hold onto them.

I think that's where my problem is. I've spent too long being exceptional. By exceptional I don't mean wonderful or brilliant, I mean an exception. I have been too long an exception to the rules that govern most people. For better or worse I've gotten used to being either this dynamo skittering with thought and creative passion or being this inert blob made of pain and despondency.

Being in this odd inbetween state that it seems is normal for everyone just doesn't feel right. I don't know how normal people exist. I still don't know how. I feel like everyone would rebel against their mundane lives if they had even once felt the power and beauty and terror of a mania. If just once people had felt the horribleness of a depression perhaps they wouldn't have such faith in indifferent systems. If people knew what I know I don't think they would be the way they are.

Everyone seems to me deluded and overly optimistic. Even while everyone is crying wolf and worried that their savings will disappear under an ocean of debt, they still believe in some sort of meaning to the world.

I can't feel that. I can't feel the love of God, and I can't feel ever that normal is good enough. So I am left with the decision to either live in a way that the rest of the world accepts, taking my pills and being dulled down into a manageable middle, or to go crazy and be at odds with all that this world stands for.

If I weren't afraid of another depression, afraid of that horrible time when I feel like destroying my hands and myself, I would stop my pills to feel the joy of mania and to once again have so many thoughts piling around in my head that I have to get them out on every surface I can. I used to cover my arms with notes, and fill notebooks with ideas. I used to positively crackle with passion, and now I am much like everyone else, whatever the fuck that means.

I'm glowering right now feeling bad about the lack of creative prowess I've been displaying lately. My pills sit on the desk next to my computer. I will take them soon, before heading off to bed, but they'll go down into my stomach, anchoring me to the rest of humanity.

There's the good and there's the bad about all this. I am no longer a risk to kill myself, I no longer will spend all of my money on frivolous things, I no longer will have to after every mania go get an STD test and check on my finances and feel my liver aching. But I also will no longer have 72 hour writing sessions broken up only by cigarettes and store visits, I will no longer have a song in my head every hour of every day.

I like the benefits and I hate the costs. I don't know if it's worth it, being sane. I was both happier and so indescribably sadder while I was crazy.


I have been so many things. I have lived more lives than most 21 yearolds could ever hope to. I have existed for what feel like 26 years. My time has been lengthened, and now dulled and medicated I don't feel like the person I've been the last three years, or six years, or whatever it has felt like to me.

I don't know if I'm the same person, and I need to find new ways to bring out the good things about my craziness. I need to find out how to bring out the creativity and passion that before smouldered beneath my breast.

I think I'm succeeding to a certain extent, but I don't know, and if I keep feeling this hopeless, what's the point of taking these drugs at all?

Writing like this may be one of the ways I can draw out the passion that I haven't been finding in the slow rhythms of every day. I know that when I write, things feel good. The stuff that comes out, be it filled with vitriol, or filled with joy, always feels true. That can't be said of most things. My writing and my music feel true, and for someone who isn't even sure about there being any objective truth that's a rather important statement.

So for all my ranting, and for all that I feel a little constricted on these new drugs, things are good. I am well, and I am still writing. I am still producing written word that hasn't been written before, that is hopefully interesting. As long as my blood is still pumping and my hands still writing, I will be ok.

I wish the truth were happier.

I hear better stories on the street than I could ever come up with on my own. Dead Mothers and stolen bicycles. Torrid tragedies remembered by streetlamps.

I was walking to the store, Cigarette in mouth, breathing in smoke which simultaneously comforted me about my coming death and increased its proximity. In the centre of the street, a few people met and began talking loudly about a party, or something of the sort. One of the girls, clearly drunk, and rather obnoxious sounding said "I can't believe they stole that bike off my front lawn. That was my mom's bike. She's fucking dead and they stole it. That's all I have to remember her by. She's fucking dead and they stole her bike. What sort of people do that, just steal a bike off a front lawn. What the hell am I gonna do?"

I walked down the sidewalk, away from there middle of the street conference. While I was smoking and watching the billows rise up above me into the night, I could hear two of the voices behind me while I walked. "That was my mom's bike. I needed that. I can't believe they did that, I just can't fucking believe it." I couldn't make out what the friend was saying.

About halfway to the store, and about a block after the voices disappeared into a house on my street, I could still hear the timbre of the girl's voice. It was the voice of the girl at a party you just wish would shut up. The voice that sounds just as annoying when complaining about there not being enough dip for the chips as when complaining about something that needs to be complained about. It was so sad. That's a voice I would disregard normally. I would have just felt annoyed by tone and not have bothered to hear content. It's something to note; the most annoying people still have problems.

I finished my cigarette feeling great and horrible at the same time. I knew I shouldn't be smoking. It's bad for my lungs, the smell is atrocious, and the benefits aren't really that apparent. It makes some things bearable. It's not a habit yet I guess. I've only bought one pack in the last three months. That's a good sign, but that I still need them is a bother. But I still need drugs every night. To feel good I need lots of things. To feel right I need lots of things.

while worrying about my lungs and the shortening of my life I lit another cigarette and wondered if that bike would be returned, and how that girl's mother died, and who she was, and what the hell was going on, and if it was recent or something that the girl just talked about every time she got drunk. Was this all just something that came to my head because I like stories? Did I make all of this up and convince myself it was real. Shit.

I hear more interesting stories in the middle of the night, in the middle of the street than I could ever come up with, but I wish I could. I wish the stories I heard were made up, and I wish the stories didn't have to be true. I wish that girl's bike, that had once belonged to her mother, hadn't been stolen. I wish that the stories about me, about going crazy, about shattering my life into a million pieces and having to pick them up and patiently glue them back together with drugs and persistence weren't true.

I wish my life this far with a dead brother, a crazy father, a crazy self, and generally unfulfilled dreams and ambitions weren't true.

I can make up stories, but they're never as interesting as the sad ones that I hear at night, when I can't sleep and my feet just want to strike the pavement, and my lungs just want a mix of fresh air and carcinogenic smoke.

I wish the truth were happier than it is, for me and for everyone else.

stagnation bothers me.

I'm so much more likely to want to write when I don't have time for it. I've written obsessively for a long time, but that tends to be more obvious when I have stuff to do all day. It doesn't seem like I write so much when I'm not doing anything else in a day.

I have a feeling it's just because time feels different based on context. But it still doesn't help me feel more inspired while I'm sitting in front of the TV writing.

So, in this advertisement for that movie "monsters vs aliens" they were playing a lovely song called Hey Pachuco by Royal Crown Revue. Something to note is that this is a kids movie, and the song is about Pachucos, a particular breed of Mexican sometimes gangster from the 1940s. The song is largely based on the Los Angeles riots between sailors and pachucos.

It's a pretty awesome slice of history. I'd suggest you check it out. I just find it interesting that it's in the advertisement for a kids movie.

So that's sort of proof that I haven't a whole lot to write about. I sort of hate having nothing to do. IT gets very old. I'm not good at being useless. I'm way more ok with sitting down and watching television without being busy than I ever have been before. I still have a bit of trouble being stagnate though.

Even writing sometimes doesn't work as a way of fulfilling myself.

Regarding Obama

Regarding Obama.
I've no doubt he'll work on the problems, but I don't think that the general intertwinedness between the corporate and the governmental will be overcome. That's a serious problem for me because it is not only a conflict of interest, it effectively disenfranchises whatever amount of the 300 million us citizens votes. We are given a few options for candidates, and those candidates cannot run without corporate funding. We sort of chose the candidate that ends up in office, but effective advertising is shown to have such a profound effect on purchasing behaviour that it would be a bad idea to think it didn't do something similar with voting. Essentially all candidates are fundamentally Liberal Capitalists, with varying attitudes on social issues. The social issues can vary because the people funding them aren't worried about the social, they're only worried about making money. So the variance in candidates though very real doesn't change the fundamental outlook that they must have in order to get the office. This applies to all of our elected officials, and once one looks at the process of lobbying in congress it becomes even more apparent how intertwined the corporate and the governmental are. So while I see Obama making changes, which will be beneficial, it will not remove one of the basic problems that lead to all this. The serious influence of the corporate on the governmental will not change under his leadership, or under the leadership of any president elected by the same system. The liberal capitalist agenda will remain strong, and the fundamental conflict of interest which causes ills to the planet, the people and the ability of citizens to affect the governing body above them will not be resolved.

It is a somewhat pessimistic way of looking things, but things are dark. I'm not of the opinion that this Liberal Capitalism is evil. It isn't, but I am worried by the fact that it is indifferent. There are no socially constructed taboos, and mores, to prevent them from doing ill. Humans however have implicit rules engrained in us from birth. The indifference of the powerful is dangerous. The Corporate doesn't control everything, but their amount of influence is so large as to be astronomically difficult to fully represent the vast expanse of their power.

There could be hope in all this, but I'd have to think more. I don't think that that fundamental problem will be solved while the US still exists, but there is a small chance I'm wrong, and I really do hope I am.

My 21st birthday, and my Animus.

I'll preface this post with the note that I have two songs that have been running through my head tonight. One of them is by my band Sans Francisco, the other is by Tom Waits.

