Another chapter...

I moved out today. It didn't hit me as hard as it did last year which proves that hindsight is not always 20/20. THis post will be different then the other ones before it. Recently i've been looking to the outside world to interpret what's going on inside of me. It's worked, but it's time for a bit of a change.

This school year has been one of, if not the, most ridiculous year(s) in my life. My grades suffered, I had no time to breath, I was running on four hours ( or less) of sleep a majority of nights/mornings, and I seperated myself from somethiung that had been in my life for the better part of two years. I laughed. I cried. I learned. I grew. And now, at the end, I feel that I have, for all intents of purpose, reincarnated into the me that's typing this rught now. I feel like a completely new person, and, inspite of ( or because of) a great deal of the heaven/hell i've been through this year, I can't say that i'm upset with the results.

If it were not for this year and the extracaricular rehersals that oten took 6+ hous of my day...everyery day, I would not have learned how to work under pressure that would have caused me to slit my wrists last year. If it wasn't for the hundreds of pages of books and paper after paper, I would not have learned to accept the fact that life seems cruel right before it becomes cruelest. If not for the virtually sleepless nights I would not have built the endurance to sit trough lectures in which professors seemingly forget to teach and continue on with self indulgent banter for entire eighty minute periods.

This year, if nothing else, proved to me the extent to which I will have to stretch myself in order to be anywhere near I need to be to do what i want to do in the future. Because honestly, I can't see myself being satisfied until I am better at what I choose to do than anyone . Call this attitude what you must, I know that it's pointles to try something unless i'm going to be the absoulte best I can at it.

Why I do this....

It has come to my attention that I have been and am now creating something here that society (and academia) has not been able to make sense of. They question why anyone would make something public that is and has been so personal. They wonder how an individual could have a desire to explore ideas and thoughts that are so close to his or her heart in a space where anyone could see them and comment. They are baffled by the fact that otherwise socially and intellectually introverted people (read: me) would so boldly and freely articulate their hopes, aspirations, desires, and dreams to an arena that not only consists of the people whom they would not communicate with under normal circumstances but also includes the entire world.

Though I can't accurately speak for everyone, I'd like to (at least semi-intelligibly) speak for myself.

I started this journal as a means through which I could unload what was on my mind at the end of any given day. Because, honestly, (no matter how much I hate it and how much it jeopardizes the stability of my sanity at times) I live to think, and I, as a result, internalize and inwardly scrutinize everything that goes on in my head. If you were to ask me a year ago, I would have told you that I think too much. Now, because of my experiences in life and the ability to succinctly record and review them here, I see that, despite it all, I don't think nearly enough.

Essentially, here lies the end of the line for many tracks on which the train(s) of my thoughts have traveled. Every post here no matter how short or seemingly trivial is a (debatably) decipherable snapshot of ideas and thoughts that travel so quickly and in such abundance that they would (without the aid of this external storage) coalesce into a giant ball of uninterpretable, indirectable and unrefineable feelings. This journal keeps my mind free enough from these thoughts to be healthily burdened by them, and, in spite of my internal protests, creates an opening for others to dissect and interpret them in ways that may aid in their understanding of things they would never have ventured to observe before.

I would be lying if I said that this didn't scare me. I'm not one who revels in the idea that people (no matter how small the number) can see my thoughts and incorporate them into a pile of beliefs that affects and forms their own. But even with this being the case, I still feel a rush of happiness when someone tells me that my thoughts have made them think. I can see why this would be confusing to society. Because, like this journal, and, to a greater extent, me, it is an illogical contradiction.

Ignorance is bliss....?

"I can't stand it when people try to get me involved in their cause. I mean what if I were trying to be politically apathetic" said a female in my English class today....

I sometimes wish that the irony of people's statements would hit them as hard and as clearly as the force with which they state them. Here was a woman sitting in a classroom of an institution that was, at one point in time, all male, across from a black male (me), conversing with others about her gripes with protesting, after explaining her plans for acquiring a PhD. in English.

Sometimes, just sometimes, I wish people would educate themselves on things outside of their own narrow-minded, personally affecting circle of understanding. How did she suppose she was allowed the opportunity to get somewhere other than the kitchen? It's a proven fact that people in power do not share it unless they have reason to. With this in mind, why in the world would a man have made room for an individual whom he saw as a "weaker (lesser) vessel" without some form of reeducation by the type of people who wanted to get others to see things from their point of view (individuals with a cause)?

Do people not see the political and social masochism in protesting....protesting? I may not like the idea of people rallying against organized religion, but I do realize that restricting their rights also restricts mine. I think that if people would step outside of the "it's them not me" mentality and see things as (at the very least) "them equals me in the long run" a great deal of ignorance would not automatically translate into widely accepted acts of cruel stupidity.

This idea applies to a plethora of other asinine acts of mass ignorance and denial that could be easily avoided with a moment’s meditation. The concept may be offensive to some (namely groups whose entire method of operation rests on seemingly unchangeable, outdated and often harmfully discriminatory rules) but I feel that peace will never come to people who maintain that the only right behavior is that which shares the same strictly upheld idiosyncrasies as their own.

I mean honestly, if individuals would only take off the lenses of their specific experiences and start judging the cultures, beliefs, and action of others based on observations that compare and not contrast their differences, I feel that a great deal more understanding and clarity would be shed on situations such as the one that happened in that classroom. The girl would come from under her politically apathetic, "if I don't see/acknowledge it, it can't hurt me blanket" and wake up and smell the, "but I was just a non-combatant/civilian riding the subway" coffee.

