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Wednesday, April 23, 2014

'Punishment in Higher Places'


                   The above clip is for 'Out of the Races and Onto the Tracks' by The Rapture.  It is the namesake for this blog. 

So recently I have taken a break from blogging.  I have had a lot on my plate.  More than you know.  More than I care to discuss.  I am always delighted to see that people actually read this blog.  And it makes me sad that I have let people down.  I hate letting people down.  But seriously!?  Do people actually enjoy reading this?  Do people actually enjoy reading what goes on in my mind?

I often wonder what's the point in writing a blog like this.  I write about so many different topics.  Do people read this drivel?  Do people care?  If I stopped writing this crap, would anyone notice?  Does what I say actually matter?  You, the reader, do you like what I write?  Are you interested?  Intrigued? Inspired?  Disgusted?  Maybe I should ask myself what my intention is for writing this blog?  Is it for self-aggrandizement?  Is writing this only to appeal to my ego?

I don't really know the answers to any of this.  All I know is that I love writing.  Ideas and creativity are constantly flowing through my veins.  My blog is my form of expressing what I want to come out.  Music, art, creativity flows through my veins in place of blood.  This forum is the attempt to express what I cannot say face to face.  My blog offers another reality.  It presents another side to my persona.  I am presenting a character to you that is part of myself.  An expression of myself.

So that presents a question worth asking, what is reality?  Is it something that we perceive within our own framework?  Or is it simply what others define for us?  Maybe there is no reality.  Or maybe we are all connected to machines and what we see is only an illusion of what's real.  You know, like the Matrix.  Whatever the answer, my blog paints a picture of my reality, my point of view.  That is what makes us all unique; we see and comprehend the world in different ways.  So with that in mind, does it really matter if this blog has a specific purpose or goal?  If I enjoy it,  isn't that what matters most!?

And I like writing this blog because it presents a picture of what I see as my reality.  And I often think to myself that others can connect to this one reality.  Do you share a view in what I see?  Do you see beauty in the same presentations of life as I do?  This is the essential reason why I write.  I want to connect to other people.  I want my writing to transcend human nature and its innate need to box everything in.  Why do we have a need to distance ourselves from one another?  Isn't it a basic notion that we all share something intrinsic?  Aren't we all made of the same molecules, made of the same parts that form a beating heart, a breathing lung?  In fact, human nature is built on the sheer notion that we all share something intrinsic and true.

Maybe it's this reason that I write this blog.  I want to find this truth.  After all, what is it that we all want in life?  Don't we look for the same needs?  Humans all share a common objective and goal in life.  We want to make the most out of what we have in front of us.  And lately I've been doing just that.  There has been a lot going on and my life is going through some massive changes.  I can sit here worrying about what may or may not happen, or I can just live today for its intrinsic value and worry about tomorrow when it comes.  I'm not saying not to plan, but I am through worrying about what will transpire because that only immobilizes me with fear and self-doubt.  And then nothing gets done.

What flashes through my mind is a slogan on a bumper sticker 'Yesterday is history.  Tomorrow is a mystery.  Today is the present.  That's why they call it a gift.'  Tomorrow is never guaranteed for any of us.  Tomorrow, the whole planet could get washed away, engulfed under the ocean.  An alien civilization could come to Earth and proclaim us its slave, or worse, dinner.  Or you know, the inevitable hurtling toward a zombie apocalypse where you wake up thinking you hear raccoons in your garbage cans again, but then see the undead eating your neighbor's face.  I had to go for an effectively graphic visual.

But reality can change drastically at any minute.  None of us are seers with a crystal ball, able to predict the playing out of each moment of our lives.  One minute you're a carefree art history graduate student in California, and the next you're married with four kids living in Florida selling real estate.  A clean bill of health turns into having to return for what seemed like a 'routine' test because the doctor notices a 'growth' under your arm.  No one knows for sure what we will turn into in one, five, fifteen years down the line.  In one year, everything can turn upside down and change.  You just never know.

So the best answer to why I keep an online journal like this is to share my thoughts with the world.  Perhaps I might end up helping someone or making someone feel better because suddenly they don't feel so alone.  Our thoughts and expressions can be isolating in that we all hide pieces of ourselves from the outside world.  They look in and see one version of us that is often in juxtaposition to how we view ourselves.  So maybe someone out there is having the same thoughts I am at the same moment.  Maybe the song clip within my post is also running through someone's head at the very moment they come across this page.  That thought is what keeps this blog running.  The sheer fact that visceral human connection trumps everything: money, ego, power, war, disease, poverty.  Our humanity is based on the fact that we all live in different versions of reality.  But, for one moment in time, we have the possibility of connecting with someone who fits and overlaps in our Venn Diagram somehow.

So with that thought in mind, I leave you with the thought that you, the reader, and me, the writer are linked in this moment that will be forever frozen in the cosmos of time.  Our history is built on connection and collaboration but somehow, in today's society, when we are on each other's front doorstep as a result of social media and technology, people are more isolated and disconnected from each other now more than ever.   So in an attempt to heal a fractured and broken world, I write.  Positive thoughts, actions, and words can mend the unraveling that has begun to happen.  Will it stop the inevitable meltdown that we seem stare in the face?  Perhaps not.  But at least at the end of the day, I know that I did not give up.

Humanistically yours,

~R~

 
               'The Wave' by Animal Kingdom


'Being Alone' by Young Man


'!!!' by Yadnus

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