The one by my band is called Dear Antigone, lyrics and vocals by me, guitar and harmonies by my band mate Matt Sevrens. It goes like this

Someone once said, cellar door is the most beautiful phrase in our language
I'm not sure I believe that assertion, now that I've heard your song
Oh Antigone, You have so enthralled me
Oh Antigone, you've so enthralled me

You say the words you think, You say them unabashedly
My voice could never do you justice
in these sad little songs I sing
and I hope that I can be all the things that you seem to ask of me
A hope that you can bring me peace, if not a rest from all this
please Antigone
Please Antigone
Please take me

You say, it's all in Vain
I don't know, what it is you want, out of me
I once tried to measure an hour, in wasted time
when with you, It's never so good as when you're there
it's never so bad as when I'm missing you
dear Antigone
please set me free, from the shackles that so roughly bind me
to this world
could this lovely girl, in front of me
my dear Antigone, be



So that was the whole song, but the whole thing has been going through my head. I need to find my Antigone. (not necessarily a girl, though the song does suggest that.)
That's what I've been missing, someone who can set me free from the shackles that so roughly bind me.

I talked to my ex girlfriend tonight, while avoiding working on a paper that's due tomorrow. The thing that kept coming to mind was the fact that she never really understood my need to create. It's not a matter of choosing to create less so I have more time for classes and school and work. There isn't a choice for me. She never seemed to get that. She fell out of love with me and also couldn't deal with being so close to all of my mental problems. It's something I think I've gotten over, but she still makes me want to smoke.

At the time it was both a fulfilling of oral fixations and a desire to put physical scars where the emotional ones were. It worked to an extent.

I got over her with oral fixations. I smoked more cigarettes in those couple of months than I ever had before and ever will again. Talking to her, or using instant messaging to talk to her, still makes me want to smoke. I guess that's a sign I haven't really gotten over her. I don't love her anymore, and haven't for some time, but there's still some bitterness there for me. I felt pretty abandoned when all that went down.

That ties into the other song that was in my head, Little Drop of Poison. It's not important that I put down the lyrics in this post, you can look them up if you'd care to. it's tied into all this though.

So instead of being with someone who doesn't understand my need to create I need an Antigone. I guess that's my model for a partner. I'm looking for one of those really, because I'm no good at dating, or at playing the field. I'm good at being in a relationship and caring for someone.

I've been figuring out my head, and the only thing that's constant no mater what is going on with me is this need to create. I always am making things and when I'm not I don't feel real.

I feel real right now, sitting and writing this. I was almost in a mood to neglect posting here, but that's not something I ever want to do. I have to write every day. I don't feel fulfilled otherwise. Sure I was writing a paper today, but that's not the sort of writing I mean. When writing a paper, no matter how enjoyable, I can't just say the things I think. There's too much back story and too much messiness to put into a paper for school. I have to write these ridiculous rants and these long long posts about what it is to be me, because I haven't figured that out yet.

I'm getting better at it. The realisation that I really do need an Antigone, a partner in all of this is one step in figuring it out. Writing every day, whether or not I feel like it is another step. The things that drive me are pretty clear, creation and a desire to help someone and be helped by someone.

I had so many things I wanted to say when I was thinking about this blog post outside, smoking a cigar to signify the end of the paper I wrote tonight and the end of my 20th year. Today is my 21st birthday. I'm not a new person, but it's a notable landmark. My first adult birthday, while sane.

I have a final, and a psychiatrist appointment tomorrow, then I'm done for the week. I have work some of next week, which will be a nice change of pace. I'm ready to take on the world as a slightly different person. Like I've said before I still don't want to conform to the way the world is, but I do want to be able to deal with it on my own terms rather than the on the terms of my moods.

The whole mess of who I am and who I want to be, and my goals and my desires is all too messy to deal with at once. I have too take all this day by day, and so far that's going well. My friends are helpful in this, and my drugs are helpful in this. Breaking up my routines with writing and song has really given me something to look forward to.

As unusual as it is, I look forward to this blog post every day, not always consciously, but still the anticipation is there. I like being able to finally say all the things that build up over a day, especially a day like this with paper writing and two finals and a discussion with my ex girlfriend. These are things that just tend to make me want to get more and more shit out.

The moral of all this is that I'm ready. I'm here. I am creating, and I will be doing so for the rest of my life however long or short it is. I've shortened my life with tobacco and alcohol, with marijuana and wild nights, and I've lengthened it with atypical anti-psychotics that can keep me from just saying fuck it to this life that I haven't found meaning in yet.

The only thing I've found of worth is to create. So every day, unless my computer breaks again, I'll be here, typing away my sorrows and joys and in betweens because for me this is more than a narcicistic bit of self aggrandisement, it's an outlet, and on some really shitty, or unproductive days, my reason for keeping on going.

It's dramatic, but these aren't histrionics. I'm doing this because I need to, and read or not, this blog is keeping me sane in a more fundamental sense than the neurochemical. I'm not sure I believe in a soul, or in something about us that isn't just our brains, but if any such thing exists this is where I'm giving mine room to breath.

This is my animus. Unless I take to doing this in private, every day you'll get to see some of it, some of my animus spilled on the page, and explained, not just for you but for me.

my way with words isn't mine.

I tend to think of my ability with words as something that just came about naturally, but that's far from the case. The way my parent's used language around me while I was growing up and the way that my dad thought about writing all influenced how I use language. I used to write essays for my dad on various topics. It was fun, but important, and I know that that improved my writing style. So while I have a way with words, it's not because I have some natural ability. I have a way with words because of the training I had. That's useful to know.

What I tend to think of as natural ability is more a product of being raised on writing, and reading, and language. It's nicely sobering to remember that what I've got comes from practice and training rather than just a way with words.

I don't know exactly what brought that on, but It seems important. There's an intersection between natural ability and environment that's vital to the development of a skill or talent. Same goes for music and other things. The music is the same way. I heard music growing up. It would have been a bit better if, like in the family of my friend Paul, people played music all the time, but exposure is still important. It's important to not think of a skill as something entirely yours. It's about the influences. Not laying claim to a skill is a good way of avoiding that bravado that comes from making something that you think is good. That my writing skill is really something given me by my parents, and by my time practising, is humbling in a good way.

Creation is my only refuge.

The point I made in the other post is rather profound. I don't know how true any of the stuff regarding Sans Francisco is, because I think I'm just having a bad day, but the statements about creation are true. I only feel real when I'm creating. Sometimes a conversation will enthral me. That's actually one of the preconditions for my infatuation with someone, in conversation with them I am enthralled. The only other times which are real to me are the ones in which I'm making something.

That's an important thing to note. What is real to us is so much a mater of perception. The fact is that everything in memory is foggy and is somewhat surreal to begin with, but when that sort of patina is draped over the present, one can imagine how disconcerting it would be. My present is like that. If I'm not making something I am in a limbo. I am in a between. There's not a lot I can do about it except to create everywhere. To always be making something new, whether or not I think what I create is going to be of worth. That's one of the changes for me. I can't feel real just by going to a party. I don't automatically feel expansive, I have to induce it.

I can't just be driven by a mood and then go on into the world that way. I have to push myself into these furies of creation to make the world mine. Other wise I don't feel as if I've done anything.

An hour of class often feels like wasted time. The transit between home and school feels like wasted time, and the majority of conversations I have feel like wasted time. One effect of my drug is that I'm less depressive, and tend to be a bit nicer to be around. That shows how drastically unpleasant I must have been. But I still cannot shake this feeling that nigh everything I must do is pointless. I am real when I write, and I am real when I play music that hasn't been played before. I am real when I'm typing this poorly structured essay, because it is the flowing out of something new that keeps me going.

I've long wondered about the value of existence, and the only things that haven't come up short have been writing and music. Everything else is sullied by the fact that we don't know if there is meaning. Everything else is unsure, and may be of no use to anyone in the long run. But Creation.


Gods. I want to write Creation in all caps to make my point, because language isn't even sufficient to explain what I want to say. CREATING is a reason to live. That's all.


I often have felt I hadn't a reason to live. I've often felt the power, as well as the hopelessness, of being alive. I have felt a wide wide range of things, and the one thing that has stuck out to me is that I can keep on living as long as I can create.

That is the only thing that inspires me to continue. When the world has fallen down around me, and I feel this strong desire to drive my hands through some wall, and destroy their ability to play guitar, their ability to write, The only thing that sustains me is this ability to create.

The only reason I don't end up slamming my hands against the wall again and again until they are useless, is because creation is worth living for.

I'm willing to have gone through whatever ills I have gone through in order to create.

I don't know if that will always be the case, but up to now that has been the thing that has kept me alive.

I am still alive because I can create. There isn't another redeeming value to life that I've found yet.

One can argue all they want with that logic, but they will be found short.

creation is my only refuge.

I'm only real when I'm creating.

I'm not always sure what I'm going to write about when I sit down to write a blog post, but I do it every day and somehow I always come up with some writing topic. That's something new to me, having to force myself to write every day. I write every day whether or not I feel like it, because no longer do my moods drive me to write. I still feel driven sometimes, and I still have important things to say (or so I think), but I don't have the same sort of fervour.

I sort of want to move. I like Davis. The place is fine, but I feel almost like I need a new setting to fit the new person I'm becoming. I'm still the same in a lot of ways, but not being blown about on the winds of mood is something that takes a lot of settling down to. I'm getting used to it of course, but I don't entirely feel the same. I almost miss the wild fluctuations, even though they caused so much distress.

