Update

That's right, I did it. I revamped the blog. Just wanted to let you know (for no apparent reason). There is another, more meaningful post in the works, but I dont have the time to write it right now. Adios, until later...

Revampirization

This post is not about Twilight. That's right, I finally figured out that Twilight is a foolish pastime created for preteen girls who don't have a life and are desperate for some kind of lovin'. Actually, this pretty much describes me, except I am well into my teens.

This post was going to be about how I was thinking of revamping my blog, because the colors kind of make it hard to read, but I am too lazy and/or can't think of any colors to make it, and/or don't wnat to redo the header. Because it's purdy. To me.

However, I finally concluded that what needs revamping the most is actually just my life. Seriously. I need to become a completely different person, place myself in completely different circumstances, and do completely different things. Chances are, I would still be unhappy, but at least I would know that I just have problems, and that isn't going to change.

The fact of the matter is, although some days I may be happy, and some times of days are better than others, what I pretty much look forward to most in every day is...sleeping. And I recognize that this is pathetic, but I can't actually change it. We all (us juniors) have turned into some kind of robot species that goes to school, goes to sports practice (possibly), and does homework. And eats (sometimes), and sleeps (sometimes). It's really depressing, actually.

Now recognize when I say this that I am not actually depressed. That's right folks, ignore the emo colors of this blog and the fact that I write depressing poetry. At this exact moment in time, I am not depressed. However, my situation, and the situation of all of us (who read this blog regularly, maybe) is depressing. It is bleak, and the light at the end of the tunnel doesn't actually exist. I actually live my life knowing that I think it's bad now, but it can always get worse. And it will, next year. And next year isn't as bad as the year after that. And so on...

So, comment and tell me what you recommend I do, other than kill myself, because I have already deemed that it is not practical for me to do that at this particular time. Maybe I'm the only one who thinks that I lead a pathetic life, but chances are that's not true...it would, in a somewhat perverse way, make me feel better to know that others feel the same way.

Loves to all of you....

The Way Home

This is a story I wrote for Englilsh, for our short story assignment. I don't really like it, because I didn't really know where to go with it, but there are parts of it that I do like, mostly the parts that aren't really to do with the plot. Even though there isn't really a plot. I don't really like the topic I chose either, because I think it's been kind of exhausted, but I couldn't come up with anything, so whatever. Anyways, read and enjoy (and comment)!

The Way Home

There are many ways to think of the way home. There is the bus ride towards your abode during which you can take notice of the arpeggios of your iTunes library, or the separated, filtered rays of the sunlight of Seattle. There is perhaps a mile long walk towards your neighborhood, which you travel daily without fail to step on each crack in the sidewalk and appreciate the leaves from trees you do not know the name of, or wishing for the comfort of a vehicle when the weather turns against you and there is snow melting through your canvas shoes. There is the travel of an plane that returns you to the country from whence you came, and in return for a small fortune you can enjoy the same B-rated movie as many times as the 18-hour journey allows you to. And perhaps when you reach your destination you can enjoy forcing your body to conform to the opposite of what it has been doing, eating and sleeping 12 hours in advance.

This is not the story of a bus ride, nor does it tell of me walking the mile towards my house. This story involves an 18-hour plane ride, but it is not the story of the plane. It is not the story told by the B-movies that I have seen 6 times in a row. This is the story of a homecoming, of the realization of a homeland, and of a culture that seeped its way into a body like the wet seeps into canvas shoes. There is some question as to what is a culture, so perhaps I should define what I mean. For me, my culture is defined by tradition, ritual, religion, family, country, and everything else that is a part of where you come from. In a melting pot country as America, culture is perhaps lost in the larger scheme of things, or maybe molded into a larger culture that has many smaller parts of culture from the many countries of contribution.

