Chase the Day

Ah, shit yeah... Or "shichya," as it's more phonetically spelled. It's a saying I picked up from an Australian friend of mine and, truth be told, people around my neck of the woods often wonder why the Hell I'm saying it. I don't really know the technical reasons behind why I say it, but I use it for the same reason I use anything: it works.

My closest friends know what a fucking roller coaster I've been on since early 2006. Really, long before that, when I went from having more money than I needed to having almost none at all. Lots of factors played into that - some external, others self-inflicted - but, damn... you learn who your friends are when you're that close to rock-bottom. And I've got the best of the best. It took everyone I know to help sift through four years of utter confusion. Everyone I know and then some, for I'd be remiss in not mentioning the kindness of many strangers. Through it all, I've found that my enemies are insignificant and easily ignored. In fact, I wish them all the very best in life. As long as they don't cross my path again, of course.

I don't know if the Sufi or the Jews coined the term, but "This, too, shall pass," is about as certain as death and taxes. Oh, I've touted it, but I know it now. Some things take a little longer; need a little more patience; require a little more effort, but they'll pass. Tomorrow's coming whether you want it to or not. How fucking wonderful is that?

I've not yet returned to the physical shape I was in back in 2007 - arguably the best shape of my life - but I'm almost there. There's even an added bonus this time. In 2007, my left foot wasn't being properly rehabilitated. It is now... and I can almost taste the mountain air and the deep ocean water I'll be able to expose myself to again. It's been far too long. Someone I admire once said that if you stop moving, you might as well be dead. Yeah... totally. Never mind that moving too fast can kill you, as well. Been there, done that... I'm still here. At least speed is exhilarating.

It's been an eight-year journey to get to where I'm at. Eight insane years. Outside of maybe 1989 - a year that's value in my life has only recently become truly realized - and 2000 - a year I wasn't yet mature enough to deal with - 2002 through 2010 marked the biggest changes in my outlook, my perspectives, my beliefs. Everything I thought I knew up to that point was effectively proven wrong amid a rapid-fire succession of change. Locations, loves, schools, careers, you name it. No stability whatsoever. Just a pretty convincing facade of it. No, that's not entirely true... I was stubbornly resisting change in some fucked up desire to win a conflict I had no business fighting.

Taking chances - something I'd long been accustomed to - suddenly seemed foolish. Instead of rolling with the punches, I tried to hold on to some ill-conceived plan of world domination. It almost fucking killed me - figuratively and literally. But, after 2006, that all slowly started to reverse itself. Four years down, as it were, and four years up.

That's not to say this resurgence was of my own making. Not entirely and, I'll probably have to admit at one point or another, not even primarily. There were plenty of well-placed slaps and kicks in the ass that got me back to where I needed to be... where I should've been the whole time. Slaps and kicks from both friend and foe at the most unexpected - and opportune - of times. Face it, people... those around you know you better than you know yourself. And when strangers figure you out before you yourself do... it's just all the more profound.

So I started taking chances again, albeit in the wrong direction. But, hey, I'm not perfect. And, besides, that first wrong-way chance got my career kick-started. I knew something was wrong, though. I knew I was in the wrong place and for all the wrong reasons. At least I knew, though... which is more than I can say about all of the previous fuck-ups.

And then came 2009. The year I let the career go down the drain. Not sure what I was thinking, but I'm betting it had something to do with my physical location. I was, literally, in a place I did not want to be. But that summer was pretty awesome. Again, the right people - friend and stranger - at the right time. And I got off my ass and took a leap.

Then another. And another.

Now, I'm almost running again. It feels great. The wind is blowing the bullshit out of my hair. That can't happen sitting around. 2011's looking good. I'm sure that everything I think I know will effectively be proven wrong amid a rapid-fire succession of change. But this time, that's the point.

Next April I'm reengaging my quest to visit every country in the world, beginning with a month in Australia. I've always been a creature of momentum, ever since I left the roost at 17. That I got stuck is beside the point. I ain't stuck now. There are some things I want that are elsewhere in the world, and I'm going to go see if I can have them. Carpe diem? Nah...