Sometimes I feel like the stuff I'm putting the most time into now isn't the stuff I want to produce. I'm playing music that I like with matt, but I feel like there's a whole lot of boundary pushing I want to do with my other music. That hit me today while sitting around with Matt. It wasn't a practice session or anything, but I kept on being more and more annoyed at the little things he does, and it kind of hit me that I'd rather be sitting with my loop pedal and working on some of the difficult problems that I have with the musical pointillism stuff. The thing is that when playing with him I get bored. The bass lines bore me, and the things no matter how good they sound tend to feel less vital than the stuff I create alone or with Dan.

I like playing with Matt, and I want it to go somewhere, I'm excited about it in a lot of ways, but I can't just do that, and sometimes it gets in the way for the stuff that most interests me. It hurts that I woke up at 4 in the afternoon, so already I haven't as much time to do the stuff I want to, but I'm still not willing to take the time that I would play my musical pointillism and put it towards this other stuff I'm doing.

I guess that's what my problem is. I like doing this but not at the cost of the music that I feel like no one is doing. Sans Francisco is doing something interesting, but it's not something that engages me every time I play it. When I play one of the bass lines I'm not fully there, and when I sing one of the lines I'm not fully there. It doesn't feel like creation. That's the thing I'm not real unless I'm making something. The time when I'm writing music, or writing blog posts, or making something are when I'm fully involved. Rehearsing things I've already made bores me to death. Writing bass lines to things already written bores me to death. I can only do so much of it before I get all pissed off.

I have to be making new things. I like playing my own songs that I've written, but not nearly as much as writing new things. That's part of why there's a heavy improv element to the musical pointillism stuff, that way I'm real while I'm on stage. That way I'm actually a full person. I'm not performing something that already exists.

I just want to be real, and the only way I can do that is by making. Making anything really. I don't create the way others breathe, but if I don't create there isn't a point in breathing.

I'm tired of doing the same things over again. I know how important it is to have a song tight, have it put together so well that it sounds perfect, but I don't know if I have the patience to make that happen. I can't cede my existence for that long. It's so close to making something, and yet so far. I want to eschew the routine, the practised, the automatic. I can spend my time in front of the TV not existing, but I WILL not spend my time with a guitar or bass in my hands not existing. That's part of why I don't remember bass lines. I can't stand doing the same thing every time. I tried. I will continue to try, and I intellectually understand the importance of it, but I can't force myself into that rut.

I'll keep on with Sans Francisco, but I'm keeping on for when we make new songs. I'm keeping on for the catchyness of the songs we write, not because I like playing the song perfectly. I don't like playing a song perfectly, if it's the same song I've played ten billion times. I like writing the song. I'll perform because I must, but I exist only for the creative bit. Playing music isn't creative, only making it is.

Musical Pointillism

Eating pasta, watching television, and happily done downloading some lovely albums. I've no finals on lovely St Patrick's day, which I so love so the plan for tomorrow is to sleep in, sit about, watch television, and drink an beer or two. I'm rather looking forward to it. Perhaps some reading and some writing and music.

got back about half an hour ago from smoking cigars and talking about musical stuff with my friend Dan. He's the drummer percussionist guy from my band Exactly. He's been working on programming a loop on Macs MSP. It's pretty exciting, and he's got awesome stuff going on. I'm pretty psyched, because this means he can do a lot of things with the percussion. The possibilities are really wide ranging. We talked a little about specifics and if the parameters of his program could do what we wanted it too. He automatically came up with some solutions to our problems. It's exciting.

The problems I've been having with my musical pointillism has been in the fact that it's only guitar and a loop. I'm good at creating a static picture, which though certain rhythms will show up and there is movement, is generally a singular picture. Adding this dynamic looped percussion set up gives it a certain amount of motion. There's also the bass line, which I'm using my delay pedal (able to loop for around 3000 msec) for. The trick is that over those three(I may have more, not sure) seconds a certain number of repeats lead to a fade away.

I'm going to have my friend matt, and guitarist in my other band Sans Francisco, play bass this way. The strictures of the delay pedal will counteract some of the melodic things he can't help but do. It's going to be useful.

I have two inputs on my loop pedal, the one I'm using on my guitar, and the other input is ostensibly a Mic input, and what I want to do is get a mic and have my friend Paul who is off and on in Sans Francisco, and is one of the main members of Exactly, will play trombone through the mic and on the loop. It should be useful.

Point is there's a whole bunch of stuff that we want to do with this. It allows for creative input from all parties, (well I don't know if Matt will end up feeling like he's got creative input) and it's got a lot of possibilities. It's my first serious chance to be the primary creative force behind something musical. It's really nice. Being the impetus behind something is great.

There's lots of musical stuff floating around in my head, but it's far more manageable on my drugs, which is super nice. That's what I've been thinking.

My Generation's art.

I always worry that my generation will write memoirs no one will ever get the chance to read. We'll pour effort into long descriptions of going mad, or growing up a certain way, and no one will ever see them to benefit from them. It's fine for the person who writes the book, because writing about the bad parts of ones life makes them seem not less bad, but more manageable. It isn't quite as good for the rest of the world.

I used to worry my generation wouldn't create much interesting art, but I'm no longer worried about the creation of interesting art, I'm more worried about the desimination of that art. There are great band made up of people my age, but it's the shitty ones who get radio plays. There are great painters, and writers, and sculptors, and all sorts of other things, but those aren't things that come up to the public view.

My generation will create, but I don't think anyone will see it. That gives great reason to ask the question; is art without an audience art at all?

That's a troubling question, especially for someone like me who has art *music in my case* but rarely shows it to anyone. Our memoirs may be good, our songs great, our paintings brilliant, but it's all for naught if no one sees them, hears them or reads them. We listen to music for different reasons now. The same is true for how we consume writing and visual art.

Music is a distraction and something to go in the background. I don't know how people can listen to top forty hits on their iPods all day long, but that is what they do. the visual art that makes it is in advertisements, and the writing we enjoy is about sordid affairs, or about celebreties.

Art serves it's purpose as a placating remedy given to the masses. It's the same crticism that's been used since the Horkheimer and Adorno paper "The culture Industry." I fell like this art that my generation makes to put in advertisments and television shows, and the television shows themselves, and the art in full page ads are all worth less because their purpose isn't art.

To a certain extent I'm a formalist that way.

I'd like to keep going on this topic but my meds are kicking in and I litterally can't. It's like it's gradually powering down my brain.

A bit about my current state

My room is a horrible mess. I haven't cleaned properly in months. I feel a little bad about it, but I never feel the need to clean. It's not a good thing that I willingly eschew cleanliness, but for some reason it just doesn't seem that important.

Even last night when I had people over it didn't seem a big deal to me. That's the thing. I just don't want to do any of these things I'm responsible for. Or maybe it's more like I have a pool of resources I can put towards anything and cleaning my room just isn't one of the things I choose to put resources towards.

That would make sense to me. I've been doing a lot more music lately, and it's been pretty good by my accounting. I've also been getting on top of the stuff I need to do for my job. And then there's school. I've been rather good about that as of late. I just don't have the extra resources to get to cleaning my room, or sorting out my clothes.

That's probably not a good thing, but I think I'm operating on the same schedule as I was when off of my meds, and it doesn't apply to my medicated state. That may be part of it. I'm much better with my meds, nicer, better to be around, less snappy, less negative, less wild. They're definitely a good thing for me, I just need to get used to them.

It's not just that either, I have to get used to a whole different life and figure out if I'm comfortable with just doing the routine things that each of us does every day. I don't know if I feel like the way the world is structured suits me. I don't want to live in the confines of habit. The routines I feel I need to go through stifle me. For all my desire to understand the human brain to a greater degree, for all my desire to explore the things that make us human, sometimes I just want to quit it all and play music. Sometimes I want to say fuck it, and just write books, songs and poems. Sometimes all of this is too much.

Of course the drugs make me realise a bit more fully the weight that a routine puts on ones shoulders. I've even had to justify the taking of them to myself. I'm taking them to avoid depressions, and to perhaps lengthen my life by preventing a possible (hell considering statistics on the subject among people sharing my disorder, likely) suicide. I'm not taking them to become a productive member of society. I'm not taking them so that I can work and be prosperous, I'm taking them to save my life.

That's a pretty profound difference. They're being prescribed to allow me to fit into society, but I don't need to fit in, in fact I'd much rather not fit in. I'm taking them to fit in or not fit in on my own terms. To a certain extent it's the same as my hindsight justification for the short time for which I could have considered myself a smoker. Cigarettes in some way helped me cope with the shittyness of life, and for all that they very well may have shortened my life by a few months or a few years, they have, by preventing my just giving up, given me back many more.

Right now for me is a time for rediffining of terms. Who am I? I don't know anymore, but I'm working on it. I am not someone who wants to be subject to the greater trends of society, and anytime I see myself doing something just because it's what has always been done, I feel a little bit of myself die. So far that and my desire to create have been the only certain things. I want to create, and even though society doesn't value my music or my writing the way they value the creation of pointless monetary assets, I want to continue as if what I do is the most important thing there is.

That's all I'm really sure off, but I guess that's a lot. I have to resources to do those things I want to as well, so I'm not so bad off. I just need to figure out the rest, through song, and writing. Maybe I'll find out and I can tell everyone who I am, but with this being a completely new experience and the fact that I'm always changing even if only a little bit, It may be rather hard to do.

the weather and my writing style.