On a plane ride towards a country you have heard stories of, but never seen, the mind cannot help but jump to conclusions. I first saw in my mind the India of Bollywood films, with mansions the size of palaces and people in rich, brightly colored clothing dancing in the street. Then, I saw the India of foreign portrayal, of children with swollen stomachs begging for paise, and simply more people than the country could hold. In between showings of Hidalgo, I imagined myself being confronted by my large extended family at the Bangalore airport, all waving madly and giving me the famous sideways Indian head nod that makes it impossible for the inexperienced individual to distinguish yes and no. I could see myself not understanding the rapid language that I had not heard around me since I was four or five. To put it simply, the concept of India was large, foreign, and frightening, with all the pull of a magnet drawn to its opposite charge.

Walking through the streets of the country I had never seen, which was one and the same as the country that had given me my life, I found what a homeland meant. It meant not being different from those around you, not being a foreigner or an immigrant, not looking like you don’t belong. I also found what my homeland was. It was not the India of Bollywood movies, nor was it the India of Slumdog Millionaire, it was India as I chose to see it, and that made all the difference. I had created myself a country in my mind, and now the country was responsible for breaking those barriers that had been formed between us.

Regardless of the fact that I didn’t know what to expect, the minute I stepped off of the plane that had been my home for two days, I felt a warmth inside of me, a knowing feeling that said this is it. There is a time when everyone recognizes themselves, and for me, it was when I saw 13 members of my extended family grinning madly at me from beyond the security checkpoint. It was the moment that I knew that there was no hiding place from a country that had been tattooed into the insides of my body, that exudes from my very being as a scent, a feel, a look. It was a realization that there really was no barriers between me and my homeland, only illusions that had been created by expectations and fears.

Once safely past the mob of potential taxi drivers and the drive home at breakneck speed amidst parking-lot-traffic, there was finally enough time to contemplate this country that had captured my heart, and yet I felt so strange in. There was a mood of casual disregard that was present in the faces and the actions of every native of India, the open friendliness and innocence that I could see everywhere I turned touched my heart, and gave me the feeling of pride I needed. It was a prize that had been given to me by my country. The generosity and welcome that I found in the Indian people made me know them, made them my countrymen, and gave me the knowledge that I was where I belonged.

The conflict that I had known all my life was resolved, the world righted itself to a position in which I could see how it was possible to belong to two different places. One was a house, and the other was home. One was the product of a bus ride or walk towards a neighborhood in which I reside, the other was a country with a pull so powerful that it brought me halfway across the world but made me feel at home. A culture that had wound its way around me and felt like an embrace, not a restriction, was now simply a part of my being, and the ties that bound me to my country were not to be severed. I had found the way home.

Kaleidoscope

I writed a story! Finally! It's not a very long story, but nonetheless, a story it is. I just realized that the word nonetheless is actually none the less. Wow, I'm cool. I'm also high, apparently. Read my story, it's about being high!

***

He meets her outside the lair in which she resides, blowing smoke rings and seeing upside-down kaleidoscopes. She has created a world for herself, from imagining things where they are not, where they should not be, and hearing only the inhale, exhale of the variety of take-me-away’s she has concocted for herself.

It is the imagination cocktail, and he didn’t care what he was selling to her until she doesn’t come to the door of her den, and so he knocks, and the door opens, and he enters. What else can you do?

She is spread across three beanbags, the only furniture in the room, and if her chest wasn’t consistently rising and falling, in a serene way that reminds him of the beach, he would swear that her glazed-over eyes are a surefire way to tell that she’s dead.

He approaches her and waves a hand back and forth in front of her face, until the world turns sideways and he finds himself on the ground, with hands clutching his throat and a girl straddling him, still blowing green-blue smoke into his face.

He coughs and sputters until she lets go. When he can stand up, he runs. That’s what he should have done. Instead he waits, leaning against the wall, until she is sitting in one of the three beanbags, waiting for him.

He takes out the package, with her name on it, and offers it to her. She holds out her hand, but he shakes his head and silently asks for money. It is over. She has none. She grabs for the package but he has already returned it to the lining of his coat. For a second, he looks into her tired and finished eyes, and almost feels sorry enough to allow herself to return to her created world, but he turns away and comforts himself. It’s better for her this way.

Of course he knows the pain she will suffer for the next few days. It is the pain of losing your life source, losing your sanity, and really, it feels like you are losing everything. He knows, he has felt it, until he was weak enough to return to begging for life, and that’s what brought him here. He needs this money, because he needs his life.

