Naked Soul

2011-01-01T00:36:00.000-08:00

"The Holidays are Officially Over"

So here I am wondering about J.Edger Hoover. It was his birthday yesterday. I know this because he was featured on some random quote page, and I just noticed the clock slipping past midnight. I know there is a long night ahead. Of drinking coffee and energy drinks and chain smoking until my lungs putrefy. I guess to be honest I feel a comradere with that old cross dressing dictator. The want to be feared and respected. He got his by wielding an iron limp wrist, and I am an asshole to random religious people on the internet.....don't judge me...it's good clean fun.

Which I guess is ironic since I have deep spiritual roots that will never go away. It is as much of a strength as it is a chip on my shoulder. Maybe it's my little way of saying "See, I don't take faith and spirituality too seriously". I'm sure it is much in the same way ol' edgar could say "I regret to say that we of the FBI are powerless to act in cases of oral-genital intimacy, unless it has in some way obstructed interstate commerce", and then puts on a dress to give a reach around to a man who wears his pants entirely to high for his own good. Well, I guess it made him feel sexy.
Speaking of sexy, how about that Jesus? I figure if the huddled masses are going to pretend it's his birthday...I can pretend thats how his parties go. I like our pagan holidays though. I've never been a big fan of the Jesus mythos...but I love the god of Saturn! Getting together in the coldest months of the year to make everything bright and colorful, to the tune of a mass orgy where anything goes...sounds a lot like some of the parties I used to go to. You know, the kind that you attend when your doing drugs and haven't become boring and responsible. I guess the point I am driving at is that I am a believer. I believe in mysteries and patterns. I believe in the exploration of the never ending branches on the tree of science. I think we could become God someday....you never know. I like to think that there is a being who has a plan that makes sense of the things that are senseless and cruel in this world. I like to think that he doesn't cause them, or just let them happen because we are his ant farm to alleviate boredom.
At the end of the day though, you have to take stalk in whats important. Which is being able to laugh at things and find the joy life has to offer, while bearing the bullshit which inevitably comes your way. Choosing your battles and letting the little stuff go. Meandering this semi cluster fuck of wonderment and ass raping without lube that we call life. We can loose ourselves in existentialism until the cows come home. We can grit our teeth at the unfairness of this world....or we can just do the best we can to be a good human being.
That is to say good, as in I don't give two shits about your sexual preferences, or if you want to worship the invisible man in the sky....or your hamster. Just try to take care of the people you love, and be someone who is a positive force to the world around you. So even if people hold prayers at work, or push pamphlets about Jesus having a hard on for me, I let it go. For starters I started eating early anyways and hurt gods feelings(gluttony, selfishness, and rebelliousness....im a triple threat), and also it doesn't hurt me. Just like someone wanting to build a mosque by ground zero. As far as Im concerned they are all just worshiping and searching for the same thing, even the scientists crushing atoms hoping to find the god particle. At worst, we are nothing more then glorfied apes crushing nuts with pebbles...and hopefully we are just in the shaky humble beginnings of amazing things to come. I haven't yet lost hope in the human race....or myself to find grandeur...or redemption.