The weather has taken a nasty turn. I'd rather it just rained instead of threatening with big grey clouds and cool winds. Waiting for the other shoe to drop is never something I've been a fan of. I've spent enough time waiting for things to go wrong, or turn for the worse in my normal life, I don't usually like it for weather.

The weather metaphor is used a lot for bipolar disorder. It's a pretty accurate one. The clouds roll in and it threatens to rain before a torrent falls down. The same happens with manias, where you've those days where the sun just peeks out from the clouds and it's still cold out. It's like the lead up.

Oddest thing, I'm imagining this read in an English accent. I tend to write in a way that just sounds better read out loud in an english accent. I can do it in the Irish but that's not quite how I write. I don't really know why it sounds so much better to me when it doesn't sound estado unidensen. I've never been comfortable with being from the US, and that may just be part of it.

I've always had trouble figuring out where my writing style comes from because I've all these influences that aren't connected to where I'm from. I spent too much time reading books of all different sorts. I spent too much time in Japan, and I spent too much time wishing I weren't from the part of northern California I was from.

That irks me a bit. It's not necessarily of importance enough to blog about, but in actuality, what is?

My current band and music

You all should go over to www.mattsevrens.com to see the music my new band has been making. It's catchy, and unusual. I think people will like it. So do check it out. it's not the stuff that I've written that musical philosophy stuff about. It's not my Post chordalism, or musical pointalism or whatever. It's folky pop with clever lyrics.

Do check it out. If you enjoy it let me know. Perhaps I'll post more if there is interest.

finnally my computer has been fixed.

My computer has been fixed. I'm so tempted to yell that, with my lovely caps lock key. I rather missed her. The thing is, turns out I use the computer far more than I had thought. It's almost like most of the easily kept social ties are on the internet now. It's a good and bad thing. It's good for my gas consumption, and bad for keeping my body in biking shape. It's good for my introverted but people loving people loving persona, but bad for the actually people I love.

I'm ambivalent about how much of my life, and the lives of others, centre around computers, but as far as action is concerned, I'm unlikely to change my direct involvement with said devices.

Something I'm sort of surprised to have missed is posting on this blog. I had been doing so every day, and it had been quite a release. I just didn't realise how much until I no longer had it at my fingertips. That gave me time to sit and handwrite part of the memoirs I'm working on, but handwriting is a practice in passion not in work ethic. I am a shite editor when it comes to handwritten works, and transposing them to my primary mode of wirting, my computer is always a troublesome endeavour. I'm not overly worried about that transition, but it will be a large amount of additional work over the editing and rewriting. One of my friends said it takes at least five years to write a good memoir. All that made me think of was the David Bowie song "five years", but she's right about one thing. Perhaps not the time in particular but certainly the fact of a long time being needed. I'd say more like two or three years, but on never fully knows. I would find it interesting to have it take 3 years, so that it's about as long as the primary time of focus.

But that's enough mulling. For now I'm just happy to have my computer back and my blog back and my connection to the rest of the world (well my non physical connection to it at least) back.

Rather pleased if you couldn't tell.

I'm working on a paper right now. I felt like writing but no longer felt like writing my paper, so while I've use of a computer I've decided to once again post on this lovely page of mine.

My teeth have been hurting me. I rather hate dental work, despite realising it's necessity. The thing that most bothers me is the ability of dental problems to remove all other thoughts from ones brain. If my teeth hurt I'm unlikely to be thinking about anything else. That occurs in a lot of different cases, but because my teeth hurt I'm having trouble thinking of anything else.

The paper I'm working on is titled "Madness and Meaning: Mental Illness and the Essentialist Turn" That sentence is rather hard because the shift key on this shitty school keyboard keeps sticking. I have to make a serious amount of effort to press it again and again. It leaves me tempted to not capilatise anything. That of course is a bad idea, but I can't seem to shake it nonetheless.

Not having a computer seriously puts a damper on my existence. There are plenty of things my computer is good for, and without it I realise again how much time I spend using it. It's usually just in passing, for the listening of music, or the reading of blogs and articles, but without it my life is significantly different. I write on notebooks for hours, giving my hand these uncomfortable cramps that I try to get rid of by massaging my hand while watching television. I don't like my life without a computer. Typing is a hugely useful thing for me. My hand writing is bad and I've a tendency to grip to hard. All of this leads me to wish I had a keyboard under my fingers to catch the thoughts that fall out of them.

My computer will soon be fixed, and the same goes for my teeth, so these minor things that ail me will be done for, however I'm a little too in the moment to just think of them as temporary.

Some challenges posited by my memoir writing.

my computer is well on it's way to being fixed, and my memoir is on it's way to being written. That's not to say I have near enough material as of yet, but on the plus side, I'm up to about 10,000 words and I haven't yet gotten to the meat. Actually that may be the minus side. I haven't actually figured that out.

The problem with this writing I've been doing is that my life is confusing. Trying to structure it so that people could make sense of my ups downs and various influences is a nigh arduous task. Timeline doesn't properly organise my life, and normal memoir structure doesn't either. I don't want my readers to be as confused as I was once they get to the bit about madness.

That's where the issue is, in portrayal of moods and all of that I can't rely on time, or on history. I seem to be doing that a lot, working on things for which I've no forebarers. It's a hard thing to do.

Of course there are many memoirs to look at, and read and reference, but somehow I feel like my memory of events is unsusual. I explained to someone earlier this week how I remember things so well; I tie everything together. If I'm learning about one topic I tie it to another, and another and so on until everything is a jumble of connections.

I have connections, not timelines. I have to go back and use details to sort out the actual timeline of my life. I think that my dad's first break that I was aware of was after my brother's death, but that's only because I'm assuming a partially causal relationship, not because I have any real feeling about which occured first. I could always figure out which years these things happened in through memory and through asking people, but I don't really think that would clear the air.

I want to explain things in an order that makes more sense. That's why this memoir is going to be an interesting experiment. I don't know if I'll ever end up releasing it, but I do know that there's quite a lot of stuff that interacts. It's not stream of consciousness, but it is structured based on sense rather than time.

Most people understand time, but for me, with my ups and downs, and dilation and contraction, time isn't the best way of ordering things. I don't experience time in the same way, and I don't know quite how to reconcile this experience with others.

So be it.

Wishing I could post more. Damn broken computer.

The stuff i've been writing in notebooks as of late all points to the writing of a memoir. I'm pretty sure I finally have the impetus and will to do it. It may end up being more like a "dreams of my russian summers", memoir only in the loose sense. I'm expecting it to be more about the truth than about the actual events. That's a tricky thing of course. I have a feeling stuff from the blog will come in handy and get slid in there, but I imagine most of it will be new stuff. I intend to continue writing the blog as soon as my computer is repaired (which should be soon). I'm using a school computer right now, and so will keep this post short.

The memoir may take some time away from my posting, and I do intend to put some serious work into it. I'm not entirely sure if I'll ever finish it, or where I'll get with it, but I do hope to find out.

I've had a lot to say as of late, mostly because my new meds have been giving me an unusual freedom from the mercurial nature of my moods. I do hope I can write more of it down here when the computer is fixed. That memoir may take a year, or two, or longer, but if I manage to finish it the people who read this will be the first to know.

So good luck, Will be back when I'm able.

adieu.

a contemplation on memory

My posting has been very very sporadic of late. My computer died and I've yet to get it fixed. Ah the life of a college student. I have been writing every day though. There are a lot of interesting things happening to me, and though the presumption is a bit egotistical, I bet you'd like to hear about them.

I'm on new drugs. Taking Seroquel. We're still working up to a normal dose but I feel better and friends are taking note. The fact that I can actually chose what to work on rather than being at the whim of mood and inspiration is very odd. I've been taking time to get used to not being nervous about the next coming episode. There's just a whole lot of stuff that I'm still getting used to.

I could explain more, but I've been thinking other interesting things that are more interesting to everyone else. I don't feel so hopeless anymore. Though I still don't believe in a god and I still don't really feel like life has any meaning, I haven't been feeling so hopeless. I haven't felt as blown about on the winds of time and space.

All the things I wrote while I felt that way show a lot. I don't know how accurate or inaccurate the things I though were, but it's certainly interesting to see what I was thinking in the past. It's a different sort of revision now. Before this looking back at things I had written was a study in differing writing style and growth as a human being, now it's more like reading things written by an entirely different person who I happen to have the memories of.

All of this has also given me a differing view on the way memory works. Of course I've been taking courses on exactly that topic as well, so I know better how it actually works, but I've also had these philosophical thoughts about it. That sureness, and lack of sureness that memory has is something I'm rather enthralled by. The fact is that we know only our current state. What is now is all that is. I think I can finally finish reading Swan's way, and the other volumes of "À la recherche du temps perdu" (or Remembrance of things past) The insights that it has about memory, and its sheer size are a few things that interest me.

I've had some of those Proustian thoughts myself. The ones about memory being held in time isolated from other events. It's all of interest to me more now than it was before, because being well and remembering not being well is a surreal experience. The things remembered take on a movie like quality.

I remember tics and gestures I used to do, and I remember being curled up in the foetal position on a bed, but I don't always feel like those people are me. That's the leap that we all make, that these things we remember really happened to us. It's an easy leap to make, and logically solid, but it still is a leap. That's where all of this coalesces into one problem.

