October 16, 2006
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Topic: If I write
If I write for a few minutes, I know something will happen. I’ll think about things. My mind will drop into my chest, which will warm and feel comfortable except for the fact that the sensation is confusing. I lie in bed, music on, and I am the center of the world, and the only thing I don’t love is the cold water of reality. I think I want to think and write about changes in my life, and also this constant experience of reflectiveness, lost in my chest.
I haven’t journaled in a while, certainly not the daily writing that consumes me when I travel, or that I use to unburden me when the days of my life have stretched out in gray color. But I want to capture this sensation that has defined my life. I am actually not as comfortable as I used to be writing reflectively, perhaps because I now see much of my previous writing as confused babble, full of fantasy and uncertainty.
For example, only two years ago my life was literally consumed with my personal educational and life experience, and my ability to objectively look at anything in life was nil. Cars were signs up man’s disconnect from exercies, offices were prisons, money was something I had little of and therefor was for the materialistic and those devoid of meaningful lives. My world was confused and often tortured by these thoughts.
I can now counsel that person. I recall the struggle and sense of purpose I had, and it has been redirected into a whole new life. 25 years old now, apartment in Brooklyn, teaching in Red Hook, taking each day in stride. Such a new life and rather than the confusion that might have accompanied it in the past, is a sense of “finally…I can breathe.”
Comments (3)
Life in Red Hook and you aren’t writing? I’ve always believed that Dublin and Brooklyn were the two cities that created literary genius… something in the air no doubt.
Go sit in a crummy bar and read Last Exit to Brooklyn and Only the dead Know Brooklyn and Sophie’s Choice.
and what school?
It’s a nice feeling to begin breathing again, isn’t it? I am glad that you have found comfort.
I was wondering down 7th Avenue just about six weeks ago. Prospect Park is still fabulous. The Museum is great (again), hope the library renovation comes out as well. Brooklyn is a little too “Manhattanized” (obviously) but still the best city on America’s Atlantic.