S.J.Huffman

Hey Harry Part Two

2010-08-21T09:27:00.001-07:00

He listened quietly to the soft heartbeats of Gatsby. He remembered times when the cat would run into the house, running from Justin. Fearful for it’s life the heart thumped rapidly, veins pulsing. Scared. Survival. Fearful. Sanctuary...the cats soul would scream. Usually cats had many interesting things to say, and like all animals in tune and enveloped in their instincts retained a savage hint of wildness, especially when threatened.
The neighbor boy Justin was feared by all animals on the lonely forest road. He was all smiles and laughs, but when you looked past the pale mask of greasy black hair you saw into eyes of pure intense hatred. You saw into a soul that enjoyed hurting and causing pain. A soul that liked to cause fear. Animals saw it even if most people didn’t. Harry saw it...and Justin hated him for it.
The cat wasn’t saying anything pithy, it wasn’t sending out beacons of beastly adrenaline. Gatsby’s heart beat softly and slowly as it’s blood seeped from its cuts. Harry sat against the ancient oak tree. His arms gaining rivulets of murky red as he cradled the cat. It was serene there. The sun was starting to set, giving the world it’s golden goodbye before nightfall claimed it’s throne of blackness and ungenerous light.
Most people are scared of death Harry. Usually Harry loved the old oaks timber voice. When it spoke it’s wisdom held the vastness of Lebanon, and the earthy smell of forest and life’s knowledge. But his attention was on his dying friend, and the tree’s voice held no more distraction then the rustling of leaves and the sun’s light dancing between them tickling the tree to laughter. He listened intensely, his eyes soaking up every detail, his soul open and eager ready for the barest of whispers before his friend slipped away into the river. The heart was barely beating at all anymore when he heard it. Don’t be afraid harry.....everyone must go to the river.
He should have cried. He should have felt anger. He should have felt something but he couldn’t anymore. Everything was overwhelming in his mind. The infinite mysteries of the beckoning river. Every answer a tree had given him merely spawned more questions. He didn’t understand people’s souls, and why they could live the way they did. He didn’t even know if he had a soul, as his mind raged like a sinking vessel in a perfect storm. The voice erupted with a rumbling boom of thunder and gravel, breaking Harry's fragile harbor.
“What have you done?”. His father stood stiffly, his fists shaking as he looked down with disgust at his son. He was an imposing figure. An expensive buttoned formal shirt. Trousers painstakingly stitched, and shiny shoes. His eyes were bloodshot with a wild fury. His muscles were tense with a murderous flex. Maybe Harry was tired of his father hiding from the truth, or perhaps it was the fragile state of his serenity. It could have even been fate that pushed harry to connect with the unwilling soul of his father. The tree would have told him that he just needed to be loved and understood. The oak would have told him he just needed comfort. Harry was in no mood to listen. When an animal is weak, they lash out...and a human is still an animal even if they try to forget it.
He pushed his mind into the river. The river was always the same when he traveled along it’s infinite meandering. The tree’s crowding around it laughing as tree’s do. The others in the distance black and burnt brooding in silent disapproval with no voices to call their own. He tried not to fly close to the inviting river. It was difficult fighting the pull. It swirled and rushed with colors that didn’t exist, and a cacophony of voices that you could only start to distinguish the closer you came. Harry tried not to get too close, he knew that if he was pulled into the river he would never be able to come out again. He saw Gatsby watching the fish with the eyes of a hunter. He could hear his old nan playing the piano and singing to him, but he had the eyes of a hunter too, and he had saw his prey. His father’s silhouette stood at rapt attention at the edge of the dead forest. Whiffs of pipe tobacco growing stronger as he sped towards him.
He had found people’s souls in that valley before. When he was younger he used to go to the nursing home. Everyone there was easily found, reluctantly making their way to the river. At the home there was a man who sat in a wheel chair saying in an old pleading voice, “God damn, god damn, god damn, god damn, god damn, god damn,”. It was a strange litany to the deity most turned to when facing the winter of their years, but Harry understood it. “Hey Harry”, the old man said, when he found him sitting idly on a rock by the river. His eyes were bright and sad, holding tears that would never fall. He was wearing a farmers patched overalls, and a worn black hat with wide brims slicing the sun in half across his face. He spoke his words like a man moving a massive weight, “I hate him you know...god.”
“The oak told me that hate and love exist with each other as night and day.” The old man listened to his words as he grasped a long piece of grass to chew between his teeth. His face looked like strong leather when he looked up at harry with forsaken eyes.
“I never listened to the tree’s much...I probably should have.” Their eyes connected and Harry fell gently into them. The iris was like a sea, his pupil an island. The enclave of ones soul. He stood on the island the horizon stretching out unbroken to meet the night sky illuminated with a million stars and a lonely moon. He walked up to the shore and saw the man’s memories reflecting in the waters. He saw him planting crops and living a simple life in his cabin with his wife. He saw the seasons change and the harvest come and go. He saw children born and time take it’s due. He saw winters were the farmer would eye his family with resentment and hostility, blaming them for a life of hardship and duress. He saw him leave to drink and forget all the while with the tree’s calling out to him fervently. He ignored them with force until it became second nature. He saw his children grow and leave to never return. He saw his wife grow frail until she left for the river willingly. The old farmer merely drank more and more, hating the world around him, and fearing to leave it.
He escaped from that dark ocean, an estranged island in the night. The old farmer sat chewing his grass. “I’m scared of the river”. “What if I am not meant to swim in it...what if I drown in it’s waters.” He let out a tired sigh,”It invites me with colors I have never seen before, but they remind me of the colors of my memories when I sit inside my soul looking at the shore of my island.” “I’m scared and lonely Harry”. He flew into the sky, until he met the sun, the warmth melting away the valley until the sickly smelling disinfectant filled his nostrils and he knew he was back. He heard the voice behind him. The soft mumbling prayer of god damn. He touched the old mans shoulder with gentleness and whispered in his ear. “Everything is going to be ok...we are all loved and missed.” The old man looked up at him with tears brimming in his grateful eyes. The truth was that harry didn’t know if that was true or not, he was just parroting what he heard when he was forced to go to church with his devout parents. If people knew what was going on in his own head he would probably be burned at the stake.
He went into people’s souls less and less. Usually it made him sad, and oftentimes he saw things that were terrible. He saw how people enjoyed destroying other people’s lives, and he could understand how they would fear the river. If Harry was swimming with them he would try to drown them. Can you even drown someone in that river? There were too many questions and not enough answers, his mind felt like a stone splashing into the ocean, disappearing in it’s unfathomable depths. Sinking until the light was gone, swallowed forever. Harry thought that he was very much afraid of the dark. He pressed his hands against the side of his head, forcing his mind to quiet. It was all too much, he couldn't handle it on his own. He was spinning wildly through the dark side of the valley, heading towards the silhouette of father and the smoke spiraling up lazily in front of him. The branches whipped across his face angrily. He was batted and smacked around while he held his target. In the distance he could hear the tree’s calling out in despair, but he had no ears to listen to their voice anymore. It was dark in this forest, he flew through it as fast as he could knowing if he stopped something terrible would happen. His father turned to meet him as he rushed forward with impossible speed. The pipe burned with a low red ember, lighting eyes without white. They were black with the barest pinpricks of red, he charged into it.
