a new thing i tried doing

sometimes
it's just sometimes
and i want it to be more than sometimes
i want it to be this time

right now
right here
focused intense
with you

but its hard to say why
when i don't know why
or how
or which because

and none of it ever makes sense
to anyone other than me
which i see
and i know and i understand

but can't comprehend
with my heart
just my mind
and my thoughts and my known

but my feel
feels so much else
which is strange
and scary and weird

so i try
and i try
and i try
and i do

and it is
and i won't
so it's fine
for now

and that's that.

____________________


i try all my best
at the bequest
of a power
that's other
than me

and i struggle to find
a source in my mind
for the love
and the hope
of the free

but it takes its toll
as i walk down the road
of the life
that i've lived
so far

so i pray to my god
that the things i find odd
will resolve
become part
of my whole
____________________

on the same night
and in the same vein
i write again
for the third time

and find hope in my words
and in my thoughts
and feelings
and fears

because they're real
and me
ineluctable, forever
and human

i eat a sandwich
just like anyone else
and i try to sleep at night, even though i can't
just like anyone else

but i reflect...
just like me
because no one else
can do it for me
or like me

and i break rules
just as i make rules
and find rules
to be meaningless
or the very source of meaning

so i live
day to day
year to year
and one life to the next

just like anyone else
a brief moment of warmth here and there
and the eternal coldness where it isn't
but the memory, always in between.

coherence

I don't know what to think sometimes. Or even how to think.
Sometimes, I can't even frame the question. But it's still there, under the surface.
Just below my consciousness, I am aware of its presence. It is future, and it is past.
Hopes and dreams . Fears. Memories both sad and happy. And life's underlying purpose.

I drift in and out, as if in a trance. I am on autopilot.
When I ride my bike, brush my teeth, when I'm with you, when I'm in class.
Sometimes even when I play guitar or read a book. And I daydream.
About the future. About the past.

And as I wander, on autopilot, daydreaming, I perceive the world.
It affects me, imprints upon my mind.
I feel --fear, anger, sadness, happiness--in response.
And I don't even always know why.

But sometimes I feel like I've woken up, and I really see.
And I understand cause and effect again, and I know why I feel the way I do.
About myself and my actions. About other people theirs.
And I understand karma. And everything's blue.

Sometimes it happens
When I ride my bike, brush my teeth, when I'm with you, when I'm in class.
Sometimes even when I play guitar or read a book. Or when I daydream.
And it is the present.

Hello

I've just finished my third semester of law school. I am now halfway to being a lawyer, whatever that means.

I haven't updated this blog in quite a while, I know. I've been busy. The semester has been intense. I took 5 classes, international law of development, international project finance, international business transactions, intellectual property and jurisprudence. For those of you keeping count, that's four I's and a J.

Anyways, I'm pretty tired from all that, so I'm going to sleep. Hopefully I'll be posting more than I have in the past few months now that I've got a break from school.

A Change of Pace

I got sick of writing so much, so I made some videos instead.


(Thanks for the webcam, Brittany.)


The videos are on youtube:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=7eld2M-jaQU

http://youtube.com/watch?v=xF3134i76gE

nothing in particular

it's been awhile since my last update...

is kind of a meta statement--too self-referential to be really meaningful.

so that's not how i will open this post
I can't believe I'm leaving Paris so soon--1.5 weeks, and I'm back in NYC, back in school, in a world so totally different from the one I now inhabit that i can barely comprehend it. Change is an interesting thing--sometimes we yearn for it, want nothing more than a change of scenery, are totally ready to plow into the unknown and experience something completely different, no matter what it may bring. Other times, like scared children, we cling to the present, or the past, unwilling to release the bird in our grip for the potential two in the brush.

Change is the genesis of transformation.

The only real question is, "are you ready?"

And the answer, as always, is elusive.

__________

All of my friends went on vacation at pretty much the same time, leaving me in a bit of a difficult spot. A social person, I feel somehow empty inside--maybe the word is lonely--when i don't have others around to share my experience with. Being suddenly without the group of friends I hang out with primarily makes me feel somewhat confused. Too often, my entire identity is defined by how other's perceive me. WIthout that mirror to hold myself up to, without others to communicate with, it's almost as if I don't really exist at all...

Of course that's not literally true. I continue to think, to be, even to strive. But when the meaning my actions contain is only the meaning I assign to them, it's as if the cup is half empty.

If hell is merely other people, then heaven is, too.

__________

I went out tonight with Chris, a friend I met recently, and who just moved to Paris 13 days ago. He's trying to get a job, but the French code makes it very difficult for a non-EU worker to get a work visa, so he might have to move back to Berlin if he can't find an employer who's willing to help him get one. We got a couple beers and talked Philosophy while sitting in the courtyard outside of the Centre George Pompidou, then went to an Irish pub for a couple pints of Guiness.

I spoke English with someone for a change, and got into topics so abstract that they are really impossible to communicate in a language one isn't fluent in. I found it refreshing to have an intellectual conversation with another person who was just engaged in it as I was. It's always a recurring theme for me--the best times I can remember all involve one other person, and an infinite number of ridiculous tangents going off into no-one-knows-where, in-depth examination of the very world in which we immerse ourselves. Thinking back, it makes me nostalgic for similar times I've shared with friends in the past.

__________

Well, this has turned into a bit of a silly post, with lots of nonsensical introspection and not much content.

Cheers.