It's only but so long that people can ignore horrible situations that seemingly pass right over them until they are excluded from that passing over and they experience first hand what the fuss was all about. That shouldn’t be the ultimate motivator, but in this day and age...I fear that appeals to our intrinsic desire for self preservation are all we have.

Still walkin' that road....

I just came back from seeing the movie "Glory Road". Now for those who know me, I am not one to usually go and see a film that I feel I might choke myself halfway through due to sappiness and clichéd attempts at forced moralistic conclusions, but my little sisters wanted to see the thing and I, being the big brother, was all but required to take them. In three words, I was surprised. Sure it had a rough start in the beginning, the dialogue was choppy and the talk between the coach and the recruits was a shade dodgy, but after all of the necessities were out of the way... the magic happened, and it was because of this that I began to think.

I've tried to avoid it thus far in posting. I figured that my skin held a story in and of itself that required no testification (I have a habit of creating words), but here I am, banging away at the keys, trying to write down my view on this before I loose the nerve. Needless to say, I'm black. I've been this way from the moment of my conception and I will bee this way until the day I die. I've skirted around this topic for the sole fact that I’ve held the mentality that being black is not the sum total of who I am. I was raised with this mentality and sought to essentially overcome the stereotype of the close minded, militant, gun toting, durag wearing (despite my profile picture) African American with a chip on his shoulder the size of this 300+ year old country. In doing this however, I have (in this journal at least) been a Judist to a part of me that is as important as the air I breath.

Many times people of my color seem to believe that to be educated requires an individual to downplay and even ignore their ethnicity. When accomplishments of success garners congratulatory proclamations that originate from surprise that is rooted not only in the overcoming of obstacles, but also in the color of ones skin, we, as a country, fail. Yes, I said it. I've heard the assurance of equality given time and time again by those who have never seen the bad side of a day. I've witnessed the puzzled faces of those who believe this to be a free country, as they hear of individuals who, in living life within a racial profile, strike as blindly as a cornered animal at anyone who shares the same majority of their accusers. I've felt the tension in the air of a classroom mixed with blacks and whites as the topic of discussion faithfully landed on disparities in American society. And I felt that it was high time that I acknowledge this in this Journal.

I've purported to share what was on my mind in this journal, and I for the most part have done so. But, in watching that movie I finally came to the realization that my socialization has been through the eyes of one who is part of a race that has, for the better half of past few centuries, not been allowed to and has been seen to be incapable of even possessing the ideas that I have shared in this journal. That is something that I can hardly wrap my mind around. The fact that a few decades means the difference between being strung up from a tree for trying to read and being an honors student at a research university is almost incomprehensible.

This journal won't now become the rantings of a racially embittered black teen. I don't harbor enough anger or patience for that. I just wanted to throw into this stockpile of thoughts something that hints at the corner of my mind at every glance in the mirror. I believe James Brown said it best...

And Life Goes On....

It’s been a year, and I'm back home for another Christmas break. I figured that this post may have more significance than the others simply for the fact that it marks the anniversary (exactly to the day) of the creation of this journal. It is because of this that I have decided to reflect back on another year that I’ve had the privilege to live through....let's see...

The year has been one of (if not) the most interesting and inspiringly depressing years of my life. I have been through emotional extremes of joy and pain, have had sorrow tap me on the shoulder while happiness gave me a reassuring handshake, and have heard, felt, and known heartache knock on my door as peace tried its hardest to close the curtains of my soul. I've experienced a great deal (to say the least), and yet, I know beyond a shadow of the doubt that I've only scratched the surface of adulthood, which leads me to question the very validity of the claim that my age and educational status so deftly exclaims through every calligraphical nuance of my signature. Am I ready to lead a life of blaring uncertainties wrapped in a thin veil of analepticly assuaging promises of possible stability? Will I every be able to face the possibility of an inability to accomplish my lifelong dreams without the risk of taking chances that may not include the option of beginning where I started. How can I accept the fact that, despite the tears, love, contentment, and complacent frustration, I will still have to live through repeated instances of even deeper effecting emotions without cracking under the seemingly unbearable, monotonous pressure of them all?...

...I recently ended something in my life that had been atomically fused to every particle of my existence. Needless to say, it hurt. But the truth is, though I may never totally get over it, I’ll live. I figure that that's the beauty of life. The fact that joy and pain are like sunshine and rain never meant a thing to me until I cried tears of both happiness and sadness right before the end of that something came. The bliss I felt for having that something in my life and the hell I foresaw in that something leaving were for a single moment in time interchangeable. I'm guessing that in that same moment I saw the entirety of my life through those teardrops and I grew up all at once...

...Funnily enough this caused me to understand that, no matter how I may ever feel, I will never be truly and completely ready for each and every blow that life has the ability to throw my way. It is an incapability that I willingly concede to. But it is this incapability that makes me who and what I am. Life, at times, sucks harder than a marathon runner at the top of Mount Everest, in the middle of a hurricane (an embellishment?...yes... unfounded?...no...) This is something that I admit to. However, as long as I have a healthy desire to live, it is all but impossible for me not to roll with the punches (in spite of the black eyes and missing teeth). I will never be truly ready for adulthood because it does not come with a checklist of requirements. All I can do is plant my feet, take my stance and wait for the bell to ring.