I have yearned, always,

For something indefinable.

Something buried in the hymnal,

Or the bottom of a communion cup.

Maybe something hidden just beneath my skin,

Or within the puff of this cigarette,

…the song hummed by my niece while coloring…

And I think its life beckoning.

I found the never defined, and fuck, is it moving.

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I spent my evening on the freeway.  I drove a Suzuki LS650 Savage 60 miles in the gusty wind and it was so much fun.  My hands and feet are still reverberating from the trip and I felt great on the bike.  The clutch was quite a change from what I've been dealing with on my Buell Blast...I'm tempted to steal the Suzuki for myself but I do love the Buell; I'm hoping after some time in the garage tonight installing a MRC clutch assist it will be a better ride for me.  My jacket also came in the mail, and I'm struggling to decide if it's worth keeping.  If it was just a jacket I'd send it back and find something new, but unfortunately for me, XS is the smallest they make motorcycle jackets.  I suppose motorcycle jackets are meant to make one look like a line backer, but I'm fairly certain the shoulder armor is actually supposed to rest ON the shoulder, not the arm...
Freeway riding is actually easier than city driving, at least when there isn't stop and go traffic.

I feel a little buyers remorse over my bike.  It certainly is the right thing for me right now, but I feel I will grow out of it sooner than I anticipated.  The great thing about used bikes is once they are a certain age they seem to keep their value.  I think I will spend a year on the Buell getting used to all the new technique and skill I still need to develop and perhaps consider upgrading next season.

Mostly, the hour long drive on the bike helped solidify the decision I've made to ride.  It's scary and thrilling and dangerous and satisfying.  People at work remind me everyday I'm going to kill myself doing it, but right now riding is something I want, and it's a want I can actually fulfill, do something about...T hat doesn't happen all that often, getting exactly what one wants...so I will take what I can get.

It took a few hours, but finally, while making a turn, only in second gear, I leaned with the bike and it was the euphoric high I've experienced after a great run.  The sun on my back, the amount of control in my body leaning to the right while the wheels stuck to the ground and I made a lovely whoosh sound as I changed to third...and everyone keeps reminding me people die on these things. And it's true. I know. My childhood friend, James, who I had a terrible crush on in my early teens, and who grew into such a kind, handsome young man, died in a head on collision on his bullet bike.  I found out while in study group through a text message.  And I hate open caskets, because that isn't the person at all, it just makes everything worse...I visited his grave once.  It was near a chain link fence and someone on the other side was smoking and life can be snuffed out so quickly and suddenly we are rotting bones with feet on top of us.  People talk about where he might be in life now, but I think about all he did. How happy he was.  And though he died young, at least he died doing something he loved.  And maybe that's better than being slumped over in some nursing home being fed apple sauce...
I know what love feels like, what life feels like, and I think it's a little silly not to do something because it's risky.  Because if I make it to the nursing home, I'm going to have some fucking great memories.  Hopes and dreams that may or may not have come true, triumphs and failures, and risks taken that make me joyous and broken and filled with gratitude.
So, whoosh...

Railroad tracks separate me from where I want to be.
And I run like fuck to cross,
wondering if I've ever been home before this.

I'm just running like fuck.  

We are all just running like fuck.

And it's neither here nor there;

it has little to do with where at all...

I think it's mostly who we're running near.

I would whisper the dirtiest word and scream the loveliest dream and it would all mean the same thing.

I sat at my desk in my cubicle with my hands cupped over my nose and mouth.  Staring.  Not seeing anything.  Just trying to tell myself to take a breath and move my hands.  You are fine.  Move your hands. Count to three and then move your hands from your face and get back to work.  But I couldn’t ever count to three, and so I just kept sitting there that way.  And then finally I took a deep breath and moved.

I don’t freeze up like that often.  But sometimes it happens when I become anxious; generally caused by a perfectionist mentality where I feel I've made a mistake or I’m not smart enough or any such nonsense that I try to sift through on a regular basis.

It makes me feel weak to have an aspect of myself so vulnerable and needy.  It’s not something new; it has been a background demon my whole existence.  Every year I conquer more of it, or at least a different aspect of it, but I cannot completely rid myself of it.  Maybe someday, maybe not.  How I react to it has morphed throughout the years and currently I believe I’m in the best place I’ve been.  But becoming anxious…freezing up…sometimes it’s just too much for me.  Sometimes I really just don’t know what to do but give in.

I can change a lot about myself. I have changed a lot about myself.  But right now this is still a very real aspect that I deal with on a daily basis.  It may look like I’m complaining.  It may look like me whining.  But it’s really just that I don’t know what to do and I don’t know how to handle what my mind is telling me.  Because I don’t want to believe it, but I don’t know how not to.

Today I crashed my car.  I let this anxiety control me.  I let it turn a day that was beautiful, sunny, clear, into something hurried and ruined and terrible.  That was me.  That wasn’t the anxiety.  That was me that did that.  And I can be better than that.  I am better than that. 

I am responsible for my actions, my reactions, how I respond to situations around me.  I’m not broken. I’m not weak.  I may suffer from anxiety but that’s no excuse to let it own me and my happiness.  Someday, I will make it my bitch.  Until then I will keep trying, keep growing, and just be grateful for the sunshine when skies are grey.

I am not perfect, but I am authentic, and maybe T hat is better anyway.

I am a fire

always burning

burning, burning, burning

burning, beginning and...

the last sentence is just to show I gave up using Harvard commas

He begins to sing and everyone presses forward; I'm left leaning alone against the wall by trash bins filled with empty cans of overpriced beer.  I don't dare look at anyone's face.  It feels sacred and holy and no one makes a sound.  I have no right to see their tears, no right to attribute some meaning to them.  We stand silent and are moved all at once.  In some run down scene with no seats and no windows and no one breathes because it might shift what is building within that building; I rest for three songs.

When I get I upset, I get upset.
When I'm happy, I'm so happy.
When I lose, I am an epic failure.
When I win I'm on top of the world.
I am passionate and it is fucking painful to be that way sometimes.
I get tunnel vision.  There is no bigger picture.  It is only what is before me.  Sometimes that can be a good thing.  Sometimes not.
I'm sorry.  I'm sorry for being this way.  For lashing out at God and Life and losing heart and sometimes I really can be brave.  I really can hold my shit together, sometimes.  But sometimes isn't quite often enough and often enough I tend to give in to my emotional knee jerk responses.
Life is hard, but not too hard.  And if I can hope and love and bring some joy to someone else's life then it can also be so worth it.