Water of Bottle

(I figured it would be appropriate to use my most recent typo as the title for my most recent post. Bottle of water, water of bottle, potato potahto.)

So again I find myself at a loss trying to wrap my head around how quickly time flies by. It's been over a month since I made my last post claiming to be back. I feel like that dad from every other movie. You know, the one who ran out on his wife and lil Jimmy and lil Lucy when they were just wee little babies. The one who shows up every Christmas promising Jimmy and Lucy (not so little anymore) ferris wheel rides and cotton candy and hugs and bedtime stories but disappears before Christmas dinner is even served. The one Jimmy pretends to hate but secretly still wants back home. The one Lucy still cries herself to sleep over.

But you don't cry yourself to sleep over me, followers. So are we cool? Yeah, we cool.

I have two things for you.

1- A song. Just for you.

	Black Kids - I'm Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How To Dance With You .mp3
	Found at bee mp3 search engine

Black Kids - I'm Not Gonna Teach Your Boyfriend How to Dance With You

2- I wrote a little poem, just for you. It's called Every Other Morning.

Every Other Morning: a poem

Wake up

Eyes shut tight

To keep the sunlight

From trickling in

Fall off bed

(On purpose)

Stand up and shuffle to the bathroom

Or crawl

Eyes still closed

Anything goes

Trust that you just picked up your toothpaste

And not your pineapple face scrub

"It’s toothpaste!"

Although, on some occasions..

It’s pineapple face scrub

Shuffle to bedroom

Or crawl

Eyes still closed

Anything goes

Trust that you're putting on your good jeans

And not the ones with a big hole

Where your hiney is

Those would be your best jeans

For special occasions only

Trust that you're putting on a clean sweater

Preferably your Beatles one

But anything goes

Eyes still closed

Grope through closet looking for socks

Sniff socks

They smell clean

Trust that you're putting on clean socks

Shuffle around bedroom

Or crawl

Eyes still closed

Anything goes

Find shoes

Wear shoes

No one has knocked on your door yet

Bus isn’t here yet

You have time..

To water your plants

Good morning Lucy, Marla, and Marcelle

Look for bottle of water

Feel up random objects on your table

Find bottle of water

Trust that it’s a bottle of water

And not the Dr. Pepper

You poured into a bottle of water

Find plants

Water plants

Trust that you're watering your plants

And not your books

Trust that you're not Dr. Peppering your plants

Nor your books

Shuffle to the door

Come to a halt

Step backwards

“Beep” like a truck on reverse

You're forgetting something..

You're sure of it..

What is it?

Shrug

Screw it

Shuffle down the stairs

Eyes still closed

Pray you don’t trip

Although, on some occasions…

You do trip

Wave hello to security officer

You know he’s there

You can’t see him

But you can hear him

Snickering

Walk to the bus

Or zigzag

Eyes still closed

Anything goes

Walk to the back of the bus

Where empty seats

Are guaranteed

To avoid sitting

On someone else’s lap

And then

And only then

Do you dare

To open your eyes

Slowly

Breathe

Smile..

Palm your face

For you remember..

What you had forgotten.

Underwear.

Just playin'. So it's slightly hilarious how if we rewind my life's tape back to one year ago, I'm basically exactly the same, only 3 kilograms lighter and sans awesome Superman boxers.

Crouched in my seat, listening to music, procrastinating college applications, even though one is due on the first of January. Re-applying to colleges has been a major hassle. Oh, for those of you who don't know, just a quick recap of the past few months of my life: I was all set to go to Montreal, Canada to study chemical engineering at McGill. But then I got accepted into a scholarship program to study geophysics. So now I'm taking a prep year here in Saudi Arabia and applying to colleges all over again. Ah, well. You gotta do whatchu gotta do, friends.

Or in my case: you gotta put off whatchu gotta do, friends. My recipe for success. Things tie up nicely anyhow.

Has it really been over a year?

"How did it get so late so soon? It’s night before it’s afternoon. December is here before it’s June. My goodness how the time has flewn."