It's a saying I've used a lot, but its is a false premise; a false promise and a false hope. We are incapable of seizing any day, never mind any other moment in time. But we can, however, chase it. And, as another saying goes, the chase is where all the fun is. C'est la vie.

I'm coming. Shichya.

***

* It's all about the moment, the here and now, and perhaps a little about what comes next. * Go out on a limb once in a while... somebody's there for you, you know. * Having no direction isn't necessarily being lost, though being lost is a prerequisite for finding your way. * The world is moving faster than you ever will, and will move longer than you can possibly be remembered. * a stubborn refusal to accept an overwhelming sense of embarrassment or shame prevents any acknowledgment of such defining moments of life. * The more beautiful it is, the better to kill you with. * The days when a mirror was just another toy are long gone. Reflections no longer reflective, the face staring back just another enemy, allied with the onslaught of time. * A lie is a weight the wind will not carry. * It's remembered how it wants to be. The chase, the trap, an act of foolish bravery or cautious abandon to feel what couldn't be said. * Tomorrow, sunrise will begin the chase again. * Are you going to do something, or are you going to watch it burn? * No worries. The sunrise will greet you in the morning. Whether or not it lights the way home is another matter entirely. * You'll know when the clock is right, for motion and thought will blur into one. And when it does, don't hesitate. * There's a scream of triumph as youthful lust streaks through cloud, finally knowing what it means to fly. * Why you’re smiling as the world starts tumbling finally makes sense. It’s too late to stop, and you didn’t want to, anyway. * If it's going to happen, there's no need to worry about it. * Life's picking up speed, and people you don't want to leave behind are going to be left behind. * The world is a large place until you've seen it all. And when that happens, you can just make up another. * Maybe that's why so many people choose to live in the desert... the grass isn't greener on the other side, because there's only tumbleweed. * Whoever made the mistake of attributing Red to love never understood what it meant to be angry. * Mirages are a good thing to follow, however, when you think about it. They do have a tendency to keep you moving. * Precipitation on the precipice, flowing down the path of least resistance while wondering what it would be like to be a flake of snow. * This is not a summit's peak, but a cliff's edge, and the difference is unimportant. Get up. If you're going to fall, do it here, do it now. There's still air beneath you. *

Dichotomy of Writing

A strange thing just occured to me as I sift through myself and try to figure out why I can write sometimes, and why I can't write other times. The realization, to say the last, is a bit odd, a bit contradictory, while totally expected and not much of a suprise. In order to write, a writer must be mentally uncomfortable, but physically comfortable.

Of course, this certainly isn't the case for all writers, but I'm willing to bet it applies to 90% or more of them. And it certainly applies to myself, as well as every true writer that I personally know. That being said, since I'm not biographically proficient in any of them, I'm going to use myself as an example.

Case in point: 2006 was clearly the worst year of my life, for a variety of reasons. However, closer scrutiny of that particular year reveals that 2006 was merely the worst year of my life mentally (I use merely in a wholly sarcastic manner). Physically, 2006 was probably one of the best years of my life. I lost 40 pounds, I wasn't smoking, I was eating balanced and beneficial meals, I reacquired my long-lost healthy tan, I was exercising six days a week, and all in all was in the best physical shape of my life. In better shape, even, than my nine total years in the Army.

And I managed to finish, polish, and/or draft three complete scripts. On top of that, I managed to start at least three more.

In short, I was mentally upset, while physically happy.

2007, so far, has been a relatively good (though quiet and boring) year. Early in the year, my writing had slowed, but it was still relatively consistent, and I had delved into projects that weren't necessarily my own. For a while this year, I was able to play with other people's uncomfortable mental states.

And then I went back to North Carolina for a while. Result: quit exercising (although this will hopefully change), picked up smoking again (naturally breaking a New Year's Resolution), started eating worse, and began losing my tan. Physically, I'm back in my pre-return-to-the-West-Coast mode, and I haven't been able to write a damned thing in the last two months. The writing bug just wouldn't hit. Why? Well, because I became mentally AND physically uncomfortable.