It's the same damn question we as a species have been asking since the advanced development of our forebrain. Who am I. If my memories don't define me, because they are only me in as much as I admit they are, then what does? If my actions now become but memories later, then are they important either?

That's the thing. I can't really say if the zen living in the moment is really the best way to go or if the western Sartrean existentialist equivalent is a solution. I don't know if there is a positive thing about our existences, and I don't know if now that I'm well enough to continue on in a way that isn't horrible tumultuous I'll have enough good to outweigh the bad.

That's the problem, the answers don't come. In what I study, the brain and its workings, I don't get to find out what meaning there might be. I'm given more things to mull over, but I'm never given a large number of explanations. That's where I hit a wall. These questions that we ask are nigh unanswerable.

I'm awfully tempted to take the Wittgenstein view that we're just asking the wrong questions. That's a significant idea. Asking what it all means may not be a question that makes sense. An object doesn't mean anything. A state of existence doesn't mean anything. We associate our words with semantic quatility, do we also then associate what they refer to with semantic quality? I'd guess that we do. We want to construct meaning out of our memories, and out of the objects in our world, and out of our lives, but the fact is that meaning may not be applicable to these entities. That's where we may fail, this application of a human construction on something beyond us, be it life, or memory, or whatever else.

lack of posting, explained.

Haven't been posting as much lately mostly because my computer died. I do apologise for that. I'm not sure how long it will be until my computer is fixed, but I have been twittering more because my cell phone still works. so if you still want to hear from me I'd suggest going through the backlogs of this blog or going to my twitter at www.twitter.com/patch615

Finally Finding out who I am: Living on an even tack

I'm on an even tack. It's unusual and wonderful. I haven't felt this normal in a long long time. I'm so happy that things are good.

I have a few things to talk about, though I really could (and would be more than happy to) go on all day about how my new drugs are affecting me.

It's been a weekend of papers and music. I played a show today with one of my bands, and this weekend I started another band. It's pretty exciting. I need to get back on recording my solo stuff, but I haven't really had the time.

I've really been enjoying all the creative stuff I've been able to do as of late. It's nice. I was worried that my new drug would hinder my creativity, or just change it in some odd way, but it really has made things better. I can create at will now. Before it required passion, or inspiration, now it just works.

That's something I've never known, being able to do something just by working at it. I always was able to do some things naturally and simply couldn't do the others. It's very odd finding that I'm actually able to change my abilities by exerting effort. It's weird being able to write a paper without having some spark behind the writing.

My friends have noticed the difference too. I was worried about giving up alcohol, and to a certain extent weed, but frankly, I know I'm not going to miss it. Another plus is the fact that one of my drinking buddies from when I was drinking a WHOLE lot, also has quit drinking because of the drugs he's on, so we can not drink together. It'll be interesting.

I'm feeling good. Even the stuff that's a cause for anxiety, debt, schoolwork, being single, isn't nearly as bad as it ever was. It feels good to feel good and not worry about the consequences.

It's nice loving music again. Before music was what got me through. I didn't love it the same way. It was like a relationship you have because if you didn't have that person to lean on you wouldn't be able to support yourself. Now it's one of those things where I'm not playing music because I need to, because I couldn't live without it, I'm playing because I love it. Of course I still feel like I need to play, I still have music coming out of me all the time, and just can't hold it back, but it's not so urgent. I can play music without the need for catharsis.

That cathartic turn that writing and music took for me is something I'm glad to be over. Writing to excise demons is always a study in futility. Those demons remain, and the things you write don't bring anything positive into the world about you. The writing is flat, and bitter, and full of the ugliness that language so brilliantly can display.

Language and writing can be so ugly and harsh when used that way. Music too can take on that edge. Music not made as a remembrance of what it felt like to be in a world that was ending, but which was played because playing it would make the world end.

I haven't known who I am without these vast fluctuations in mood. In the mountains I was stifled and so wasn't able to feel who I might be in less confining circumstances, and once I got here I went mad. I've never fully figured out who the hell I am. I know some things about me that couldn't be suppressed by depression, and couldn't be exaggerated away by mania. Those things stick out, but I'm still in a mode of self discovery.

Some would argue that who you are under pressure, in the worst of the worst, is the essence of your being, if that's the case I better know who I am than most people ever will. However, I think that who I will be in the rest of my life (drugs willing) is really about when I'm well.

It's such a trip finding out what is real, what isn't. It's so odd finding out which things really pique my fancy, and which were just infatuations enhanced by mania. It's great finding out that I really am this driven, exciting person I thought I was in mania, but without the arrogance and over reaching. It's also great finding that I'm not the waste of air, and paper, and space, and resources, my depressions had me so convinced I was.

I'm here, and I am finally me.

This is my first chance to find out what makes up my world, and what I am. I feel reborn, with some of the ties I had before, debts, and friends, and school, and memory, but that is no more than I was given at my birth. I am new. The me that will walk out my door tomorrow is going to be a different me than has walked out that door hundreds of times before.

An excerpt from my notebook.

This is an excerpt from one of my current notebooks

"The world is organised in such a way that people like me (whatever that means) are noted for honour but nor for support. The value of art of course may be changing, but as things have been and may continue to be for a long time coming, I am valued in one way and forsaken in another.

I just make note of this because there is still a heavy stigma regarding mental illness, but the social enthusiasm that mania brings as well as the creativity are rewarded. Like everything else in my world this exhibits a very apparent duality, or polarity of things.

I'm still not sure if I prefer Manic-depression to Bipolar as a term for what I've got. Both make sense, and both are valid. Bipolar just seems like it doesn't fully explain it, unless of course you already think of Major Depressive Disorder as Unipolar depression. Of course only psychologists and crazy folks think of it that way. Which is why I feel Manic-depression is more descriptive to the lay person.

All of it is semantics though. Not to say Semantics aren't important, Just that getting to the semanticity of a single word neglects some serious complexities in the disorder itself."

"It seems like being mentally ill is all I ever write about anymore. What happened to my other interests? I used to write varied things about varied characters but as of late all that comes out is the examinations and laments about my head. I know how much it has affected my view of the world, but it did not remove all my other interests. What happened?"

Preparing for Normality.

My head has felt a little different these last couple of days. I started on a new drug (new to me, not new in the other sense) to sort out my brain. It seems like it's working. I haven't been having the crying spells that had been cropping up this last week.

I just feel normal. That's so unusual for me. I don't feel like there's any serious cognitive impairment, but every once in a while my eyes just sort of loose focus. It's not like the world goes blurry, because everything is clear, my processing just goes out of focus. So I could be looking out at some trees, and the trees will still have defined edges, but the visual image doesn't have any connection to anything else. It's like all I'm getting is the feed, and none of the associations.

That doesn't happen often enough for it to be a serious problem. I do need to start going to bed earlier on this drug, it's pretty sedating. I always used to have trouble falling asleep, so going to bed at 2, let alone as early as midnight, was kind of the only option. There are a few things I need to get used to.

I won't be drinking much alcohol anymore. My dad is on the same stuff, and I know that alcohol affects him a whole lot more now. Drinking the way I used to is just out of the question. Given, I used to drink pretty prodigiously. I like alcohol for alcohol's sake though, so I'll still be able to enjoy a snifter of Irish whiskey, or a bottle of good beer. It will just seem like I had far more beer or whiskey than I did. I suppose I'm fine with that. I'm willing to give up drinking for a modicum of sanity. Shit, even if it just rids me of the depressions I'll happily give up drinking. The problem I keep hitting is figuring out how to deal with social situations. parties are exculsively drinking affairs, and frankly they're rather boring while sober. I really don't like parties, and I really do like alcohol, so there's that. I'll likely just be the DD a bit more often when my friends want to go out drinking for the evening. And I do have a rather good excuse. It'll just be a little hard to explain considering how much I drank before.

Of course all of that is probably a good thing. I will miss it, but I am most certainly NOT going to miss depressions.

I'm really hoping my creativity doesn't suffer, but as if to prove that it won't, I'm working on a concept album. This isn't like some of my other projects, started in mania's and never followed through with. I think it may be good. I'm being a little backwards about it, Lyrics first. I've always gone the other way around. I feel like that might produce interesting results. I'm not sure if I want to do it alone or get some friends involved. I ultimately just want to get it done as soon and well as possible, but I don't really know how that'll work.

I'll likely write the songs and then see if my band likes them. They'd have to like all of them for it to work, but if they did that would be nice, I could use drums and a trombone in the songs I think. It's still a major work in progress, I've only the lyrics for one and a half of the songs. It's exciting though. It's interesting learning to work when neither despondent nor ecstatic.

I spent so much time getting used to, and understanding my mental issues that adjusting to a normal life is hard. It won't be exactly a normal life of course, but that doesn't make it less daunting. I haven't ever really been normal. My youth was spent in a very small town, up in the mountains, in this very specific microcosm of a world. my adulthood thus far has been spent grapling with mental illness. All the while I've never quite felt like there are people like me. I take a sort of Shikatagnai attitude about that, but it still is something to note.

Shikataganai is a Japanese phrase meaning "It can't be Helped" is an admission of futility, but not in a defeatist manner

Normal is going to be weird. Normal is not something I've ever truly experienced, and anything close to that is going to be foreign. I don't really know what to expect. I'm not apprehensive, but I am unsure. It will be interesting to find out how I take to whatever bit of normality I can grasp.

