time to begin again...not anew, just again

He looked at his own Soul with a Telescope. What seemed all irregular, he saw and shewed to be beautiful Constellations; and he added to the Consciousness hidden worlds within worlds." -Samuel Taylor Coleridge, "The Notebooks"

falling

It is such a wonderful, tender moment, when you fall in love. The duration of the falling itself is inexplicable. Sometimes it is a torturous tumbling of years, other times it is a fleeting moment of two pairs of eyes meeting on the street. But the feeling itself, once you have fallen lasts forever in your mind.

I remember the summer that I fell in love with John Keats. And today I remember him with more affliction than most days.

No, no! go not to Lethe, neither twist
Wolf's-bane, tight-rooted, for its poisonous wine;
Nor suffer thy pale forehead to be kissed
By nightshade, ruby grape of Proserpine;
Make not your rosary of yew-berries,
Nor let the beetle nor the death-moth be
Your mournful Psyche, nor the downy owl
A partner in your sorrow's mysteries;
For shade to shade will come too drowsily,
And drown the wakeful anguish of the soul.

<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<But when the melancholy fit shall fall
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<Sudden from heaven like a weeping cloud,
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<That fosters the droop-headed flowers all,
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<And hides the green hill in an April shroud;
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<Then glut thy sorrow on a morning rose,
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<Or on the rainbow of the salt sand-wave,
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<Or on the wealth of globed peonies;
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<Or if thy mistress some rich anger shows,
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<Emprison her soft hand, and let her rave,
<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<And feed deep, deep upon her peerless eyes.

She dwells with Beauty -- Beauty that must die;
And Joy, whose hand is ever at his lips
Bidding adieu; and aching Pleasure nigh,
Turning to poison while the bee-mouth sips;
Ay, in the very temple of delight
Veiled Melancholy has her sovran shrine,
Though seen of none save him whose strenuous
tongue
Can burst Joy's grape against his palate fine;
His soul shall taste the sadness of her might,
And be among her cloudy trophies hung.

-Ode On Melancholy by John Keats

unlike a parasite

unlike a parasite, originally uploaded by prettyjjbean.

As defined on wikipedia: "A Mutualism is an interaction between individuals of two different species, where both individuals derive a fitness benefit, for example increased survivorship. Similar interactions within a species are known as co-operation. Mutualism may be classified in terms of the closeness of association, the closest being symbiosis, which is often confused with mutualism. One or both species involved in the interaction may be obligate, meaning they cannot survive in the short or long term without the other species."

trapped inside the labyrinth

trapped inside the labyrinth, originally uploaded by prettyjjbean.

Sometimes it is difficult finding our way back through the mirror. As much as I desire to write here, to draw there, to photograph this, or cook that the hours and energy disappear without even trying. I'm trying to make an effort to push myself, to see things, to observe and become inspired. So often, it is easy to watch the weekend pass by in front of our laptops, catching up with rss feeds, doing laundry, watching Netflix tv episode after episode... Before we know it, Monday has arrived and our brains are still the same size as they were when we left work Friday night. I find myself in much better spirits walking and discovering, breathing the "fresh" air of New York streets and parks.

It would have been so easy just moments ago to drift off to sleep and let the day pass un-noted. I have to give myself a swift jolt and deny myself that pleasure for the moment. Instead tomorrow, I will be able to say I have written something. I have photographed something. I went somewhere. I did something worthwhile this weekend.*

*read this past week from The Healthy Brain Initiaive - A National Public Road Map to Maintaining Cognitive Health: "Mental health encompasses emotional functioning and the ability to think, reason, and remember (cognitive functioning). While standardized, widely accepted definitions of cognitive health have yet to be adopted, most experts agree that the components of healthy cognitive functioning include: language, thought, memory, executive function (the ability to plan and carry out tasks), judgment, attention, perception, remembered skills (such as driving), ability to live a purposeful life."

before i sleep

I've been trying hard (ok, well not hard enough) to finish Dave Eggers' You Shall Know Our Velocity. It has been neither difficult nor extremely exciting reading. I tend to grab the book just before sleep catches me by my eyelids, finishing only 10 pages or so a night, quite unlike my normal reading tendencies. Finally nearing the last 25 percent of the book and a couple passages have struck hard and true. One a gentle yet firm reminder that sometimes all the pieces of our knowledge don't add up to equal anything understandable. Another, not so pertinent to me personally as of late, but good words that I've been able to pass on to others regarding work frustration, future career paths, perhaps it applies to our own personal growths as well.

"It's a decadent mind , a mind that has known ennui and passed through it to something more dangerous, that wants fictional contraptions over the more difficult - sometimes more obvious and clear, other times utterly incomprehensible - truth of fact. But this is the opinion of a man who knows nothing, and it's the opinion that I throw at you to make you angry. Anyway, I read news and look for and collect facts because so far they they haven't added up to anything. I had pictured, as a younger man, that the things I knew and would know were bricks in something that would, effortlessly, eventually, shape itself into something recognizable, meaningful. A massive and spiritual sort of geometry - a ziggurat, a pyramid. But here I am now, so many years on, and if there is a shape to all this, it hasn't revealed itself. But no, thus far the things I know grow out, not up, and what might connect all these things, connective tissue or synapses, or just some sense of order, doesn't exist, or isn't functioning, and what I knew at twenty-seven can't be found now." (p.276)

"I believe in fact, and I believe in the plain truth told wholly - that the truth be retold can be a net thrown around life at a certain time and place, encompassing all within, and that people can go out there, live as actors, work within their staging ground, do so with a soft heart; I want others to go out in the world with an idea, with intentions and means, and come back with a story about how their actions affected the world and how they themselves were shaped by the results. I have a belief that such endeavors can improve the world, however recklessly, especially when these people go forward and interact, give, solve, change the situations they encounter - and also, even those with no intentions of recording their actions. There's nothing to be gained from passive observance, the simple documenting of conditions, because, at its core, it sets a bad example. Every time something is observed and not fixed, or when one has a chance to give in some way and does not, there is a lie being told, the same lie we all know by heart but which needn't be reiterated." (p.297)