This physical discomfort came from a variety of sources. One, no doubt, is the overbearing humidity found in the Southeast. Another is my less-than-satisfying living arrangements. There are more, to be sure, and while I can change some of them, a few of them are permanently etched into the ecosystem of the East Coast.

Currently, at this very moment, I have returned to the West Coast in order to attend a wedding, and for no apparent reason, the writing bug hit me. Not only that, the exercise bug did, too. And though I'm still puffing away at those cancer sticks, I feel no true desire to smoke.

Long story short, I'm guessing that I should try to knock out as much writing as I possibly can while I'm back in the Pacific Time Zone, for a I have a strange feeling that upon my return to North Carolina next Monday, I'm not going to feel like much of a writer.

Resolve

It's here now, the New Year. An arbitrary beginning to a man-made phenomenon, a year, I mean. Arbitrary, yes, but a beginning nonetheless. There are two more days before I can truly celebrate, but I have high hopes for 2007. Not as high as I had for 2006, I can't risk another letdown like that, but definitely high.

New Year's resolutions don't usually mean anything to me, probably because I've never actually kept one, but this year I'm going to have to stand as tall as I used to. Taller, even. It's either that, or 2006 will have been right... I'm quite the failure. And failure is one of the two things I don't handle very well.

I started 2006 a non-smoker. That ended on October 30th. It began again on December 12th. 2007 will not see a cigarette touch my lips.

I started 2006 a shoot-for-the-stars, goal-driven maniac. That ended when I listened to someone else. It's me first, this year. I'm not saying that to be arrogant, but I trusted my own instincts for 27 years, and they served me rather well. I'm hoping those instincts aren't rusty in year 29, despite their lack of use. That being said, I'll try not to be as big a dick as I was before 2006.

If I'm slapped in the face in 2007, I'll take it as a hint. I've been a little slow on the hint-uptake as of late. 2006's hints were like semi trucks, and I'm pretty sure I still don't register any of them.

In 2006, I resolved to finish four new scripts. Well, like I said, I've never actually kept a resolution, but I did finish two new scripts and polished up a third. My quality of writing also improved drastically last year (but it's still not good enough). I hope that 2007 will see the same productivity and improvement.

I've always been a bit of a fighter and a planner, but I must've lost every single "fight" I got into last year. Every single one. I think this year I'll just ride the winds, so to speak... see where they take me. If they blow me into a fight, we'll see how I do. I'll probably lose, but I least I wouldn't have started it.

Notice that none of those, save for the not smoking, are actually resolutions, only hopes. Or rather, the idea of hopes, the idea of resolve and resiliency. Resolve, I think, is not something that can be planned out. It's simply something that happens when you're dealt a bad hand. Resiliency is something that happens after you're hit with one. They're those questions that can't possibly be answered until you're actually there, facing those questions dead in the face. They're those winds that we hope for, that we trust to blow us in the right direction when we need them to. Maybe they will and maybe they won't.

I guess we won't know until 2008.

Happy New Year, everybody, and may the winds blow favorably.

If This Is Goodbye...

The world is bigger than any one person, but at the same time, it isn't. Our perceptions and perspectives define how this crazy planet and its events unfold before our lives. Everything that happens, and I do mean everything, is completely and unequivocally subjective. From our wars, to our World Championships, to even our weather. It's all subjective.

To him, Iraq and Afghanistan represent the ultimate in America's attempt at "saving the world." To her, Iraq and Afghanistan represent an exercise in futility. To me, it's all just a fucking waste of money and people.

To him, the Saint Louis Cardinals winning the World Series represents a return to form for a long and storied franchise. To her, well, she doesn't care. To me, it just means that San Diego Padres weren't the best team in the league this year.

To him, snow is a great change of pace, a chance to test out the four-wheel drive and his underdeveloped survival skills he learned in the Boy Scouts. To her, the snow is a distraction, a sign that tanning on the beach is months away. To me, it's just a reminder that I'm not where I want to be.