He crashed into an old house. The night sky was foreboding with tree branches naked of leaves smacking and scraping the windows in a disturbing caress. The house creaked and leaned to one side disorienting him. It was suffocated by brown vines and dead leaves swirling about suffocating it in a claustrophobic embrace. An old concrete fountain that had long ago forgotten water stood as a testament to abandonment, with cracks mating it with a crumbling courtyard. The derelict was so dark, the moons beams lighting a path through the windows signaling the only places harry was safe to travel. Movement and hustling could be heard in the recesses of the house, a flap of clothing hitting the wall, heavy boots thudding to meet him at alarming speed, only stopping where the light of the moon cut through the window. Harry could hear its unnatural breathing drawing slowly in and out. It sounded like a raspy chuckle. His heart beat with lurches...he was terrified of this place, he feared with all his instincts and all his heart that the thing in the darkness. He was unwelcome here. He made his way across the old rug, it’s patterns old, and faded victorian, like everything forgotten in this estranged house. The rug was his lifeline following the narrow beams of the moon. Rows and rows of tall slender windows. A sliver of protection with a blanket of stars woven throughout the sky. The rug came to a corner, with booming tone of a grandfather clock. He stopped and turned at this ancient proud ticking. The golden disk contained the shapes of memories long buried, with numbers cataloging a life of mysteries never spoken. He looked into the center where the hands were and saw people moving about. He fell into the reflective pool of gold as easy as slipping into a lonely soul. He remembered the clock in an old black and white picture his father had. It showed him and his mom and dad standing in front of it, a relic from an older time, from an even older memory. He saw the backs of them standing, moving slightly trying to hold still for the picture. A buried place that father tried to forget. So many memories and voices. Father growing up with wonder and love for his life. A dark resentment feeding like a cancer. A pride and respect for his dad reversing to derision and loathing. He saw the beauty of life replaced before his eyes, into a symphony of gears and cogs of industry. Love had collapsed into a small kernel. Swallowed by iron and stone. He was close to understanding, so close to illumination, but the images were growing dark. This intimate knowledge of sepia growing black with shadows of fangs and claws. The worst pain that harry had ever felt meet him with an impossible speed. Tearing and gnashing fury was ripping him apart. He lunged to the steps with it clawing down his legs. A shred of moon protected him growing so faint so quickly. How had the moon moved through the sky so fast. He had never gone into the burnt forest before. He had never rushed into a soul unwilling. He knew with all his heart, that he could die here. He crawled painfully up the middle of the steps. There was so much void around him. The moon showed red flakes floating in the pale. Like dust drifting past a window full of sunlight. A parade of blood marching merrily away feeding the evil place. Slender dagger fingers reached with promise through the gaps of the stairs rail. Just out of reach and keeping pace with his slow progression. The moon afforded him a break at the summit. He hauled himself up on the bannister, the hallway showing a flickering red towards it's end. Doors lined the hallway in perfect order. The dark wombs holding different figures. He heard the thudding boots and scrapings of frustration. He kept passing them making his way to beacon of red. A raucous coughing erupted from a room. It sounded like oil and sludge vomiting out of the dying. This entire house was alive with an evil that made harry's skin tingle with the fear a child possesses when he clutches his blankets alone in his bed. The red room was just before him. A small fire place crackled. The mischievous blaze teasing him with the sanctuary of light and throwing it away. He dived into the room as the hands reached hungrily towards him. He felt so tired. He knew what it was like to feel old just then. The fire gave him a fleeting warmth to his front while a cold chill crept along his back. Darkness had surrounded waiting patiently for the fire to go out. An old leather chair held the barest reflection of the fire's light. A well known shoulder could be seen lying against the side of it. Wisps of smoke trailing up into the pale flickers of light on the ceiling, the tell tale sign of his father. He looked up into the eyes of a father that was gray, wrinkled, and feeble. His eyes opened up slowly. They were rheumy and tired, with a head drooping onto his chest. He was wrapped in a warm robe like a swaddled baby.
“What happened to your house father?” He looked incredulously at this sad place for warmth and comfort. Father looked down at him with great loss.
“So many things can happen harry. Some things we cause ourselves, sometimes everything is out of control. People become afraid or jealous and let it consume them until it is too late.”
“How do you know it's too late?”
Father stared into the fire for a long time, as if all the answers he needed burned inside the dancing embers. Slow silent tears tracked down the deep lines in the old face. When he spoke it sounded like a burden.
“Because a house forgotten becomes swallowed by the forest, until ghosts and bones remain.” Harry realized how cold everything had become. His breath and his fathers gusted out in small evaporating clouds. The air sucked into his lungs felt like razors racing down his throat. The moon was gone, and the house was bending and groaning. The shadows swirled around them in anticipation. His father sat crying with remorse. “I let them all in harry.” He stood with a last bit of effort on shaky legs, parting his robe with trembling fingers. “I let them in harry...and they feasted on me.” His body was a field of missing skin and organs bleeding. Snake like intestines trying to slither out of large holes. Caked foul smelling blood oozed out of his body when the fire went out. The shadows erupted into a feeding frenzy ripping father from limb to limb with such a force he never even had a chance to drop to the ground. That's when harry screamed. A cry of anguish, rage, and despair. His eyes were clenched as tight as his fists until the pinpricks of light in his vision became eruptions from the night sky. The sky broke apart like a stone crashing into a lake, and the world turned white. Everything was breaking and burning. Harry had turned the midnight tomb into hell. He flew into the sun. He kept flying until he dared to open his eyes again. He was in the burnt forest. Father's silhouette had it's back turned to him. Smoke was billowing around it when it turned around. The silhouette burned like paper. Bright light shining out of it's eyes and its screaming mouth. Harry felt hate. So much hate. He left the forest, and he left the valley. He wanted to be anywhere but this place. When harry returned to the world, father stared at him with eyes that could no longer see. He turned around slowly, and moved slowly back to the house. His shoes dragging and stomping the earth. Harry reached out towards him, but all he couldn't feel anything. He followed his father silently, his feet moving without control. When father went inside to his study, his hands gripped things methodically, like a blind man in an unfamiliar place. He went to his desk and dropped heavily into his chair. The drawer slid open slowly and harry heard a click. The gunshot broke the spell that had carried harry's feet into the house. His father fell over, as the carpet became a red lake.