- Dr. Seuss

I originally took this very-very-extended hiatus from my blog because I had too much to do on my plate without an extra side dish of Blog. I kept telling myself I'd post something eventually, but the more I procrastinated, the more I realized - I only procrastinate things I would rather not do. And I guess that meant blogging was something I preferred not do. Posting regularly began to feel like more of a duty than something I enjoyed doing. I told myself, when true inspiration comes, when the words are just itching to escape my mind and fingers - that, is when I'll write again. A train of thought greatly inspired by this poem by Charles Bukowski:

So You Want To Be A Writer

If it doesn’t come bursting out of you
in spite of everything,
don’t do it.
Unless it comes unasked out of your
heart and your mind and your mouth
and your gut,
don’t do it.
If you have to sit for hours
staring at your computer screen
or hunched over your
typewriter
searching for words,
don’t do it.
If you’re doing it for money or
fame,
don’t do it.
If you have to sit there and
rewrite it again and again,
don’t do it.
If it’s hard work just thinking about doing it,
don’t do it.
If you have to wait for it to roar out of
you,
then wait patiently.
If it never does roar out of you,
do something else.

Unless it comes out of
your soul like a rocket,
unless being still would
drive you to madness or
suicide or murder,
don’t do it.
Unless the sun inside you is
burning your gut,
don’t do it.

When it is truly time,
and if you have been chosen,
it will do it by
itself and it will keep on doing it
until you die or it dies in you.

There is no other way.

And there never was.

- Charles Bukowski

He also once wrote in an essay: "The writing arrives when it wants to. There is nothing you can do about it. You can't squeeze more writing out of the living than is there. Any attempt to do so creates a panic in the soul, diffuses and jars the line."

And to put it all into a nice, yet ugly nutshell - that is exactly what happened: There was a panic in my soul. Panic because I believed I would never be the writer that people (okay, my friends) (and a few teachers along the way) were making me out to be. Panic because I've never enjoyed anything I've done as much as I do writing, and thus panic because - where does that leave me? The road I'm taking is leading me nowhere near a future I'm likely to enjoy. Next year I'm going to be in university studying geophysics, for Merlin's beard's sake.

Ah but, I digress (I'll try to elaborate on the whole future thing in another post). Point is, all these conflicting thoughts were bouncing off the walls of my skull, having a turbo-speed rave party in my mind, resulting in one massive thought knot that was harder to unravel than my earphones after having been tossed around in my bag all day (or just lying around in my room all day - they somehow manage to get all knotted up anyway).
But, my dear followers - and listen up, because this is important: It seems that the best way to deal with those thought knots also happens to be the best way to deal with those knots in my ear phone wires: Give them a mellow, gentle shake, and the knots will unravel of their own accord - Everything will flow. But sit cross-legged on your bedroom's floor, picking furiously at the wires, huffing and puffing, groaning and complaining - and you'll most likely end up with an even bigger knot.

And because I worry my atypical metaphors are not making much sense to you, dear reader, I believe it's about time I went back to what I was saying about Bukowski. The truth is, I suppose I've had a change of heart. Don't get me wrong, I still love that poem of his, and it's advice that I still hold dear to my heart - but it's just that: Advice. And I always like to think of advice as water - you either drink it or you let it wash over you. Either way, you gotta live.
Yes, writing, as all forms of art, should come from somewhere deep inside you, somewhere where it has been bubbling and simmering for a while, until it's ready to boil over and come to life. But rarely does true inspiration come to existence in an already perfect form. Quite frankly, the most inspired works usually boil over just like a pot does: By making a big fat mess. And our job is to make that mess more aesthetically pleasing. The key to letting go of my inhibitions was to realize that inspiration doesn't necessarily come to you. Sometimes you just have to work at it. It's impossible for everything you do to be brilliant; it's the mediocre, less-than-average, sometimes downright awful work that gives you both the experience and proficiency that prepare you for those moments of true inspiration. I like to think of mediocre work as nothing short of practice: little tricks to stuff up my sleeve, saving them for when inspiration comes knocking at my door - because when it does, you can bet your normal-sized butt I'll be ready. Or else Inspiration might pack up its belongings into a polka-dotted bindle and go knocking on someone else's door - someone that has been sat in front of their desk, writing mediocre, less-than-average, or even downright awful work.

And so, that being said, I am proud to present to you, dear followers - or what's left of you - The Return of the Great (perhaps the Greatest) Procrastinator. I hope you have all been splendid, and I would much appreciate it if you dropped a small line telling me what things, splendid or unsplendid, you've been attending to.

Until next time (which will hopefully not be too far away): Farewell, Buona Sera, and Salam!