2006 was a year of polarization. A lot of great events occurred, as every year, but the theme this year just seemed to be one of dividing. From the illegal immigrant issue to a political party falling apart because of a cabinet member. Wars, taxes, and the omnipresent stalwarts of religion and politics. We're further from being one nation, one world, than we've ever been. Traditional alliances, from countries to corporations, all seemed to break apart this year. And, in an appropriate twist, large pieces of the polar ice caps decided to break off. All in 2006.

On a smaller scale (well, to everyone but me, that is), my life also polarized. I've written about what happened to me enough, and I'd really like to move beyond it, so I'll spare you the details here. But, the point remains... my life was split, irrevocably. My family, even though I am physically closer to them than I have been since 1995, is further from me than ever before. There are one or two that I have actually become closer to, but my family, as a whole, is less and less a family, and more and more a group of strangers that I share a blood type with.

There was, admittedly, one bright spot for me in 2006. And it's as subjective a bright spot as something can get. No one in my life, including the bright spot itself, sees itself as a bright spot for me. But I do, and right now, that's all that matters. I'm terrified that it's going to disappear from me in 2007, and that's going to break my heart, but I don't really see a storybook ending to anything that involves me anymore. Life is essentially a wind, and we go where it takes us. Even if it's a dark place.

This past year was also the year I realized that mortality is a fact, and that it's waiting for all of us. Several friends were killed this year. Several heroes, too. People I'll never see again, or ever have a chance to meet. Gone. The ones whom nature took were the lucky ones. The others, well, they were braver men than I.

I was angry this year, of that there is no doubt. Angry, and full of hate. Along with realization of mortality, however, I also realized that hate is a very heavy emotion, one that I can not sustain for long. Neither can sustain, nor want to. I've been trying to bury hatchets, sometimes successfully, sometimes less so, but I've been trying. I needed 2007 to be the year I could cut my ties to my past. Unfortunately, thanks to some long-term issues, I know already that I will not be able to.

Ultimately, I don't know what 2007 holds for me, for us. Such is the irony of our existence... the ability to change the world, but the lack of foresight to do it. I don't know if I'll be around at the end of 2007, I will never again assume that I'll live through anything, and I don't know if you'll be around, either. I hope so, but hope only gets us so far.

So, if this is goodbye... goodbye, and thank you for everything I owe you thanks for. Maybe in a year I'll say goodbye to you again.

Don't Look Back in Anger

I'm kicking a dead horse here, but 2006 was a very difficult year for me. The most difficult, actually. Dreams turned into nightmares, plans fell apart, and life became almost completely reactive. It seemed like every path I tried to take on my own wound up blocked, and the ones that weren't led nowhere.

2006's bane, as my friend likes to say, was for me something as simple as misplaced trust. I'm a very loyal person, and I expect the same kind of loyalty from the people I consider my friends. Unfortunately for me, the one person I placed a great deal of trust in this year decided to, quite completely, screw me. Long story short, I had paid this person's bills for the two years she attended graduate school. I'm talking rent, utilities, phone, cable, internet, and even her dog's and cat's vet bills. All in all, it wound up almost $9500. Attach the interest and the late fees she promised to reimburse, she was looking at $14000. Anyway, the plan was to move to Los Angeles, where I had helped her land a rather lucrative job at CAA (Creative Artists Agency, the most powerful agency in Hollywood). There, we would work steadily, with her taking the reigns on the bills until we were square as far as the money was concerned. Of course, and I should've known this years ago, she had other ideas and, in a manner that would make Steve Miller proud, took the money and ran.

Okay, fine. I'm pissed. I started a little revenge plan. I almost went through with it, too. But, I had begun talking to someone who, in that cliché way, made me want to be a better person. Seriously. I'm not making this up. I wouldn't make something up that makes me look like a hopeless sap. I, for better or worse, wanted no new skeletons in the closet to hide from this person. Slip inside the eye of your mind, don't you know you might find a better place to play. And that I did. A wonderful place to play.

So, it's October, and things are looking up. I'm burying hatchets, rebuilding bridges, working my way out of this mess that is, ultimately, my own fault. Nobody told me to trust this girl... in fact, many people told me not to. But I did anyway. So, chalk one up to Jeff's lack of objectivity. But, things are looking up. Until I ran into another, for lack of better term, traitor.

