I moved back in with my parents for a multitude of reasons, namely trying to save money and not have to worry about making rent every month while being in school. It feels weird right now, but I'm hoping that it progressively gets comfortable and ends up being a good idea. I am lucky to have a family like I do.

Less than two weeks until I leave for California. I had all these grandiose plans to rent a car and ride around California; I would rather just lay on the beach every day without my cell phone anywhere near me and read.

Re-reading "A Heartbreaking Work..". Really 'gets me' (I hate that saying) every time, it's such a beautifully crafted novel. No other book that I've read, sans My Antonia, has given me the same feeling after finishing it.

Truly, one of the very few hardcore bands that was really able to speak a language I could understand, presented life in way that was palatable and not completely fucking distorted, was able to solidify so many of my feelings of being seemingly lost and young, growing up in this wasteland , understanding there was something more than just the small town you grew up in, a bigger picture. Modern Life is War was able to say and exude everything that meant so much at times of utter nothingness. Their final tour is now approaching.

MLIW Final Tour Dates:
April 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, and 7th.

March
28 Milwaukee, WI
29 Madison, WI...Madison Fest W/ The Repos and many more
30 Chicago, IL @ Beat Kitchen W/ The First Step, No Risk No Reward and more
31 Detroit, MI @ Ritz

April
1 Bath, NY @ Murphy Lanes
2 Syracuse, NY @ Westcott CC
3 Philly, PA @ First Unitarian Church
4 Boston, MA @ ICC
5 New Haven, CT?
6 NYC @ Knitting Factory
7 New Jersey
8 Balitmore, MD
9 Richmond, VA
10 Jacksonville, FL
11 Orlando, FL
12 Atlanta, GA
13 Jackson, MS @ The Ink Spot Gallery
14 Memphis, TN
15 Louisville, KY
16 Indianapolis, IN
17 North Pekin, IL @ Planet X Rollerworld W/ Trash Talk, Desperation
18 St. Louis, MO @ Lemp Arts Center
19 Des Moines, IA
20 Cedar Falls, IA @ The Reverb W/ Grave Digging Shovels, Beat Strings
21 Waterloo, IA @ Amvets Post 19 W/ Brooks Strause
22 Iowa City, IA @ Picador W/ Brooks Strause
23 Sioux Falls, SD
24 Fargo, ND
25 Minneapolis, MN @ Triple Rock W/ Holding On
26 Marshalltown, Iowa @ Moose Lodge W/ Quick Fix, Desperation, Holding on, Old Scratch Revival Singers

When everything is wrong, I'll come talk to you.
You make things alright when I'm feeling blue.
You are such a blessing and I won't be messing
with the one thing that brings light to all my darkness..

You're my best friend.
and I love you, and I love you.
Yes I do.

There is no other one who can take your place.
I feel happy inside when I see your face.
I hope you believe me,
'Cause I speak sincerely
and I mean it when I tell you that I need you.

You're my best friend..
and I love you, and I love you.
Yes I do

I'm here right beside you,
I will never leave you.
and I feel the pain you feel when you start crying.

You're my best friend.
and I love you, and I love you..
Yes I do.

Miles of separation, and only a phone to let you know it's killing me to stay so far away..

Our golden retriever named Mogwai, Envirokidz Peanut Butter Panda Puffs, weekly movie night, the beach, enormous library with wall-to-wall bookcases, your studio room with your paintings scattered all about, sailboats and anchors, two kayaks, bicycles, morning breakfast in bed, blueberry muffins and orange juice, waffles with peanut butter and bananas, nautical themed children rooms, taking turns reading two books every night to our children, reading to each other on the porch or couch or under the covers, constant and consistent traveling, vegetarian and vegan meals every single night, Albrecht Durer and apocalypse prints all over the house, your art through out the house, notes in each of our lunches, waiting for each other to come home, and most of all, the accepted fact that I will consistently be late to work every morning while you make it out the door with enough time to relax and actually make the bell.


Just what I was thinking for a few seconds.

A dollar hollers louder than a living creature cries.
There's more for the meaning than merely meets the eye.
Corporations and industries destroying our rivers and streams;
it's the future of earth vs. cost efficiency.
Fuck your corporations and the destruction they create.
Poison the world we live in and put our lives at stake,
damn your power.
It's time to burn it down.
Consciousness strained by the money making american dream -
socially bred desires, irresponsibility
turned our unconscious to the negative flow.
This world's a pressure cooker ready to blow.
Discontent is building, the signs are very clear.
Revolution coming, extinction is the fear.
Damn your power, it's time to burn it down.
Conditioning of complacency,
rejection of reality.
This inhumane society..
time to finally break free.
We must burn it!