Hey Harry Part One

2010-08-12T19:50:00.000-07:00

Hey Harry
by: S. J. Huffman
Part One

Harry was a rather nondescript fellow, easily forgotten. Everyone thought so. He was a portly and tall man, with slumped shoulders and bad posture. His immeadiate look was one people couldn't pinpoint. At the tavern people would talk about what was wrong with him after he left. He's depressed somebody would say, it's just loneliness. Another one would clamor that it was simpleness, he is just dumb, he just doesn't have enough pistons firing in the ol noggin. Sometimes a hard man with eyes like daggers would look up from his dirty glass and curse him for being a coward. The general consensus was that he was just crazy, with a childhood like his it can't be helped, poor broken bastard. He most likely would have had a much better life if he would've been born in in 19th century bohemian France , but we don't choose when our where we are born...or the the cards we are dealt. Harry was dealt spades...and had been folding most of his life.
He was a solemn boy from a very early age. His parents didn't pay much attention to his radical shift in attitude. Occasionally, there would be a passing moment or two when his father was reading his newspaper and smoking his cherry pipe he would abruptly stop. Lowering the paper slowly down on to his lap and think that there was something seriously wrong with his boy. The giggly curious kid had radically shifted to a serious withdrawn, solemn child. Who was quick to apologize and and help out with whatever that was needed. Father would just joggle his head abruptly, shaking the gnawing feelings away, to return to the life of humdrum that he was accustomed to, thanking god inwardly that he at least wasn't like the neighbor boy Justin.
Father rarely noticed harry at all if truth be told. Most of the time the skinny lad was so quiet and unobtrusive you barely knew he was there. But there were times when he would catch him doing the oddest things. He remembered a time one lazy summer evening. The kind he had as a child, where his father would sit on the porch drinking lemonade, with his mother knitting in a rocking chair. The old house sturdy yet smooth with years of living and the elements steady invasion. Everyone belonged there, everything was in its place and right with the world. Every imperfection whether it be a rounded stone on the old brick sidewalk, or the deep knots of wood spiraling along the columns belonged. He could tell the world was alive on those days, it was all one entity. Like a mosaic that you could only appreciate in brief magical moments, when you felt the living world all around you. Father remembered those fleeting times, but it seemed like Harry was living it each day. But instead of laughing and exhilarating at being alive, Harry seemed like he was looking at a the frightening power of the world growing dark and wretched before the storm. Harry's eyes were deep black pools, almost hollow in his face. Like a soldier who had seen the most terrifying things a man should never see, and was just trying to come to grips with it.
The sun was setting on the first day that his eyes opened to the changes he had always ignored about his son. The changes he knew deep down in his bones, the changes that made him fear and wake shivering in the night. The air seemed to hang around holding everything still. One of those days were the world had become a painting, and every person and every detail a stroke of an artist with the hand of god. He stood up stretching, having the whim to find his son. He wanted to give him a glass jar, so he could catch lightning bugs in the growing dusk. Harry was nowhere to be found. The basketball court was empty, and he could see no one through the open blinds of the guest house. But Father's mind was clear. On days like this he didn't want to slip into the drudgery...didn't need to. His mind was focused, and he knew what was important, and what wasn't. He wanted to spend time with his son. It was overpowering, his body lead him without conscious thought. Lost in the canvas of life on a magical day.
His mind clear without the weight moved fast to wear his son would be. The place where harry spent most of his time. Often accompanied by animals, where he would sit and talk to them for hours. He tried telling him once that animals couldn't understand what you were saying. That they were simple creatures, who only understood tone of voice. That he should try talking to people more, and children his own age. They had things to say back. Harry looked at him knowingly with his black eyes and said, "There are some animals you can't talk to". It was unnerving, and he couldn't admit why. He felt uncomfortable like he always did when trying to raise his subtlety willfull son. He was infuriating at times. Never shouting or arguing, always listening to what you had to say, and yet he seemed to never change his mind. Then it seemed like he never saw that harry again.
His quiet child. So solemn. He wondered what happened to the child that used to run to see him when he came home from work. On bad days he would sit in his chair, and harry would come running up brushing his shoulders off and patting his chest with his tiny hands. He used to say with an exulting voice of triumph, "Your slugs are off daddy!". He couldn't help but smile. Harry always was very sensitive to peoples moods. Always making them laugh and smile. Telling them they had to help him get the creatures he imagined swarming around them to go away. Catherine would play along laughing, shoooing away the fictious beasts playfully. All smiles and radiant she would proudly tell him. "We did it!" Father withdrew savagely from his nastalgia. He did not trust those memories. He tried not to even think about them. Down that path layed snares and traps of the mind. Men where not created to think abstractly without dangerous consequences. Time was an enemy that chafed your memory into a lie you believe if you dwell on it too often.

It was far better to avoid a battle with time you cannot win. It was an ally with the mysteries of the world you can never know and chase aimlessly until your life is forfeit. He was a dreamer like Harry once. Lost so much in imagination that all he wanted to do was dream whether he was sleeping or not. His patriarch took the time to snap him out of it, showing him the futility and dangers of dreaming. Had him talk to the beatniks at the local coffee shop and pointed out how threadbare their clothing was, and how most of them were homeless and lost in thought and intoxication. He taught him how a man must partition his mind, and only allow himself these idle thoughts after a days work is done, and only then to be imbibed as a luxury, like a cup of fine bourbon trickling down your throat. What does pursuing these idle philosophies indulge? Nothing but dissatisfaction. Your life will become one that inches along slowly painfully aware of every tick and tock, until you are catapolted violently into the distance where you find you hair has become gray, and the face in the mirror is one of a stranger. Harry seemed to be inevitably rushing towards the coffee house beatnik, and he would be damned if his son inherited such a fate. He was his son, and it was his duty to train the untrainable. His duty as a father to help him avoid a life of self destruction, and his love inevitable.
He made his way to the tree. Harry couldn't be seen, but father knew that he was behind its massive trunk, sitting on the top of the hill, with his back against the mammoth vastness. He was oftentimes sitting up there, gazing into that valley. It was a peaceful place, nestled in by forest on three sides, with a soft shallow brook quietly lapping at the smooth stones on its banks. The home father had created was beautiful. He had started with a house a little better then a shack, and through tenacity and strength had built a slice of paradise. He had a good family and life, and he knew his son Harry had everything needed to be saved.
What happened next is something that would stay in the minds of father and son alike for the rest of their lives. It was a pivotal moment of change, and nothing would ever be the same between them. It is funny how people's perceptions create or alter their reality. What two people see when staring at something, are often at odds with each other. It is why human beings wage war, or commit murder, or vent on blogs. We see what we fear to. We see what we want to. We see whatever is easist for our minds to form. Father saw Harry cradling a dead cat in his arms. Harry saw a misplaced disapproval and worry forming in his father's eyes. A chain of reaction forms because there are certain ingredients and forces working at the right place and right time. The pain of Harry losing his best friend made him react in a way that was only human. Father's fear of what Harry was made him react in a way...that was only human.
There wasn't any tears on Harry's face. He used to cry unabashed when grief was called for. At his grandparents funerals, when he was scared after a bad dream, when his parents were fighting. Something had changed in harry, so that he never cried anymore. His eyes showed pain, but only ever so slightly. Two black pools, in a pale caved in face, in which the emotions potrayed would go from pain to anger, and then animosity as his father approached that fateful day.

Natas hear me roarrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr! Sam says shut up! Love, Love, Love, and Love.

2010-04-10T01:13:00.000-07:00

I say that with a hint of mockery...because natas is me....as I am him. We cannot exist without each other. I find it a sad note, that I write this blog when I am far from myself, and write in notebooks when I am at my most clear.

Natas-Sam....It is apparent. Reach a middleground. I am you as you are me.

Maybe so Natas. Maybe so. When I have slept on cold steps, your voice has been there. When I have seen girls, over dosing, and hating their lives you have been there. But something else has been there too. Natas...you are probably one of my guardian angels. You most likely watch over me as I sleep.....but I just don't trust you. My instincts tell me that you are an evil voice. The voice that tells me to manipulate and take advantage of every situation. The voice that tells me that I am the main event and people are background noise. Fuck you.