Another long story short, my privacy was invaded in that worst of ways. Like, George Bush granting the NSA carte blanche bad. I confronted the invader, and was basically told to leave. That was fine, I could handle that. I walked away, repeatedly. For some odd reason, this jerk kept coming, and it culminated in a fight. Those of you who know, know that I am fairly well trained in combat, and the fight was hardly fair. I never threw a punch or a kick, but injured my opponent and won in the matter of seconds. And then I was arrested. I used the last of my money I still had from getting screwed the first time to bail myself out of jail (which was a rather long process... to get to that money was an adventure in itself).

Revenge here wasn't really an option. I won't say why, but rest assured that as soon as I can get out this hole that I'm stuck in, I won't be coming back for a very, very long time. Of course, this situation is also, ultimately, my own fault. My anger in the matter is as much aimed at myself as it is the opposing party. You said that you've never been, but all the things that you've seen, they slowly fade away.

Now it's December, and I'm finally getting over it. Not on my own, no, I'm far too weak for that, but the help I'm getting is astounding in its effectiveness. And it's help from someone who doesn't know she's giving it.

Last night, December 26th, I tried to get to bed early to get back to a work-oriented sleep schedule. It wasn't happening. Thoughts of getting even were once again running rampant in my mind. As I lie there, I just kept getting more angry. And then, like it always does, a random image of a smile penetrated my anger. I woke up, listened to some music that reminded me of that smile, wrote a song lyric, and went back to sleep. Calmly, I might add.

I'm trying to put 2006 behind me, literally and figuratively. I can't do it on my own, I lost that ability sometime while I was in the Army. Anger was too effective at keeping me alive and ahead of the game in the military, and I can't forget that. But I can see that smile, saying to me to not look back in anger, to look forward with that sense of optimism that I had at the end of 2005, when 2006 was looking like it would unfold as the best of year of my life. Don't look back in anger, I heard you say.

And I won't. Well, I'll try not to. It's a good philosophy. Don't look back in anger.

At least not today.

Poetry

This blog does not contain a poem, so get that out of your head. It does, however, pertain to that old cliche that "life is poetry." Yes, life is poetry, and all lives are poems. To take it further, as the film Dead Man tried to convey, even death is poetry.

Life is full of the highest highs, the lowest lows. Basically, unless you're Pablo Neruda, poems are the roller coasters we think we ride in life (Neruda had a gift for what life really is, so don't take that comment the wrong way). Mountains are made from molehills, fish become twice as big, and those damn "ones" always get away. Recite a funny story at work and we become Mother Goose. Put our lives on paper and we're an Epic along the lines of Milton.

As this year comes to a close, it's clear to me that no year of my life has been closer to a poem than 2006 has. More than that, this year has become a movie script (quite literally), complete with plot points, pinches, and a climax. Poetry in image, so to speak.

It began with the fruition of a plan nine years in the making. A career on the horizon, a journey to the other side of America, a world revolving into fingertips. That planned stalled, mainly due to the attempt to make another person more comfortable. A diversion to a home never called home, and a forgotten life that should not have been remembered. That "another person" decided to ultimately fuck me, and left me in a great deal of debt. I was effectively further from my goal than I had ever been before. A dream shattered, with a grasp on life that began to slip. So, I went out, joined the "real" workforce, and started getting back on my feet. I even got some film work along the way. Things were looking up, then another person decided to fuck me based on a disagreement of principles. Principles that, I assure you, exist nowhere else in the world (for the record, I'm still reeling from that one... the result is pending).

And yet, despite all of that, the end of 2006 is looking quite good. It's fitting in a way, poetic, that the worst year of my life is turning out to be the year that could have the brightest ending. Nothing's in stone, of course, poetry never is, but she's playing a larger role in my life right now than I could have ever dreamed. Work is steady, paying well, and I can almost count the days until debt becomes an afterthought. And my writing? Well, I'm writing... that's all I can say, and that's something. But she's in my life, helping to guide it, helping to inspire it... helping me write my own poetry.

