Category Archives: insomnia

fantasy vs. reality

Posted on by
2

When faced with fantasy becoming reality, I’ve noticed that a lot of people tend to shy away, at least at first. It seems that there is a fear to getting what you want.

A friend of mine recently bought a motorcycle that he’d been dreaming about getting for many months. One day last week, he idly called the dealership and asked if they happened to have one. He was taken aback when they told him that there was one sitting right there on the showroom floor. When faced with getting what he wanted, he balked… just for a few seconds. Then he pulled out his credit card.

This ‘balking at potentially actually getting what you want’ phenomenon I’ve seen many times. Some people would rather have the fantasy than the reality. Why? Perhaps because the fantasy holds no responsibility or consequence, whereas reality does? Maybe they are afraid that the reality won’t be as good as what they imagined? Maybe they are afraid of change? Maybe they don’t know how to have something good in their life; something they have craved and desired can now be an actuality and they don’t feel they deserve it?

more noise please

Posted on by
Reply

The view from my porch sucks. I’m sitting in a lawn chair, with a beer and a couplea candles burning down on the ledge. My view is of a parking lot awning and a street light. Oh look, there is a tree. Brilliant.

Where I grew up there was no special ‘view’ (“Oh look, honey! I can see a tree…don’t mind the powerlines and rooftops. We have a view!”).

It was just trees, hills, and sky. I didn’t have to have the world mediated through a porch viewfinder. It just was there. All of it – as Reverend Lovejoy calls it, “the cheap showiness of nature.”

Here, my view is limited by fake adobe and a garage structure and the constant rumble of the freeway. Airplanes fly overhead and cars cruise through the parking area.

I think Steven Jesse Bernstein said it best.

inspiration

Posted on by
Reply

“Inspiration” definition includes breathing, creativity, illumination.

I went for a ride yesterday. Clouds spotted the sky, but it was not overcast and the temperatures weren’t above 100F. It was lovely. When I woke up at 06:40 I had little feeling except an awareness that I wanted to be out of my house and on my bike. I put on my leathers and locked the door at 07:10. I knew I needed to eat, but the impulse over-rode my hunger. By 07:15 I was on the highway.

There are days when riding is not for pleasure or for practice, but sheer necessity. Only other motorcyclists understand how helpful being on the bike can be.

I rode north for an hour and a half up curvy mountainy roads. It was beautiful. My head cleared somewhat, but the low rumbling note of the exhaust pipe was conferring no answers.

Inspiration is that unique feeling of a lock and key fitting together, and click… something opens and you draw what feels like the first real breath you have felt in years.

I want to breathe again.

…