Strain of Consciousness

-I have found that it is ok to stand motionless without a word to disperse into the troubling cold wind. That even when the wind is calm and words are still frozen, that you will be fine. Every moment does not require the noise of a voice, but rather the stillness of thought. When words repeat themselves, perhaps it is these that need be expelled into some fantastic rant. And when you talk, sometimes it’s simply what you think, not what you add or that it adds to conversation. Those moments are special. You can dance to any song, and […]

-My steps make their way through the melting snow. It’s almost gone. Crazy how in the same week it could snow about a foot and a half and then melt all away. My breath no longer freezes before me and and I start sweating as I make my way to that building where I spent most of my day. With each step I take on my own, when my thoughts start to flare, my decisions revisit me and they become more fixed, more concrete. I see a path opening before me and it seems interesting. Not necessarily Kerouac or Rimbaud, […]

-I’m in Korea. There are flashes of consciousness that seem so familiar and there are moments when I couldn’t feel more alien. I feel like I’m looking through a kinetoscope and none of the images hold long enough to leave any impression on my eye. A whirlwind of familiarities and oddities. I still wake up weekdays with the heaviness of slumber on my shoulders and I’d prefer to keep the cover over me. Weekends bring some new experiences, like becoming an unsober zombie for a night, but I question if any of these, perhaps, if not all are to my […]

-The snow falls against my little apartment. It sounds like rain and rouses me from my sleep. There’s not much I want to do these days. Even my appetite waxes and wanes. I spent most of the day trudging through the snow to work, to the dentist here, then to work, then home and then home again. I drink too much here. I’m sure it has something to do with my dreams. They have a tendency to be more elaborate even while I wake several times a night. Freud would have said that my waking life was sexually lacking. I […]

-The city’s cold, my breath freezes before me as I walk to work, alone. There is something tranquil about walking by yourself, anywhere. I spent all day at work. Very basic these days, work eat sleep. The funny thing is, I don’t know which is worse, to be caught in a frenzy of emotion or to be as I am now, detached.

-The doors opens and we’re introduced to our new home, six thousand mile away from home. There’s a thick smell in the air, the kind you find when you go into a perpetually moist restroom on a cold morning, or any time of day for that matter. It permeates throughout the house, getting more faint, the closer you make your way to the windows. I wonder if this is the smell of this country also curious as to whether I’ll ever get used to it. We open up the windows and sleep with the cool breeze blowing the apartment dry. […]

-I’m here. Still trying to decide if that’s a good thing. I think it’s more a reticence toward the unknown, not to mention the insecurities of my being. Each manifestation of me I’m sure carries them within. There are moments when I feel as if I’ve been carried off into some greater state, but mostly I fly low and near the water, terrified I’ll fall. My mind spins as my eyes open each morning with the question:: Where am I? It maybe more than simply a question of where my body stands, but rather where my soul is. It makes […]

-I’m packing, I’m spending lots of time at the dentist, and trying to say goodbye to those I know as well as those I will not see in what seems an indeterminate amount of time. My suitcases fill and get rearanged. I’m trying to take with me, the twenty pound transformer I bought here, so that my computer will not blow up there. It is the cause of all the rearranging taking place in that small space between my cases. I squeeze in my blanket, I’ve heard it’ll be cold there. I’ve been trying to finish packing. I want to […]

-The past night as well as this day, bring me a certain peace about my voyage. There’s a calmness permeating my thought these last moments as I pack my bags, my belongings, the me that is crossing six thousand miles to foreign land. I don’t question the impetus of my leaving. It is not fleeing. I’ve convinced myself/come to the conclusion that I am attempting to open my eyes. Perspective. I am packing my shuttle case, my cameras, and all my jeans-I think this is closer to me than the work clothes I also take, khakis and chinos as well […]

-I received a call today, informing me about my departure. I am leaving on the 23rd at ten in the morning. I am leaving. It hit me. Leaving. We’re not talking about some short trip, a vacation, or anything near a visit. I am leaving for twelve months, a year of my life. Yes I have hopes of the things I’d like to accomplish in this time, but at the moment all that hid itself in the recesses of my mind and all I could think about was the unknown. It’s not an unexpected journey, but one that strikes me […]