I won't say why (yet), but December 12th, 2006, will probably go down in my history as the best day of my life. Poetic, isn't it? The best day of my life occuring in the worst year of it?

And with a screaming heart, a spirit rebuilds on a foundation of softly spoken words in December.

Sappy, aren't I?

Random Givings of Thanks

Personally, I think that Thanksgiving is a painfully and obviously arbitrary holiday, but whatever...

Some things to give thanks and not-so-much-thanks for this year:

Thanks to my friends who helped me get through a shit time in my life.

Not-so-much-thanks for the person who single-handedly put me there (not that I hold a grudge... anymore).

Thanks to the idiots who are making the "Global War on Terrorism" a de facto screw up.

Thanks to the NFL for putting a third game on Thanksgiving Day.

Thanks to Kay and Sagremor, my two cats who have actually stuck around.

Not-so-much-thanks to the asshole "retiree" CEOs who give themselves $400 million pensions while the rest of America struggles to make ends meet.

Thanks to John Kerry for informing me that I was in the Army because I got bad grades in school. I was under the impression that I held a sense of duty that many no longer hold.

Thanks to my muse for putting me back in a writer's mindset.

Thanks to my dogs for putting up with my lack of attention giving... that'll change soon, I promise.

Thanks to my sister for editing my writings for spelling and grammar at no charge.

Thanks to PH for lending me a shitload of money (five figures, seriously) to keep my head above water.

Not-so-much-thanks to Chevrolet for making the third-door latch on S-10s an easily broken piece of shit.

Thanks to the screenwriters of Casino Royale for making James Bond cool again.

Thanks to Martin Scorsese for making back-to-back films that truly inspired me.

Not-so-much-thanks to George Lucas for refusing to remaster the prints of the original Star Wars trilogy for DVD.

Thanks to the paratroopers who have entered my life, but will never be able to enter it again thanks to a really fucked up war. You guys were the best.

Thanks to the filmmakers who brought work my way at the exact moment my career seemed to dead-end.

Not-so-much-thanks to the man who had me arrested because he lost a fight that HE started.

Thanks to the networks for fielding the best television programming on the air since, well, the day I was born.

And last, but certainly not least, thanks to the people who are trying to make sure that 2007 will be that "Best Year" that 2006 should have been.

Waking Up

2006, for those of you who follow what I do and where I go, was supposed to be the best year of my life. Well, those who follow know that 2006, quite clearly, has not been. In fact, along with 2000 and 1989, it's been the worst. 2000 and 1989, however, have the advantage of only partially sucking, while 2006 has been a bane pretty much since New Year's Day.

Like all things, though, there is a silver lining to this crappy-ass year... I've learned a lot about a lot, especially myself. I can now recognize, without fail, the type of woman I will wind up with. That, in and of itself, is something to smile about... in this year not worth smiling about.

I've learned plenty of other things about myself, too. I know that I am more proud of having been a soldier than proud of having been anything else in my life, or ever being in the future. I know that the military truly does create the best friends a person can have. College friends don't come anywhere near close, and childhood friends are more an obligation similar to family than they are true friendship. I know that I have never, not once, been truly in love in my life. I thought I have, and I've definitely been lustful over women, but I've never been in love. Not really. But I do know who I'm looking for, and like I said, that's something.

A bad thing I've learned is where my temper comes from, and why it comes. Most of my friends can attest to the frightening nature of a "pissed off Jeff," but I think I've finally got that fucker under control. Well, maybe not totally, but at least I know where it lives, and, like the woman, that's something.

The one 100% positive claim to fame that 2006 will have, however, is that my writing has finally become writing, instead of a collection of thoughts followed by the rapid motion of typing fingers. What I write is finally becoming alive. My writing is finally, like the rest of me, waking up. That's no claim to the quality of it, just a claim to the honesty of it. My words are, after 28 years, ringing true... and hopefully, after 28 years, so am I.

It takes a long time to get here... admittedly, a lot of people probably do it much more quickly than I, but I'm here now, and the view, while currently obscured, is a good one.