Yes, the look of shock and awe has reason, the words appearing on the screen are yet another post by the mad man at his keyboard. Turn your music up, maybe turn the lights down low, if you're anything like me you'll sit in the dark with nothing but the computer screen and Nick Drake playing softly in the background to attempt to absolve a brutal headache and longing for old acoustic music. But, what ever your rituals may be, sit back, relax, and if necessary, shake your head at the rambling fool whose words you read. And with that, I shall begin.
Today I have been thinking of several things, as it always seems to go. The first of which is the island, my second home in my mind, and a place I haven't been to in almost two years. Martha's Vineyard, off the coast of Cape Cod in Mass. started as a vacation place for my family. It has grown to more of a resting place, a place of longing. I am longing to go there again, to see its sandy beaches, its small towns. I miss the long stone walls that border the fields, I even miss getting looked at in a peculiar manner when people hear my accent. I want to be fishing at night, want to be able to look up at the sky and actually see stars on the nights when the fish aren't biting. I'm homesick for a place that isn't my home. Strange how that works out.
From that I will move onto my throbbing headache. Its really a pain, you know. It always sticks around as some sort of dull pain, and then occasionally spikes up and causes agony. Those of you who have read my other posts know I'm going to make this into some random deep metaphor, so here it is. There are things in life that we become comfortable with. They aren't necessarily good, in many cases they aren't good at all, but they become part of our being by the sheer fact of persistence. People, habits, mind sets, they all have a way of hanging on to us and for the largest part of the time, we almost don't notice. But there comes a time when the bad things bear their fruit. Suddenly the little pester has become a large and obnoxious issue. By the time this happens, its very hard to get rid of the cause, if for nothing else, because the effects it is having are much more distracting. Just food for the thought I suppose.
Finally, I have been thinking about music and writing. Well, creativity in general. I am a poet I suppose, seeing as I am one who writes poetry. In occupying this role, I have realized several things. The most disturbing to me is how large of a preference there is toward poetry of the darker and more sad variety. A melancholy stance seems to appeal to audiences much more then an optimistic or even, heaven forbid, truly happy point of view. The later often comes off as cliche for some reason. I have wondered why. An answer came to me earlier, and it was almost as disturbing as the need for the question itself. I think people, especially those who consider themselves 'intellectuals' either fear happiness or believe it fickle and bland. After all, everyone is happy at some point in time. It is a cheesy emotion, it would seem. Even worse, it seems as if it is something that rarely last for very long. No. It seems much more acceptable to fall into deep and long periods of angst at my age the to merely be content and happy. Those at peace are rarely 'in' in the art world. It could be said their works come off as shallow, un-fullfilling. This fact almost throws me into angst toward the angsty, for what kind of world are we living in when it is 'cooler' to be dark and brooding then content and optimistic.
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