You started a post Natas...and you have lost. Let's see why. For starters, you have lost much power. Sure I am still the same S.J.Huffman...but this man has learned. I have been bad...I have been good...I have lived in the in between and I agree, that I can't live without you. Are you surprised? I think more like devastated...or at least disappointed. Your strength lay's in deception...without it you are powerless.

Natas: You cannot have good without evil in this world. I have my place as you have yours. Everyone is meant to do something S.J.Huffman...so are you. There have been times when you have been belligerent to how lucky you are...and there are times when you know...like a cold chill running through your shoulders to your spine...that you are lucky indeed. Am I am god...as I am the devil...as I am the in between. Fate exists whether you like it or not. And fate knocks on your door calling. You choose to answer or dismiss at your own call.

Fuck you Natas. You are my subconcious...you are my distraction. Albeit a source to fight against, even a target...you have your own selfish means. Do not placate me to believe that I am your friend...and you are trying to help me. The forces in place that are helping me are tangible and invisible. They are not you. Begone the voice from the other world, begone the doubting whisper in my ear....begone you bastard of insecurity and anxiety...begone you bastard of hatred.

This is sam. I have won. At the darkest, at the most despondent, you can win. Trust your instincts, trust that fate......is there and you have a choice in it. A paradox? Not at all. Fate exists in many shapes and forms...I believe...and my instincts tell me something is watching, loving, protecting, and guiding us to happiness. To fulfillment. To sanity. To love. Above all things...although I doubt everything else I believe in love. And I always will.

Natas-Fool

Fuck you

A christmas fireside chat with Natas

2009-12-20T02:37:00.000-08:00

Hello all. I write this mostly to Sam, and for his friends. Let me tell you, this guy has come a long way. Not that I don't find him lacking at times, but his last post really took the venom out of my desire to torture him. Sometimes people really do learn..and change. Not that I couldn't rip him a new one right now...but you know what...it's Christmas. Not only that, I feel as if we have come to an understanding of each other...and I think Sam is finally starting to understand himself. Why has Natas taken the helm then? Well, Sam is not himself. Funny isn't it. He is in love with probably the only girl in the world he is capable of loving, he isn't homeless this time around, and he has people that love and care about him...and yet he is at a loss of words. I'm just being cynical, were actually as thick as thieves. But sometimes, when life shows it's ugly side, everyone needs a little Natas to scare it back. Sam knows this. He doesn't fear me anymore. Sometimes you have to let your shoulders back and tell the world you will fuck it up if it doesn't leave you alone. The world isn't all bad...in point of fact...I think it has more good then the things that go bump in the night. But sometimes, you have to let me free inside. I let the world know that a kind and good person...doesn't mean that you are a person to be fucked with. I am the yin to the yang, the omega to the alpha(but only because sam's narcissism makes him claim alpha status at all times...even in my hour to shine...awww can't help but love this bastard) I think it goes to show that sam isn't perfectly healed yet. After all, none of us should take turns posting our thoughts...but at least we aren't fighting each other to the death anymore...baby steps you know. So instead of personal problems...let's blame it on the holidays. After all, Christmas was originally a week dedicated to the god of Saturn for lascivious rites of celebration. Although Sam would say, it is a good thing to get together with those you love, and let you know how much they matter to you for whatever the reason...I say look at all the holiday drunks...and the upturn in suicide rates this time of year. You know what though? Maybe I am just scared. Because sam doesn't need me as much as he used to. I am a part of him...just like I share lives with many of you...but it seems like sometimes he has control of me...and I'm not sure how I feel about that. I guess I got my own problems too...blame my soft side on "A christmas story"...im a sucker for a good christmas movie...and I form bonds with all of you. All I can say is never take me for granted. Sometimes I am needed to protect you, and sometimes I overstep my bounds...but I only do so because you force me into it. Go to the dark places in your soul, and look at yourself realistically, and without bias one way or another. If at the end of that you aren't happy with what you see...then take heart that you are looking at with the want to change. If you are happy with yourself...good, but don't let it go to your head. I bring tidings of good cheer, happiness, and balance. Natas is not your enemy if you are trying to keep balance(and yes, I speak of myself in third person...I blame it on Sam and his hopeless narcissism god love him) Merry Christmas to all...and to all a good fright! Just kidding...enjoy a little harmless fun and lying to your children about a man that makes everything better...haha what a bitch am I!