Debt, stress, and a sense of futility.

Sometimes I really hate my life. There are quite a few things that are pissing me off right now. It's usually money that worries me the most. Not because of the credit crunch, though that isn't very helpful. It's all because of things in my past, recklessness being one of those things.

The need for money to do the things I want is rather infuriating. I live simply, I try to be frugal. I live in a small apartment, and try to get my rent in on time. I don't buy things I don't need, and I recently got a job. So why do I still have these goddamned problems. I am simply tired. Tired of paying for things, tired of having to go through hoops just to exist.

my skills aren't of any serious worth. I can chop wood, I can make things, I can scavenge. I can write, and Play music. None of these things pays the damn rent. None.

So I'm stuck with no ability to really survive without the patronage of others. I am talented, but that doesn't get me anywhere. The things I do aren't valued by our societal structure, and I am left in debt.

I don't presume that I am the only one who has these sorts of troubles, but I only know my own troubles, so they are of what I write. That's the problem.

My fucking life. When some things are good, others are bad. Or rather things are always bad, I just don't always know it.

I feel like I burden the people around me. That's mostly because I do. It's hard for the people around me, and I'm tired of doing that. It hurts them and it hurts my pride, and my pride is one of the few things I'm sure I've got. God knows I'd give up my pride if it would give me the things I need, like money, or security, or any number of things.

So that's where I am. I don't have any existential depression, just this new fucking stress about money, and about being able to live on my own. It's an untenable situation.

Like I've already said, I'm just tired. Just too fucking tired. I'm gonna keep on going, and I'm going to try to fix things, but there's only so much I can do. I don't have much control over all of this, and that is disconcerting. I am at the will of things beyond my control. That's not the way I would like to be. I don't want to be blown about on the winds like this. I want to have some control, or to at least believe I do.

I don't want to be the victim of fate. I just want to be. I'm not free to live. That we have to pay to live is a clear problem with this fucking world. You cannot live without money in the western world.

NO matter how smart I am, or how skilled I am, the same constraints apply. The same constraints bind me into these knots I can't untie.

Have I been defeated?

I don't know why I'm doing two posts tonight. There's not anything particular that's driving it's way out of me. I don't have some hidden demon to let free onto the page. All that is unique to this night is a new bottle of pills, a few due dates for the morrow, and a very ambivalent mood.

I feel beaten. I don't think of taking my new meds as a failure. Recognising something is wrong and dealing with it as soon as I have is remarkable. I just feel defeated. It's not specific, nor do I have much real sense of how to combat the feeling.

So much of me just wants to be over with all the extra stuff I have to deal with. Grades, school work, work, money, meds,

If I could just be out in the woods with a garden to tend and other food I could restock periodically, and just write and play music, I'd be happy. Well I say that, butwould I be happy? I don't know. It's an impossible condition, that woodsy condition I talk about. Sometimes I feel like I'm more tired than curious, and I'd rather take a rest in the woods of the US or in an apartment somewhere instead of going on to ask the big questions I want to ask.

Sometimes I wish I could give away my ambitions to people more equipped to use them. Give my ideas and intelligence to someone who wasn't infuriated by the asinine nature of administration, and of money. I wish I could ask my questions, and do my experiements without all these intermediate steps.

Find some mentor and work under them, and then work my way up. No classes that teach me only what I already know, or could find out rather easily. No more money spent in the service of gaining information I already have. Could I just start my experiments now? I have them designed, I have my ideas, and I know what I need to do to make them testable, and to determine their validity. I know what I need to do, why do I need to prove myself for so fucking long.

I am already proven. I'm just so tired. Of the way the world is. Humans construct things, and I don't want to deal with our constructions. So much of what I have to do is separating the stupid human creations from that which was there before.

That's so infuriating.

I'm going to take my pill, and go to bed. If it works my days will start to be level. And then I'll start taking more, and I won't go into those crying spells I've been having. I will alter my chemistry until I am able to move along in a way that the rest of humanity can deal with. I will conform myself to the stupid structures and restrictions of those around me rather than forging my own ground. I am defeated. It wasn't a deceptive feeling. I am changing myself for the world around me. I am changing to better fit into this world of artificiality that I so vehemently eschew.

I am defeated, but nonetheless, tonight I will take my pill and go to sleep. I will say goodnight to the me which is at odds with this world and will wake up muted.

I will be muted. And I will be well enough to control certain things, but I will be muted, and shallow, and like those around me. I will be well, and I will be as the world needs me to be.

God how I hate that idea.

I will take my pill, and I don't know who I'll wake up as. I'm hoping I'll wake up as me, a little less sad, and blown about, a little less likely to cry for no reason, but I don't know.
I don't know if I will wake up defeated, or wake up simply modulated.

an Essay evening.

my left arm still aches just a little bit from the bloodwork I had done today. It's kind of cool looking at the little needle hole in the crook of my elbow. Today has been fast, and slow, and everywhere at once. I wrote a paper for a class. It's mostly done, but I've been feeling so uncreative lately, and I don't think this essay is one of my better ones. I don't know how to make it better though. That's always hard for me, finding that my writing isn't where I want it to be. How hard some things come is worse just because of how easy writing comes normally.

I start taking new beds today. It'll be my first time taking meds for bipolar disorder. I'm looking forward to certain things not happening. No more crushing depressions, no more of the aftermath from wild manias. Of course I'm afraid that some of my creativity will be extinguished, but I don't really believe that it'll be a problem. I just have to learn how to live on a normal even mood. I've never really done routine, or when I've tried it's been completely subverted. That's something new, learning to live on an even level. I look forward to knowing how everyone manages.

I don't look forward to not drinking. I won't miss marijuana, the social bits perhaps, but the rest not so much. But alcohol I love. I love being sane more, so I'll be fine, but I find it ironic that I'm going to stop my serious drinking before I turn twenty one. A good whiskey or a good beer is incomparable. That's not to say I don't try. Of course I can still have a little from time to time, but the separation from the ability to get drunk is pretty marked.

Even with normal moods I'm going to be different. That's something that takes some getting used to. A little bit of medicine doesn't make me normal, it just makes me a bit better. I'm not saying that I'd like to be normal, but I would like to know what it's like. As of now I have no reference point.

This whole thing comes easily. This post has been easy to write, easy to sit down to. When I try to write these graded and marked things the words don't come out as well. It's because I have to constrain my thoughts to some single topic. I can write on some topic, but I can't remove the subjectivity and passion from it. A research paper is fine, because I have all these facts to fall back on, and it's just a thought process. I can also write blog posts and essays and stories filled with whatever it is that defines my papers. There's something I can put into it, but when I have to write some paper making a subjective analysis I just can't do it. I can't pretend to be objective about something so subjective. That's where the problem lies.

there are more things in heaven and earth than are imagined in your philosophy

listing grievances or putting out a log of my existence never feels very satisfying. I don't like to wallow in my own life. I spend enough of my time having to deal with that which surrounds me, no reason to push it into my writing as well. It's sometimes unavoidable though.

I'd rather write about characters who aren't me. I'd rather tell stories about people who have different problems, and different proclivities. Somehow that's not what occurs. The only character I truly know is myself, and even that comes into doubt. So I write about myself again and again trying to dissect the contradictory person I am. It's a troublesome process. All I ever feel is drained.

Self criticism also only goes so far. How long before railing against my ills and insufficiencies makes those things the centre of my being? It's all in a mess of self doubt that I can't quite reconcile with anything else.

Where does all my self awareness get me? If I cannot change that which I feel, and think by being aware of my own insufficiencies, does it matter that I know? Does knowledge ever make up for anything?

God how I wish I knew. I feel like I would rather be fully aware of a tragic fate than uncertain with a possibility of happiness. All this damn waiting and uncertainty makes for such a bother. The things that I was so deeply attracted to in high school seem to have correlates now. What I loved in Shakespear makes more sense for my current state than for my state in adolescence. My fascination with Hamlet, and with Othello, these tragic characters, makes far more sense when looking at who I have become than when looking at who I was.

In Hamlet's famous soliloquy towards the middle of the play he hits on something really poignant, for reference I'll add some of the preceding matter. Mind you this is from memory and I haven't read Hamlet for a number of years, so forgive any inaccuracies:

to be or not to be, that is the question, whether tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune or to take arms against a see of troubles and by opposing end them. To die, To sleep, perchance to dream but in that sleep of death what dreams may come

That's the thing that always sticks out, that undiscovered country is what holds us back from death, and even from the future. We prefer those evils which we know to those we have no accounting of. Even an improvement which is foreign scares many, simply for its newness.

It is a fundamentally human trait, this fear of the new. We are uncomfortable with change. That's partly why I think I might rather know for sure of some horrible fate than have to wait and see if things will turn out alright.

I know that isn't really the case, I'm fine being left in the dark and waiting for the uncertain, but the central urge to avoid the new, and stay with the routine still bites at my innards.

That's what this is all about, those things that still grab at me despite my better efforts. Days where I cry for no reason, and days where I feel like I could take on the world despite objective evidence to the contrary. These are the things that are so puzzling. Who am I if I have no control?

I notice that most of this post is (are) questions (not sure if that's the correct grammar for the sentence). I can't help but feel that's what most of our existence is. If this is the era of anything it is the era of knowledge. It is knowledge, or whatever we think knowledge is that defines us. That includes the questions we ask, and the things we think we know.