Halfway out the door, he feels sorry again. Really, it isn’t her fault. Maybe it used to be, but it isn’t now. He thinks about the money, and he thinks of what else he needs.

A few gasping shudders and bruising caresses later, she is panting heavily on the beanbag with purple sprouting up along her neck, and he is tugging up the zipper on his jeans. He nods, leaves the package on another beanbag, and suddenly feels the compressing tightness, a need to escape the smoke filled room and the girl with the glazed eyes.

She returns to her world, and forgets about the incident of the boy who came to deliver the package and left with something more. But later, many years later, he is sorry.

A Pillow Book

Since I cross-advertise for myself on all my different accounts, here is the deal. I have started a pillow book on fictionpress.

def. Pillow book: A collection of random musings and observations, kind of like a diary/journal except less structured. Basically, it translates from a book that one would keep under their pillow to record their thoughts.

Clearly, I don't keep my laptop under my pillow, so this isn't a true pillow book. But, it is a pillow book all the same. It's a lot more personal for me to write, because there are no lies in my pillow book. It isn't a story, it's really my thoughts, without hiding behind any kind of character.

Since it's basically a collection of little blurbs, with no true skill involved in the writing, I am not going to post my pillow book here on my blog, mostly because it will be updated almost every day, and none of you want to read my thoughts every single day. Seriously, you might think you do, but you don't.

BUT, if you are interested, there is a link (clicky clicky) right next to this post to my fictionpress page, where you can read my pillow book. You can leave reviews there as well, I don't think you have to have an account to do it. If you do, and don't want to get one, feel free to comment here.

Last but not least, in case you are blind/don't read summaries the pillow book is titled "may lightning strike me". Enjoy!

I was asked by somebody to write a poem for their website about animal rights. I put it off for as long as possible, because it's not a very poetry-inspiring topic, if you know what I mean. But anyways, eventually I felt bad enough that I just gave up and wrote it. It's not one of my favorites, but I guess it isn't as bad as it could be.

White horse runs before his legs are broken
And he falls, with crooked hooves that are put into
Your gummy bears for your pleasure, sir
Please bite the heads off slowly so that you can
Get your full satisfaction, as white horse falls.

You are savage, animalistic, unnatural but only
Nature knows that you were not meant for this
For tear-free products in your eyes, but they don’t work
Because the tears are there, you can feel them.

Please enjoy your filet mignon, as long as you can
Pronounce the name that to me still means dead,
Not elegance, rich, expensive, or any of those other
Descriptions, code words, disguisers that only tell
You that you are dead meat.

As a side note, the first stanza or whatever refers to how some types of gelatin are made from hooves of various animals (doesn't that make you feel great?). Obviously it's kind of a one-sided, angry poem, but whatever, I'm vegetarian, get over it. Basically, I posted it here half because I post almost everything I write here (except for fanfiction), and half because when I showed it to my mom, she said "What?". Which was extremely discouraging as a writer, and is much of the reason why I don't show her most of the stuff I write, along with the fact that most of things I write involve copious amounts of swearing, references to sexuality, and references to suicide, which would freak her out. But it kind of made me mad that she couldn't understand the fact that it was a POEM, not like, prose or something that would be insanely clear and easy to understand. It's abstract, okay? It's not supposed to be like, "Oh, I want to get this message across and so here it is." No, that's why we write poetry, because we express ourselves in ways that don't have to be understood. Okay, I'm done ranting now.

Insecurity

Written as somewhat of a sequel to Supernova...doesn't really make sense, but whatever.

We are the learners, we are the forgetters, we are the forgotten. We are the paradox, the read between the lines, the confused, the confusing. We are the strivers, we are the achievers, we are the imperfect. But most of all, we are the uncertain. Insecurity is a trick played on us by our own eyes, we trust no one, but we trust ourselves, and this was the one mistake. This was the apple that Eve saw, that she bit, that she dropped, she fell. This was the curse, this is our curse, and trust is a multi-faceted craze of passion that ends in nothingness.