Looking in the Mirror

2009-12-02T21:01:00.000-08:00

I usually don't have a screaming match with Natas. Most of the time he is a soft whisper of fear, doubt, and bitterness. Like a predatory wolf, he shows his fangs when he senses a weakness in his prey. I always feel during those times that he is an unstoppable giant...but in reality he's just 6'2'. I can't really bring myself to hate him, or remove him from my life completely. After giving it some thought, I believe he is necessary. There have been times, that his cold detachment and primal ferocity have kept me alive...more so then the trouble it has caused. He doesn't seem so scary now. I don't see fangs, I just see a set of British worthy dentistry. Maybe his eyes are little bit hostile, but I see a longing of acceptance in them...maybe even a little bit of loneliness. I realize that when I am feeling my best, he is there as a balance. Protecting me from harms way, and it is only when I push him away that he rears his head and reeks havoc. I guess that is like all things in life. When you remove the balance, extremism always gets the best of you.
Natas is of course fictional. I haven't lost my mind to the point that I imagine people that don't exist(I think...). I have always had the habit of looking at my life, and personifying it in epic ways to make a great story of it. I have always loved a good story, and it is by far easier to talk about a grandiose battle with a fearful demonic creature, then talk about a guy who is pathetically depressed to the point his friend finds him passed out in a recliner with his hand resting on an empty bottle of cheap brandy lying next to the chair.
It was a rough couple of weeks. I rocked that pity party with determination to the highest levels. This time my depression wasn't for the usual reasons. I missed my family very much...but it wasn't the reason. My money situation was better...so it wasn't that. It was love(something to be discussed in a later post)or more to the point I should say it was a broken heart. I started to pray again, at the end of those dismal weeks(yes, that is how bad it got)and I was starting to crawl out of my hole of misery I was lying down in, and then something extraordinary happened. She came to me. She told me she loved me. She said that she wanted to be with me.
Now, I have had prayers answered before. I have even had dreams come true. But I have never had both happen at the same time. I was stunned, flabbergasted, amazed, astounded, astonished, and blown away. Then a second emotion hit me quickly...I was terrified. I had moved on quite a long time ago from infatuation, so I could look at her imperfections objectively, and her flaws were by far very small compared to things that made her great. So I realized that it wasn't her I was scared of...it was love. I was petrified by being that close to someone that I couldn't even say a word.
It made me look into myself. Why couldn't I rejoice with something this wonderful? Why did I fear it? Why didn't I trust it? I think losing my family hurt me more then I let myself admit. I saw a lot of good things in this world since I started down this path...but I think the horrible things had left their mark on me. It had changed me into someone who kept a certain distance emotionally. Someone who didn't give a lot of trust. Someone who was very lonely, and didn't even know he was the reason for it(aside from being an odd mother-fucker). This time around I handled things a little bit differently. I didn't analyze everything to death. I didn't calculate my situation into an equation. I acted. I threw caution to the wind...and I let myself believe...I let myself feel happy. Maybe things won't work out the way I think and feel they will. Maybe I am setting myself up for another heartbreak. It doesn't matter...life is many things, and sometimes it is taking chances. I still miss my family. But I have found strength in myself that I never knew existed. Taking a chance is how this journey started, and I wasn't looking honestly at myself and taking chances with the things that mattered. I no longer stare at the mirror, wondering who is staring back...or what. When I look in the mirror I see someone softly smiling with eyes that hold a sparkle. I am comfortable that I have a side of me I affectionately call Natas. When I look at my imperfections, I see some of them as character, and others something that I can work on. A good friend of mine once painted a portrait of me with a stern expression, and a thought bubble that said love. He said that I could had an intimidating demeanor, but I was always thinking about love. I feel more comfortable with letting other people know that now, especially the amazing woman I love, and their is no doubt in my mind that Natas will be there if I need him. I feel like a good person again, and I can finally believe it when my loved ones tell me I am. It is a good feeling to look in the mirror these days.

The real Natas The real Truth

2009-11-11T02:24:00.001-08:00

Sam thinks he can fool you. He tries to hide facts and figures behind truths barely beyond things that are lies. He is weak. Don't let him mislead you. The real truth is that I am as much a part of him, as he is himself. A symbiotic being that cannot survice without me.

--sam--
shut up Natas...you are a cancer I am ridding form my soul.

You do not belong in this. I have been with you since you were nine years old...wondering why you liked the song in the jukebox at the hospital. Whether you think I am a poison, or a cynical side I am real you fool!
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Natas cheated. Or am I lost. I wrote pages and he deleted them...or did I do it on accident or fear. I don't know...I am lost in the whirlwind? Will I keep on writing and have it deleted lost for eternity? Cars rush by my house...it feels like time slipping by. I don't know if it is Natas or me speaking now...I swear Natas and me were fighting. A verbal debate that went deep and philosphical...and it dissapeared in a stint of accidental deletion. Is it fate? Is it Natas? Is it Stupidity? My mind whirls...like the traffic that flows by my house.

==Sam--
I have drank an entire bottle of brandy Natas. I am not myself. Do your worst...people will understnd.

---Natas---
Who do you think I am? People see what they want to see. They see another lost soul. Another fool. Another joe...lost in the whirlwind. (Don't try to win...I will delete it and start again!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

--SAm--
Maybe you have won. I am scared to write...confused to think. Giving up seems like a soft bed to fall into, and loose myself to an eternity of comfort.

==Natas==
Nice try bitch. People won't like you just because you try to reach them on a level of hardship. They will feel for you...they will like you because they emphasize, but they will go with whoever they feel is strong.

==Sam==
I know if I fight too hard you will just delete what I write Natas...your power is strong right now. But you aren't always right.

--Natas==
But I am the easiest. And as luck would have it...you and your fellow bastards indulge me and feed me whether they want to or not. They travel down the gravitational path that is easiest...just like water. Fucking weak fools.

==Sam--
This argument will be made when I am stronger...by the power of something else behind me...I swear it.

--Natas--
We will see.

Natas

2009-11-10T23:39:00.000-08:00

Well, here I am. I will not lie...I have been drinking. Some say there is truth in drinking...others say their is nothing but a lie. i think the truth is what it usually is...something in between. I have been a happy drunk orchestrating a party. I have been angry...picking fights and punching holes in walls and peoples faces. So I have to ask myself...why I am I drinking now? Is it absolute boredom and anger at the ridiculous world around me? Or is it an inner struggle with insanity inside myself? Probably like most things a slate of grey...a war I am fighting with myself and the world. I see commercials, I see movies that placate our inner wanted needs and desires, and I tell them to go fuck themselves while I fight the need to secretly want it.

It's probably why I have always felt like marketing is evil. Some people have gifts to see the social threads that tie us together. It is like a loose ball of string that weaves and meanders though crazy paths and trajectories. Some of us see it, and sell our vision for profit and gain. Maybe everyone has a price. I probably do too. I wouldn't even be writing this if my roomie wouldn't have caught me.

I felt bad. I felt weak. I felt lazy. I didn't want to have to rationalize or deal with the reality of my life and situation. I didn't want to have to think...or feel. I was tired of advertisements of therapeutic beds,ab crunchers, and diet pills. I was sick to death of snuggies and taxes. I didn't want to look at my feelings, of what I wanted or had to see. I wanted to escape.

And yet she came..."none the less". A biblical phrase...from a translation I have read. Maybe I am a nameless street preacher footsteps away from being hauled away from the police. Yet, I mock them, and enjoy watching video's on youtube of them being hauled away or ridiculed, or seeing beer bottles hurled in their direction. I wrote once that "artists and philosophers drink...to calm the madness to think. I don't know...I guess so, life is labyrinth with it's high's and it's lows". I feel it is madness right now. A whirlwind of thought and anger and drunken ranting, that no one finds funny. It scares them, or makes them agitated and angry. Sometimes that is what I want. To cause a whirlwind of chaos and destruction wherever I walk. I call this side of me "Natas". As a Gemini I am of dual nature...but as Natas I don't believe in this shit right now.==Natas is in control now== I see the evil of humanity, I see the stupidity. I see the side that you try to hide as you look in the bathroom mirror before embarking into the world. I see what you hate for others to see. The side that you are ashamed of. Because i am ashamed of myself.