Which knowledge we chose to ignore and which we chose to take up, which things we chose to put forth as knowledge despite their lack of supporting evidence. Hell even a latching on to evidence as a support for our mental conception of the world.

We are now so defined by what we know, or by what people say we know. I'm rather ambivalent about that. Everyone thinks they have a truth. We are back into a modernist world where the virtues are meta-narrative and Truth (capital T).

Everyone has their knowledge and sticks to it, and that leaves me here in my bubble of uncertainty. I am stuck knowing that all of our ideas are based on ephemera. We are in Plato's cave, seeing only the shadows. We do not see objects, we see the light that they reflect. We do not ever touch things, we are only influenced by the fields around them. We do not ever know anything, because the truth of science (and even that isn't immutable) is that it must be able to be proven wrong. We are uncertain, as much so as we always have been.

"there are more things in heaven and earth than are imagined in your philosophy"

How long till I write myself dry?

Sometimes I just leave the text box open on a tab in my browser. I never really know when I might want to post something. I also never know if it's going to be asinine or if it's going to be profound. The desire to write comes whether or not I've anything to say. That's the sort of thing that gets to me though. That maybe I'll just write and write until all of the interesting things people could hear out of me have been written already.

How often can I write without putting every little bit of myself on the page?

That's not even the primary concern though. I'm more worried about boring the hell out of the people who might read my writing than I am of draining myself dry. I'd rather not exanguinate myself for art, but somehow I imagine that'll happen.

I don't even really know why I feel that should be something all the people who read this know. It's a conundrum I'm not entirely comfortable with. I post and post until I have nothing to say, so is my posting something that I do to empty my head or is it something that I do until I can't do it anymore? Is the emptying of my head a side effect or the goal?

Of what worth is a post if it gives no information and makes no artistic contribution to the world?

Probably none.

Probably none.

A beautiful deluge.

Today I witnessed an unusual downpour. it was trickling one minute and suddenly out from the sky came a deluge. The water poured at a prodigious rate, and everything was water and fury.

Walking around in the rain felt a bit like home. It's an unusual thing. I feel most comfortable in climes that imitate Ireland and England. That dreary, rainy thing just suits me better.

Not sure what to make of that. I could come up with explanations regarding my heritage or something like that. I don't feel like doing that. This isn't an observation made as a foil for biological or psychological musing. I just felt like noting how good it feels to have the water flowing down.

It isn't the rain that depresses me, it is the need, (or social construction) to stay inside that depresses me. It is this insularity, and separation from nature that makes me feel uncomfortable. That's true a lot of the time. I don't feel right surrounded by the sounds of machines.

We go camping because we like that feeling. We like that closeness. I don't understand people who go "camping" with a trailer, or with electronics, or with any number of other things. It is this tie to and reliance on technology, and artificiality which seems to cause so much ill. It's not suggested much, but our move from living with nature, to living against it is a possible cause to many of our ills.

People are so afraid of getting wet that they lug around umbrellas, and put on heavy coats. It's as funny as it is sad.

Like so much else, I wish for a change. Some sort of change.

What to do about lack of nature?

One of the themes that comes up consistently in my writing is the idea that the cities we live in, and the artificialities we surround ourselves with, are some how at odds with our nature. It's a very nuanced opinion, so a single sentence couldn't really encapsulate it. That's the problem. The theme comes up, but there are all these complications regarding whys, and regarding how our current state may not always be at odds with us.

That's the thing. I don't have a lot of solutions to offer, only critiques. I don't want to just provide a negative analysis of this aspect of modernity. Offering solutions is part of a good critique, and I just don't have any.

This idea(along with it's twin, madness) has dominated my writing since I moved away from the forests I grew up in. The forests were magnificent. I hated the people. The confining nature of the social structure was all the more evident for the openness of the world around me.

I spent so much effort trying to get out, trying to separate myself from the nearsightedness so clearly displayed, that I missed the full effect of a forest on my psyche.

The freedom of being able to leave my front door and be in a world where I could completely avoid human interaction was amazing. If I were to leave my door today I would find pavement, and the sound of engines. Everywhere are the sounds of machines, whirring on, slowly insinuating that there is some mechanical god keeping us all in check.

I want to fix that. The only solution to this disparity between what we are and what our cites are is what I've been thinking of as plant terrorism. I use the word terrorism because it has emotive force. what I'd like to do doesn't resemble terrorism in any way. I am not planing on spreading fear. It is the spreading of plant life that I'd like to work on.

on all of the concrete structures that line the campus I want to plant climbers which will grow up the walls, covering the cold, too-smooth manmade stone. Find someplace with the right conditions and plant an Ivy. one of the great things about this is the fact that once you have ivy on a wall, taking it off takes pieces of the wall with it. The permanence of what we create isn't really permanence at all. Each thing we make can be destroyed in rather short measure, adding plants reminds us of that.

I understand the problems with upkeep, and damage to property, but I feel like removing some of the anxiety, and damage our overly planned cities cause is well worth a bit of vandalism. We've spent so long trying to subvert nature, it's time to , if only slightly, help it along.

The things that surround us are concrete and glass, and we are slaves to these materials. The wood we see is processed, and stained, and varnished. The trees we see are city approved, and managed by arborists, and experts. In a city, or even a town of any decent size, the wills of nature are secondary to the wills of man.


So maybe we can avert this crisis of mind that living in our manmade shelters seems to be causing. Plant something. Make the world less grey, and perhaps things will get a little better.

Morbid thoughts.

Sometimes you just need someone to talk to. I think that's part of why we get into relationships. I know it's a big thing for me. Some nights are just too long. I know that if I chose to lie down I'd be met with nothing by fear and despondency. That's why I seek out someone who could understand me.

I guess it's shelter from the storm which I seek. I also want someone who I don't get tired of. People are great. And people are horrible. I can't deal with people for too long without getting some time to myself, but sometimes there are people who I can put up with no matter what. There are people who I don't feel like I need to get away from. They come few and far between, but when this occurs, it is magnificent.

I'm tired of waiting for something to happen. There is so much that I want, but can do nothing about. I just don't know what to do about that. The things that bother me the most are the thoughts I have in the middle of the night, while trying to get to sleep. The thoughts that haunt me, about death and about all the shit that could happen. That striking fear that makes one seek out any sign of life they can find.

Today in a class the professor was talking about suicide (psych class) and while he was talking about it I thought of (and pictured) someone just standing up and holding a gun to their left temple (presumably they were left handed) and pulling the trigger. I pictured the blood splatter out to the right of the room, and the scattering of people after the event. I imagined still sitting in my seat, blood and brain on my shirt, not doing anything.

Everyone around me would have been running or crying. Everyone would have been shocked, but I was sitting alone, unphased, waiting for whatever was next.

It was a morbid thought, and I realised it, but there was little I could do about it.

like the lyrics to a beauty pill song "The season makes me cruel, but I have these thoughts in the summertime too."

longing for a forest.

Yesterday in my daily errands I decided to go on a bike ride. I was downtown on my bicycle, and for no reason in particular I rode her down the bike paths into south Davis, and ended up following the bike loop. I Found myself looking for stretches of wilderness.

I'm not a creature of cities. Even a dirt road, kept by the wheels that roll over it, is too human for me. The woods have a particular feel to them. Walking through a meadow out towards a stand of trees is entirely different than any experience in the suburban, or urban environments most of us live in.

Davis would be wonderful if you grew up here. There are places to play, and there are trees and paths and parks. All of that would seem so wide and open. It is only when you've been in the truly wide and open that all of this is sullied.

I am shaped by my experiences, and cannot get around that. the things I hated about growing up in the mountains shape me as much as the things that I loved. The things I detest hold as much sway over me as the things I adore.

Of course some of this thinking has been brought on by an unusual desire to stay in. I want to get away from all of the traditional worries of the world. I want to get away from debt and away from bills, and away from cars, and away from dental problems, and away from administration of anysort. All I can do while here is retreat into my room. That doesn't suffice. Were I in the mountains I could just walk out my door, and I would be someplace different. I would be in the trees, away from the heavy influence of man. I could go off the dirt roads that run through the forest and just walk. The branches would crack beneath my feet, and the sound of the wind in the trees would inspire song in my thoughts.

I wouldn't close myself off with headphones, or with conversation, because the things I could hear wouldn't be engine noises, and electrical hums, and the buzzing of fluorescent lights.

on the State of My Generation

I worry about my generation. I worry about other things too, of course. There are plenty of things to worry about.

I've a few reasons for worrying about where my generation is going. All the generations before us fucked things up pretty magnificently. I'm also worried because we haven't done anything to inspire confidence. There are small inklings of interest, involvement, artistic movements, but no where is a revolutionary spark. There is no Students for a Democratic Society.

we are the new moderates.

We are the children of an academic nihilism, of post-modern ideals in a world which is decidedly at odds with itself. We are still dealing with the modern with tools given us by the past. The modes of interaction we have are the same, the way we act is the same, but the technologies that mediate all this are far different. We are dealing with a modern world in the only way we are able, as humans. We are the same as most of our ancestors, and most of our ancestors wouldn't recognise cars, much less computers.

I don't know what to make of that.

We are blamed of narcissism. That is part function of our raising, with "helicopter moms" suburban wealth, and advertising that while making us feel inadequate, makes us feel special. The cultural touchstones are television shows, and video games. What we remember are media constructions, not defining events.

