To be in love, rather than just outside of it, peering in.
Language is deadening and hopelessly clumsy, sure. But underneath clodhopper words that trample across white spaces, there is something sharp and crystalline.
To be in love is to recall the touch of a lovers skin, sitting here in the office, and to be transported in a lightsecond to yesterday (or tonight!), so that you are no longer in the office, the phone is not ringing, the last few weeks and months of thinking suddenly dissolve and that was not the security guard who just locked you in. Fuck.

Jeff Buckley - Hallelujah

OhmyG.O.D.

To be better. To feel better. To know better.
To know how.
To know why it seems so important.

To see and to understand. To be able to read the world and love it.
And above all: To see if there is anything beyond that "grey rain curtain" and if there is, to fly towards it, arms outstretched, smiling, and with no regrets.

These are things that seem to give one wings when one thinks about them. And yet each step seems slow and excruciating. Each drop of understanding fragile and hardwon and always ready to be undone. And each time one pauses, one sees ones feet more tired, more bloody, than when one started out. One seems further than when one started out. And yet there is no choice but to go on.

Sometimes I wish I could just Topshop and go to the cinema and make out and buy shoes and find that enough. But I cannot. Those things make me smile, of course and give me some lightness. But they don't fill this huge yawning hole that seems to stretch wider every day, full of more questions and never any real answers.

The things that really keep me up at night

Who am I?
Who are we?
Why are we?
Why am I here?
If not me, is there someone else?

How long do we have to find out?

*run on a continual loop until dawn, when to the sound of seagulls awaking, I finally fall asleep.

Life and Death.
The utter, fractal, forever-old mystery of each.

Our horror, at the level of the species, of unsolvable mystery.
And our infinite ability to distract ourselves senseless.

Could it be that this - just this - is the pivot of everything we do?

Some years ago, I was having a fantastic evening at a karate class. The stone floor of our dojo was pounding with 12 karatekas practicing their kicks.
Jump. Turn. Kick. Land. Repeat.
The magic of a black belt class is that there need be no instructor to get people to practice their asses off with face-breaking concentration.
We all thought we were very cool. We'd all mastered a kick that had taken us years to come to grips with. The punching bag in the middle of the room didn't stand a chance. In a silent line, turn by turn, we faced it and bowed. And then, jumpturnkicklandrepeat. For good measure, we'd throw a couple of dead-straight punches at the thing as soon as our toes touched the floor.
I did it once.
I fell. Great.
I did it again. The sweet thud of foot slamming onto the side of the bag, and then the tremor on the floor as I fell back to Earth. Success! And again. Harder. Harder! And for good measure, punchpunchslam! My whole body was on fire and my mind was a crystal clear sea, cool as ice.
I thought: 'I didn't know I could think, two feet off the ground - but I can! I can see exactly what to do! If that bag were a person, he'd have a shattered face and he wouldn't have a chance.'

The dojo is not just a room - it is a sensient being. And it detests boasting about face-breaking prowess. It hates pride. It sensed mine rising up from my insides into my smile, and stepped in.
The sensei behind me tapped my shoulder and said, 'Good!! Excellent. You got it. Now do it with your eyes closed from now till the end of the class.' One and half hours.
Fuck.
I was too far gone with my euphoria to watch my tongue and said, 'That's impossible. Even you can't do that.'
Mistake.
He did - Eyes closed, two kicks before landing, one turn. Punchpunchslam! Eyes open. For a second I thought I imagined it. But the bag was swinging wildly from the ceiling and everyone's jaws had hit the floor.

I tried it and of course, my forehead connected with the bag. Hard.
I tried it again. No luck.
Everyone who'd mastered the kick tried it. We all fell.
It's a pretty naked feeling, to wear a black belt and fall with your eyes closed onto a cold stone floor, panting, in front of people you respect and who've broken your bones as you fought your exam. We all felt about 6 inches tall.

The second you think you know - you don't: I've never forgotten that.