Humans...what loathsome creatures. You cry and you whine of your lot in life...as you rape and pillage the world around you. Hypocrites and bastard children you are. Oliver twist, and expect riches from your hardship...fuck you. Fastfood generation junkies...you throw me into a welfare-state of mind. You feed on your modern day gladiatorial games in glee. Indulging your minds in gluttony and feast. Love your celebrities and love your "reality" tv as you flee from real in your own life you foolish weak mortals. I am Natas and I will control this being. You will listen to me. Their is no point to your insignificant lives...their is no point to your existence. Give up on your dreams and wants...fuck you and your pitiful wants.

===This is Sam...I am back. I was weak. I drank...a lot. I wanted to calm the madness...to think. But I think I was secretly fearing the answers. I was scared about where my life was supposed to go. I was hurting from what I wanted, and what I got. Oh god that exists...I was wanting, needing, feeling, fearing, scared...please help me.
I Don't know if god has answered me...maybe I am a misfit a freak and runt. Maybe I am supposed to take medication and fall into the world of numb. I don't think so. I have puked into the toilet of despair, and saw the bile of my creation. Maybe my ideals and hopes cling tenaciously to the sides of an old bucket puked in. At my worst times and at the best life exists.

I saw the stars tonight. This was sober. I saw the stars in most of their glory...it reminded me of colorado...when I saw them clear and bright. It reminded me of young dreams and ideals. It reminded me of purity and how I have become jaded. It reminded me of what I felt inside...what I knew was right.

===NATAS===
Shut up you weak fool. Give me control, and give up on what you cannot hope to rule. I am the absolute power...I am the god. You cannnot hope to control, what you cannot understand.

-Sam-
I know what I am Natas. You are a part of me, as you always will be. But the power you have over me to hate what I fear...and feed what I fear will always be under my control. Maybe at times I will become weak. There will be moments where you will gain a sembalnce of control that you will try to blow into large proportions. But the truth is you are a lie, a fear, and a nightmare. You are only what I fear is...not what truly is...you have lost the war...although you have gained roads in a battle...you villionus patient bastard.

===Natas===
Hahahahaha...I am always waiting you fool. Humans are always failing...you will never be rid of me.

-Sam-
Maybe so. But I am not alone. No matter how many times I fail. No mattter how many times I am lost, or feel I am wrong. Their is something more powerful then you that wants me to be ok...that wants me to be happy. You will not win.

==Natas==
Hahahahaha...we will see young samuel. We will see.

We will see. I don't know who is writing this at this moment. Maybe this is the gray. We are all at war with ourselves my friends. It doesn't matter what we believe. We are at war. Fight, fight, fight...and fight. The war will never be over, but that is no cause for despair. We are human beings. That means that we have great strength and beauty...and corruption and despair. But in the end...we are beautiful, we are courageous, don't ever forget it.

Soul Sickness and Faith

2009-11-03T06:31:00.000-08:00

I've been talking to a man that says his soul is sick. He said that himself, and many others suffered from it, making them do massive amounts of drugs, and basically become deplorable pieces of shit. He told me I share the same sickness, and maybe he's right. I know my soul used to be very sick indeed. I like to think that I have been doing a lot of healing, but sometimes I have doubts if I am going anywhere at all.
For the record, I don't think my soul is sick, I feel like I am merely at war. A war to keep from being ill, or at times keeping the illness from spreading. It is a constant battle with demons, inner and external. A negative spirit that exists or I feed during times of weakness. Due to my epic ability to lie to myself, I have to stay on my toes if I want to stay/get better. I don't believe self improvement is masturbation, and I think being optimistic isn't foolish.
I read a book called the secret, and I believe a lot of it. On the quantum level human beings are energy. Our minds are unfathomably powerful and mysterious, who is to say that we cannot alter certain threads of fate or even create them. I think our perceptions make our reality. Our mythos have filtered our conception of the creator into god, allah, buddah, or aliens from space. The power of religion to affect people whether it is benevolent or malignant is undeniable. Our minds dictate our reality. We have the power to be happy, sad, scared, sacred or content with life. Not to say that it doesn't take extreme effort...constant diligence even.
My biggest problem with faith and spirituality is the intangible nature of it. I believe in a creator of some kind, and most of the time I believe he has a plan which involves our well being. I think we have immortal souls created by him that inhabit these corporal forms of ours, that may have lived numerous lives before. But herein lies the problem. It all comes down to feelings. I don't know about you, but often my feelings have lead me astray. I like facts and figures. Abstract concepts about faith and spirituality can never be published in Popular Science. How do I know I am right? Why I have I felt like I am being cared for by a power that is intense and undeniable, and yet other times I feel as if nothing is there? My mind doubts. I wonder if faith is merely a myth and a superstition. That I am a fool for believing that I will end up as anything other then worm food when my life has ended.
No matter how great these doubts become, a kernel of me always believes. I still have some faith. The moments in my life where I have felt a divine influence have been too many to disregard, and their affect on me stays. I cannot believe that human beings are nothing but animals, we are far too special for that. Our ability to create and destroy, to love and to hate, is unmatched on any level. We are wondrous and beautiful beings with a multitude of purposes, creating tendrils in the web of fate, spanning into the infinite.
Maybe I do have a soul sickness. A virus that grows in me at times. It makes me doubt myself, and others around me. It filters my perception so all I can see is the sadness and despair. I keep a critical eye on myself, and all those around me. I see their pettiness and stupidity, and my heart feels like a rotten stone. I don't know what it is that makes me get this way. I don't know how I can go from all zen, to a complete hater. I've been this way most of my life, but I don't think I have to be. How we were raised and our past habits influence us, but they do not define us. We have the power to be whatever we want to be, and that is something I never doubt. We just have to keep fighting our demons whatever they may be. We are far more beautiful then odious, and our souls are a sight more healthy then sick. We just have to keep the faith, no matter what we believe in.