9/11 is supposed to be the event that defines us, but ultimately it does nothing to create a movement, or a unity, it is an event that fits for all generations, and is really an event of our parents. Like so much of what happens now, it is the result of our parents', and grandparents' stupidity, or lack of foresight, or obstinacy.

Where are we to draw collectivity from?

Where independent movements flourished in earlier generations we have movements co-opted by advertising from the beginning (or near enough). I don't see art from people my age. There aren't galleries with our work, and the walls that before might have been covered in beautiful Graffiti on are for the most part left clean.

The short film on youtube is comedic. Some of it is brilliant, but very little (if any) of it profound. The blogs we write are about us, and not about the larger world around us. The myspace profiles we keep up painstakingly are filled with ephemera, changing from week to week, from fad to fad.

It is all in flux. A musical style is born and dies with one band. An art style lives for a week, and then fades away. Who writes the books, I don't think my generation does.


Where we have so much ability to produce, we have so little production. The fact that we are always talking gets in the way of the fact that we never have anything to say.

I don't think I can asses our place as a generation. We are a generation of mundane creation. Where before the aura of art was created by some establishment, we now are held back by commercialisation.

We don't paint a moustache on the Mona Lisa because she is everywhere, and everywhere the same.
There aren't any remixes of Starry Starry Night, because it is sacred through reproduction. A poster of that painting hangs in nearly every college dorm room in the United States. That painting is ubiquitous, and as such is unchangeable. Because one form of it is everywhere, it cannot be messed with. cannot be remixed. In an era of mass production the establishment is they who decide what is printed.
The smart young artists decide to become designers, making ad campaigns for the powerful, instead of making art which subverts the status quo. There is no refuge from advertising. There is no refuge from mass production, and there is no refuge from technology.

We know that ads effect buying behaviour. It's not something that can be avoided. If people are exposed to ads, a predictable percentage of them will go out and buy product. This is a dynamic that has a lot of influence on my generation's actions. We are defined by comodifiable trends. While the Hippies had some time before their style and attitudes were adopted by capitalism, (or rather were sold back to them) our modern Hipsters are a product of the sold to begin with.

The roots of rolled up pant legs, thrift store clothing, and fixed gear bicycles were all from communities separate from the subculture of hipsters. It was only once these things were sold with such fervency that they became hipster staples.

Fashion is largely the co-opting of practical modifications for aesthetic reasons. I roll up my pant legs so they don't get caught in the sprocket when I ride my bike, but eventually if what I do becomes some sort of ideal, people will roll their pant legs up without having biked anywhere.

If I look like I shopped in a thrift store, it is because I did, and I did so because i don't have the money to buy new clothes. If a hipster does, it's because the styles that are sold to them in department stores, or in urban outfitters, or wherever they shop, are intentionally reminiscent of the clothes I pick out at the thrift store.

If a band sounds lo-fi, and rough, it is likely because they cannot afford the sort of equipment that makes them sound clean, and even. Sure there's a stylistic component, but what hipsters don't realise is that there is a very clear monetary component.

The people who make the trends are not the people who have money to follow fashion. People who spend money to look like b-boys are not b-boys. That is an essential problem in our era. The things that mark some community are co-opted. People who look like me may not be like me.

If I look like a hipster because of lack of money, that does not make me a hipster. When I was a punk, seeing someone with a Mohawk meant I had found kin. It now doesn't mean anything of the sort. Someone riding a certain type of bicycle, or any seemingly self made bicycle used to mean I had found people also interested in bicycles, no longer is that true.

We are not what we appear to be. Appearances no longer count for much. I can't help but wish they did.

You can't have a revolution without a community. the counter culture communities are all appropriated by ads, and by commercialisation. The primary organisations are determined by our elders, or at least by their politics. We are the new moderates. Perhaps a little more progressive than the age before us, but we are prematurely old. The attitudes (and excesses) of adulthood are now ours.
I don't think we'll be the generation to have revolutionary ideals and then sell out for a house in the suburbs and a lease on stability, because we've already been sold.

We don't own ourselves anymore. Credit card companies, and Loan companies, and our parents, and our jobs, and our schools, and our stores; they are our owners. How can we sell out when we don't have possession of even ourselves.

So how are we going to break free of the bond of our forbearer's mistakes, and the bond of advertisers?
How do we keep the meaningful from being transformed into the superficial?

Late nights, Guitar, and Idiosyncracies.

There are a lot of nights where playing guitar and writing keep me up far past when I should be down to bed. It's a common phenomenon for me. I don't even consider tiredness in all that. It's separate from the bipolar though. When I'm Manic I go out on walks at three in the morning on a week night because I just have to go out and walk, because I just need to be moving. It's far different when I stretch my night longer and longer because I've been writing and playing.

When I was a little kid I used to play with my legos so intently that when I finally realised I had to pee (which was when I was near wetting myself) I had to run to the bathroom. It was a really sudden thing. I got so into the world of my legos, and so into what I was doing that nothing else was important. Eating, Sleeping, Peeing. these things only happen when they absolutely had too.

I think that is one of the things I can really separate from my madness. I may be obsessive and energetic by chemistry, but I feel like even when I'm my most normal, least chemically imbalanced, this singularity of focus is pretty common. flight of thoughts is pretty common too. That's where all this trouble comes in. The things that are more pronounced in mania are also parts of me when I'm not manic.

So I'm going to describe something interesting that I hadn't heard from anywhere else before I came up with it. It'd be nice to see if other guitarists feel this sometimes. I get what I call a "guitar high" If I play guitar for long enough, I sometimes (more often than not really) get this high that is very similar to being high on marijuana. It's bizarre, and notable by outside observers.

I also get Guitar withdrawals. I just want to play so badly. My hands even make instinctive guitar playing motions. I make stringed instruments wherever i can, and play anything remotely guitar like. more than a few days I just couldn't take. I try to take a guitar everywhere. The few times I haven't, I sorely regretted it. This is also something other people could tell you. I am just not comfortable without a guitar around.

Also noted, having a guitar to put all my energy into is magnificent. This conduit through which to spout whatever musical thoughts I'm having is a great thing. I love the feeling of strings on my fingers, and the callouses are marks of pride. If my fingers hurt a bit through the day, my day goes better.

That visceral connection between the strings and my soft fleshy finger tips (no longer so soft or fleshy) is so essential. The ability to say something that language cannot express is magnificent. I've mentioned what I mean by that in earlier posts.

Ambivalence

About half of my favourite posts start out without any purpose. I just start writing, and what comes out is essentially the rough draft/brain-storm that I make when writing papers.

I don't know why I like that so much, letting my convoluted thoughts be an end product.

That convolutedness has always been a problem for me. The severity of the problem varies greatly, but sometimes it's simply too much. Too many thoughts swirl about in my head, and the torrent created is capable of washing me out to sea.

That's why my interest in this convoluted, jumpy, writing style as an end product surprises me. For all the harm that the quick, heavy, and unstoppable flow of thoughts causes, I still am mesmerised by it.

That's true of so much. Ambivalence is a more prominent emotion for me than hate or love. There is so often this measure of both. So I love and hate the way my mind works. The way the cogs mesh, the way the thoughts spread, I love and hate that. I cannot seem to decide if it's a good thing or a bad thing, because maybe it's both.

An unusual awareness.

sometimes when I sit down to write I get this unusual awareness of the way my hands work. The feeling of which parts hurt, and which muscles I flex to perform certain actions.

There are a number of little things like that. Things that show up when you don't expect them to and remind one of the things that generally remain hidden.

Last night at a party I was finishing a cigar, by myself on the patio, and I just stopped. Everything just stopped. I looked at the long grass and the detritus that lay on some parts of it, and was overtaken by the odd beauty it had. Even the burnt couch off to my right struck me as magnificent.

The point of all this is I don't care for most of the rest of the world, and it's only these blips of magnificence which keep everything else together. everything would disintegrate were it not for these moments of lucidity.

I don't have them nearly often enough. I really wish they were the default rather than the exception. That the world should go on with primarily horrible goings on , and these little graces are the only respites, all that seems cruel to me.

On Improvisation.

on the balance between written and improvised songs. Improv provides certain difficulties and getting shows, allowing for audience participation and consistency. I love a primarily improvisational mode though. The way things show up when the usual conventions are subverted fascinates me.

I don't want to just play songs that are essentially the same everytime they're performed. A tune, or some general motif is pleasing, and going from that is wonderful, but more preconditions leave me feeling trapped. I can learn and rehearse and perfect songs with consistency, but all the creativity is in the making of it.

The fires of creation don't spill out my fingers when I'm playing that which is known. It is only when forging new ground that my spirit soars. In improvisational music I have found that "mystical connection to the starry dynamo in the holy machinery of night"

The madness that moves further towards destroying me is channeled into this anarchic vehicle and made inert. only for a moment do my passions cease to cause me harm. All the pain and sorrow that spreads in me comes out, leaving nothing but music, and hands aching at the pure effort of expression.

so philosophically I want improv. I set out to write logically, questing for some intimation of what my musical purpose is. Instead I have found and inner desire to set free my wildest of wills and see what happens.

In a way I set myself up for unhinging. Complete removal from the banal, the normal, and even the sane. I strive for anarchy, for freedom, and for improvisation.