Art Intimidating Life: The Ruins of my Mental Empire - Part Thirty-One

these days world-famous musicians who've sold millions and millions of albums world-wide are making mention of the stupidity and mindlessness of my local (elected?) leaders - this recently, and the regular phone-calls and family dinners bring me back to the exact neighbourhood in which i grew up - more so, i've moved into a neighbouring neighbourhood with lady-elle which keeps it in within reach - last weekend i was pushing a trolley in a supermarket and saw myself as the boy-child looking up at myself in my army-shirt and hangover - i wonder if it was then i decided as a child i wouldn't shave too often as an adult - i see the same stores where they were when i was a child - i tell the owners - i grew up around here - and they pretend to care - i see familiar faces everywhere i go - yesterday i sped down somewhere different in order to eat lunch somewhere different and saw the same sandwich man working somewhere different - more halal - i eat my lunch at the bench with my hood-covering my face - reading brouchers selling meditation and mantra as i watched skirts and suits talk on telephones to a meeting with someone they only like because they make them feel good about themselves much like a social-networking website, but over lunch - i'm alone and take my time but eat quickly as i haven't eaten for twenty-four hours, which seems to happen at least once a week for one reason or another - i use my adulthood, and make the most of it, but realise you can never escape your childhood - i don't fear truths like that - it's a balancing act, of what’s acceptable and whats not - what to take from it, what to keep and store, and what to leave and distance yourself from - you can't keep it all as you've got to make room for taxes and annual leave - music seems to put a smile on people’s faces, i guess because it's not so desperate - you store it in your head and don't have to consciously carry it around with you like, for example, a finger painting - i remember in my first ever year of primary school, we were presented with finger paintings at the end of the year, that we'd apparently painted ourselves on the first day of school - i was adamant i had nothing to do with the painting presented to me - i did not paint this, i told them - this is not mine, fuck you - and i was serious too - at least i remember feeling serious and so strongly about been given a painting that wasn't mine - i didn't want my name put to this shit - but it's hard to be taken seriously at any age before you turn twenty-five - but hey - perhaps it was mind, and my mind was still developing at the tender age of six (it's possible) and i simply didn't recall painting it - but like a dog's urine, i know when something isn't for me - i'll walk into a room and either spike up or slink back - i'll receive an invitation, and simply reply with the feeling that i can't see myself attending - for no real or logical explanation, i just know what i should and shouldn't be doing - and i don't fight it but it's hard to explain to the outsiders - why not? - i just need to find the right book to keep me going - music is like oxygen or alcohol, whereas books are like women - i feel good when there is one around - you develop a relationship with them - you spend quality time with them - you spend the weekend with them - the same can be said about music and albums, but i'm a slow reader and keep my eyes and ears open - i wake up in hot sweats for no reason whatsoever - none that come to mind during the confusing grey fuzz bombs of an early am wake-up call - voices, explosions, and a sense of confusion you just can't shake off before too long - a personal war to keep you up at night, coinciding with the never-ending expectation to perform - you're needed somewhere, all the time - you picture yourself walking through a cool green forest with creeks and streams, food to be found, and the distant gush of a waterfall somewhere - when in reality you're in your hometown again, walking through the drizzling rain on the way to work again, with nothing in your pocket but ten dollars so you can pay someone to make you a sandwich - nothing is closer to the truth but nothing can weigh or nudge reality closer towards one or the other - a mantra you recite while you're sitting on the toilet with your head in your hands - im this way because im honest to myself as much as i can be - everything would make so much more sense if i only allowed myself to lie and trick myself into believing i truly am a good person doing the best i can - but im not, and so it doesn't - everything is convoluted, twisted, warped and contradicting - it's hard to understand but still you think you understand, but you doubt yourself - a mangled mess of life and unthought-thoughts - the tangled wire holding your sanity together - the torn up map of your life scattered and lost in the dust just outside of sun-burnt farm-land - and you begin to calmly sweat