Life, Choices and Clichés

2009-11-01T07:57:00.000-08:00

All streams flow into the sea, yet the sea is never full. To the place the streams come from, there they return again. All things are wearisome, more than one can say. The eye never has enough of seeing, nor the ear its fill of hearing. What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.

And further, by these, my son, be admonished: of making many books there is no end; and much study is a weariness of the flesh.

Between Solomon and Ecclesiastes I felt for the first twenty-one years of my life that the things I loved was pointless. Eventually it came to a point where I had that view about my life and struggled for the will to live. Sometimes I cynically refer to those times as my 21 year coma, but it wasn't. Fate exists in it's shape and form, and my life and the things I have experienced have happened as they should.

My problem was that I was trained to view these scriptures literally. The bible is a very wise, and spiritual set of books, like many other holy writings, but should be viewed like all the others. They are books written by men...and men are regrettably fallible. When I say this to stalwart friends of particular faiths they always ask me the same question. "So you don't believe the bible was written by God?" No...I do not. But I do believe our creator was an inspiration to these authors, whether it is the bible, the qu'ran, the vedas, the avesta, and many books of spiritual origin. By our natures, human beings will always see things in different ways, it is our inclination. That is why each one of these books, has multiple interpretations. Personally, I am glad for it. To quote William Cowper, "Variety is the spice of life, that gives it all it's flavor."

But back to cliche's. At twenty-one I was living as numb as possible. If I wasn't working, I was spending my time alone in my home hiding from the world, and myself. The blinds were drawn as I slept all day, with only my movies,books, and constant eating to keep me company at night. The nature of my religion had strict policies on drugs and association with people outside my faith, so I unsuccessfully attempted to live in a middle ground. Ironically scared of losing my family, which had already slipped away. I did my best not to think, or feel, feeling out of options in my prison of the mind fucked.

As fate would have it though, I found just the right catalyst I needed for the difficult decision I had been putting off for so long. A man who would turn out to be one of my best friends. Someone who had lived a childhood raised in the same religion as me, but had left it to live his own life. We talked for hours while the drudgery of work passed by unnoticed. He was amazed to met somebody like me working in the facotry, and I was equally astonished. We mostly just talked about our love for books, and the many books we had read. Literature being the love of my life, I couldn't help but admire him. I even told him something I hadn't told myself in years. I always wanted to be a writer. I started telling him all these idea's I had for books, and it was like a dam had broke in my soul, and all this energy and strength came pouring out. I no longer felt like I was dying every day. I had more will to live then I knew what to do with. There were no cliche's! I had a myriad of options. I could do anything, get to know anyone, I had no rules except my own. I was free. I wrote everyday for hours. At work, at home, even writing at bars(for the first time)and getting to know people from all walks of life. To do these things, I was shunned from all my family and friends I have ever known. They would no longer talk to me, look at me, or acknowledge my existence from that day on. But that was just a necessary evil. For the first in a long time...maybe even ever...I was living. I started smoking ciggerates, drinking, and enjoyed the ganja. Everything I did was a self affirmation of life.

But over the course of time something happened. All the people I met seemed small and lost. They let me down and disappointed me. My days started feeling the same, and my depression came back even worse then before. Without the support of my parents to bail me out in times of trouble, and the inexperience from learning to live for the first time in that big world with no rules I made a lot of bad mistakes. I eventually quit writing. I started drinking a lot, and doing other things that I had never done before. Anything to feel better. Anything to keep me from missing my family, which had become a source of unimaginable pain. My journey of life that I had set out on, was now a sad thing, with a sad and lonely person. I quit showing people anything I had wrote, because they always had a comment how it reminded them of someone else's work or movie. I quit going to parties, because it just felt like the same thing over and over. I quit talking to my friends, because it was as if I had that conversation over infinity in purgatory. I rarely prayed at all...only praying when I was on the verge of losing my mind. I felt trapped again. I couldn't go back and live a lie...and my life had become unbearable. What was I supposed to do now that there was nothing new?

Looking back I realize that I had a lot of people that cared for me. Good friends that were worried and helped me out. I will never forget how I ended up in the situation I did, or the things I learned that I never had to think about before. There were times, when I lay huddled on steps, trying to stay warm, trying to sleep before going to work, where I looked at life in ways I never could have come to. Some of the places I went were...horrible. Crack houses where I had to constantly wear my shoes, because there was needles on the floor. There was a place I stayed at once, where the toilet hadn't been working in three weeks, and shit was filled to the brim and dripping down the sides. Some of the few things I had left were stolen there. It wasn't from the guy that let me crash at his crib, but it still felt like a slap in face. That was were my prayer crystal was stolen. I didn't pray much after that, and still don't pray as much as I used to. Not all the places I stayed at were bad though, but it is human nature to focus on the bad, and those bad things stayed in my heart poisoning me for quite a while.

I never stopped fighting, and eventually the poison left. Maybe I prayed in those times and the times that followed more then I think I did. With all the ups and downs, I always found the strength to keep on struggling. I kept working and fighting to rise up from the ashes like the proverbial phoenix. As fate would have it, I met up with my friend from the factory. At the time I was on the verge of being homeless yet again. He let me into his home, and I lived for a time as "the guy on the couch". We had both been through a lot...we had both learned a lot. Our friendship growing again into something more meaningful from our experiences. We eventually got a place where the couch was just an option. I now know what real friendship is, and what it means to me in scales of importance. I have an understanding about life, and the pitfalls that I am susceptible to, whether it is a trap of my own mind or not.

The funny thing is, even though I have attained what I have been fighting for, and wanting for over two years, I still feel the tendrils of cliche touching tentatively at me, and at times trying to pierce my heart. Sometimes I look at what I have and find it lacking. The reality is that it is beautiful and precious. You cannot put a price on people that genuinely care about you, on friends that are heartfelt and honest. Will they let me down sometimes...of course. Just as I will them. A small price to pay I think, to no longer be alone on my yellow submarine. I try to be happy with what I have, and most of the time I am. The other things I need will be taken care of, and the other things I want may or may not happen. I guess these days, I take an adage from Samuel Goldwyn, "Let's have some new cliches!". I choose to live a good life, and be thankful for the things I have, and will experience. I choose not to let the bad things get me down. I choose to be a good friend, and be a good friend in turn. I choose to love life for what it is, and not what I want it to be. I choose contentment.