"They have witnessed the law, both domestic and international, being spat upon by those who do not like its terms. Is it any wonder, then, that they feel justified, by sitting in and freedom riding, in breaking laws made by lawless men? [They are trying] .. to haul out an investigating committee to look into the disturbance to find the cause of the unrest among the youth. Look into a mirror! The cause is you, Mr. and Mrs. Yesterday, you with your forked tongues.

A young white today cannot help but recoil from the base deeds of his people. On every side, on every continent, he sees racial arrogance, savage brutality, toward the conquered and subjugated people, genocide; he sees the human cargo of the slave trade; he sees the systematic extermination of American Indians; he sees the civilized nations of Europe fighting in imperial depravity over the lands of other people - and over possession of the very people themselves. There seems to be no end to the ghastly deeds of which its people are guilty. GUILTY. The slaughter of the Jews by Germans, the dropping of atomic bombs on the Japanese people - these deeds weigh heavily upon the prostate souls and tumultuous conscience of the white youth. The white heroes, their hands dripping with blood, are dead."

- Eldridge Cleaver, "Soul on Ice"

They told us that "Nothing gold can stay" and that nature cannot hold onto her first hue for longer than an hour. I believe they were wrong and that Mother Nature and Robert Frost need to rewrite and rethink their initial concept of what's possible and what's realistic. Defying reality and completely re-writing this poem ourselves, the golden hue can last for years and years, turning into eternity, ending in a triumphant and beautiful defeat of Mr. Frost's ideas. Dawn may go down to day, but there is always the next dawn to rise again. What if it was changed to "Sometimes, gold can stay"? Are you willing to play along?

I talked to the sweetest woman in the world tonight about her daughter visiting South Africa with American University in order to help improve farming and sustainability. Also, her two sons traveling to Peru and staying in small, remote villages with locals and their indefinite struggle to learn the Peruvian dialects of Spanish. She told me about how her daughter fell in love in South Africa and dated the boy for five years and then broke up because he had joined the Peace Corp to find his way back to Africa. Now, she is working in New York City and is dating a new boy, but her mother knows it's just not the same - there's no chemistry. Secretly, she is wishing for her daughter to return to her conquistador who has come back from two years in South Africa. I bet the daughter wants the same thing.

How much can you allow blind faith rule your life? And really - arguably, all faith is blind. At what point do we determine that our life is ours to live and not let faith or fate steer the direction in which we sail our ship? When do we become conscious decision makers for ourselves, and not leave this up to fate or faith?

When do we disobey this idea of being a vessel at the mercy of intangible ideas? At the end of the day, when you are laying in bed by yourself, how much faith can you really put into faith? Does faith and the idea of fate, working out in your favor, just become a matter of comfort for yourself, so your reality is slightly skewed? At what point does this continue no longer, and your decisions become a balance between instinct and pure fact? When does an overwhelming feeling of intuition not preside over this delicate balance?

These are all very important questions and I would like to know their answers. I would like to know the reason behind my blind faith in blind fate. Or is it possible that faith and fate aren't blind, they are just uncomfortable for the mere fact they are intangible? Is it possible that an uneasiness can be assumed to be because we are not able to physically hold on to these ideas? And because we cannot, should we discount the worth of these two ideas? I would argue yes.

Really, at what point do you just say enough is enough and decide to walk away from these two things? Really, how much longer can you decide to keep a comfortable distance from your reality, or what you assume to be your reality? Is it also possible, then, that your assumed reality is merely skewed and is just as intangible as fate and faith?

Or is it possible that even beyond all this, we are not even conscious decision makers? Do we ever know the outcome of our decisions? I would indefinitely argue no. Are the decision we make only made with the best judgment we have? Is it ever possible to make a decision and be positive you have made the right one? Could a life be fulfilling by rebelling against this idea of conscious decision making, and let things literally play themselves out? Is it humanly possible to just become complacent enough to let the act, act themselves? Instead of just taking a back seat, is it possible, in this sector of your life, to allow whatever blind faith or fate there is to overrun your conscious? Is there any other way, really? What other choices do we have?

It's getting to that point - of being complacent enough. Complacency has the most negative connotation. But is it really that bad, in this certain situation involving decision making? Or really, instead of indefinitely even using the term "decision making", can we abandon that and just say "making the most educated guess" instead?

How willing are you to play a minor role in the outcome of your life, and allow the majority of your decisions be made up by an unconscious, intangible set of pathology and mental capacities? Or is there any other way? Is it possible that this is just far too complex, and rather simply, "what will be will be" and there is no actual decision making? If this is true, then, what merit would there be in conscious thought and conscious ideas?

Honestly, how much longer can I bare to stretch and bend and twist and wait, to feel at the end the day as if I had been stretched too far and have bent too many ways and twisted at too many angles, and have been left utterly fragmented?

[Note: This is what happens when you have an over-active mind, are thinking about Oedipus The King and his family, and you can't sleep. You end up just dusting off dusty corners in your mind and regretfully do so.]

You remind me of the necessity of having more hope than fear/No one can be allowed to sleep.

Four Year Strong - Rise or Die Trying rules, definitely the summer anthem CD of 2008. I'll listen to this the entire time I'm in California. Oh yeah, I'll be in California in about three weeks. Pretty much all I'm really looking forward to. That, and next Saturday in Providence.

Milford Police Department - You're not fucking welcomed at the campus again. Bring your "serve the public" protection bullshit elsewhere. Next time, there will be more problems..

School is going as well as possible this semester. The first few days started out as an anxious-filled catastrophe where I am still left feeling utterly frustrated and lost. It's all a matter of environment, and I'm just not in the right environment that I need to be in to do my best work and increasingly grow intellectually. There are very few classes offered that are set up in the way that I can excel and actually think, instead of being told answers, listening to long lectures, or being told that I need to just settle for the way things are because that's just the way it is. Or being told that at the end of the day, any alternative to American democracy is troublesome or just not good enough. My Women in Poetry class is great - the class itself is a little boring and dry, but the reading is really enriching.

I was looking through my folder of pictures tonight and was browsing the 'Buddies' folder, looking at the pictures from the past year, even longer than that. Tons of pictures of Dan and I from the summer, Fisheye photographs of me shaving Steve and lighthouses, and just old moments in time. I'm real siked that I had the ability to make all these memories and now I can look back on them and all I can do is smile 'cause they all mean so much. Biggest bummer is that now that Dan and Lynn moved to Stamford, I see them less and less. But at the same time, it's great seeing two of your best friends in love and following their dreams together. I can't wait for the summer. I can't wait for nice weather and sunshine.

I was thinking about it while sitting around, waiting for class earlier this week. And I think I feel a growing disparity between the other kids at my school now because I've taken it upon myself to de-school and completely wipe out of my scope of vision what I had been force fed since pre-school. It was a gradual process, but taking the steps in order to figure things out for myself, question everything, and not accept what I had been previously been taught led me to the path of self-discovery where I am now. I wish it was possible for me to trace back the exact point where I got there, and pass the secret on to everyone else. Regardless, I feel such a huge disconnect from 99% of the people around me, most of them remaining the majority of society that are so deeply ingrained in thinking that there is nothing else and this is as good as it gets, that there is no struggle and everyone is on the same playing field. But I know better than that.

I wish there was a cure for sleepless nights, spent tossing in bed, thinking about the future, and trying to figure out what the fuck is going to happen. Sometimes, it just all feels like too much and my throat is closing up and there is no feasible exit for something better. I wish it was as easy as lifting up this fake facade curtain of bullshit and just sneaking out the back door, moving on to a better way of life. I guess the best anyone can do is disconnect as much as possible.

"I know that some days it feels like a 9 to 5 deathmarch.
And that's half the waking day taken away.
I'm pretty sure that we imagined something more.
Don't let that fire in your eyes flicker and fade.
They're experts at extinguishing hope, so you better hold it and keep it close.
It's a one-round match; you better grab it by the throat.
And don't let go...
I'd like to say hats off to the slash-and-burn architects,
They know exactly where despair and commerce intersect.
They've solved the equation for the gold rush, soul-crush;
Three hundred million open mouths choking on the surplus."

Chris Clark's Introduction to American Government 111, Spring 2008

Reading Required:

VIOLENCE EXISTS - WE DID NOT CREATE IT.
GHETTOS EXIST - WE DO NOT PROFIT FROM THEM.
MEN ARE SUPPRESSED - WE DO NOT SUPPRESS THEM.

Those who have a stake in the system cannot blame the system.
But we can.

Black Mask and Up Against The Wall, Motherfucker.