Maps

Creased like the spine of your favorite novel- spontaneously taking you back to the moments you found most moving – each line is duly paid for with time. Your skin is the receipt for your experiences, stained from those summer days you stayed in the sun too long. From the knowing smile at the white lies you let your daughter get away with, to the flushed cheeks you hid beneath your hands because your admirer caught you staring; From your lover’s kisses that have now curled your lips the way they used to curl your toes, and the lifetime of worries nested in the brow that weighs on the lids of your eyes. I can trace your stories along each of these lines. Years of pain has burrowed deep in the joints of hands that have as many impressions as you have made on the lives of others. They brush the thinning hair from eyes that have witnessed and weeped for both loss and love. And of all this, I have none. My skin is smooth and lips full. My eyes are bright and hands strong. But I see you and now I know that, if I am lucky, I will one day look like you- mapped with the diary of my history.

A Mental Hard-On

Intellectual stimulation is a foreplay often forgotten

I’ve

come

to the conclusion

that my attraction to men

many years- decades-my senior,

is a misplaced credit

to their

age.

In fact,

my attraction

has less to do with

a kind of freudian temptation,

but rather I’m drawn to the magic of a mind

swollen with the nectar of intellect

and a wisdom that

 comes

from experience.

This has become an attraction

that not just outweighs the typical pull

of the usual superficial attributes, but has the power

to completely void them. A quick wit,

a talent for wonder,

and a wet

appetite

for

mental

stimulation:

yes!

The Evolution of Our Decay

How arrogant must one be to think he is exempt from the laws of nature when his very existence is a result of such laws.

Everything in nature is there because it fought like hell to be there and negotiated with its environment for existence in exchange for function. As a part of the natural world humans do not hold an immunity to this fundamental desire to exist, but must recognize that there is no tree without water and no water without oxygen- that our place in this world must have a function that promotes the existence of that which sustains us. Otherwise, we risk being the casualty of a renegotiated environment.

Before the BANG there was ?

pul·sate

/ˈpəlˌsāt/

Verb

1. Expand and contract with strong regular movements

The audacious ‘?’ is the driving force in the expansion of knowledge. It forces us to take a closer look and reexamine all that our lazy minds have accepted without trial. It causes entire systems to be reinterpreted and interrupted, and through the pursuit of the answer often comes more questions. Many times we find ourselves stuck in between question and answer, and have to take a step back to insure we’ve asked the right question before moving forward. And once we’ve finally found the answer, our tiny declarative period will morph into another ‘?’ to be explored.

This is the pulse of Science

and the core of Human Evolution

My fear is that our ego will one day make us feel so superior and removed from this pulse that we will abandon the desire to fuel it. If this happens, then the only evolution left to observe will be that of our own decay.

PopQuiz

 That moment between letting go and your next adventure when you realize you’re a million feet above ground and have nothing to hold but your breath.

Gossip Milk

Gossip milk has stained your lips.

Don’t kiss me.

I’m intolerant.

(We can’t pick our family, but we can define our relationships with them. Somewhere we’ve lost the power to establish boundaries in our relationships under the notion that familial titles come with fixed entitlements.)

Gasoline Smoke Screen

You bought me a drink

Wanted to see how far I’d let you go

My song played on the radio

Close the curtains I’m not an early riser

Blackout

Pass the vodka before you pass out

I now hate my favorite takeout

I only recognize you after midnight

That new bar sucks

I missed your call last night

Your kinda cute in the sunlight

Click

I’m not photogenic

You keep that up and your face will stick

You pour me another cup then we fuck

Whats the name of that one song Turn it up

Just text it

Don’t come up

You complain I’m getting cryptic

You like to fight

Shhhh

I like the make up

Maybe sometime next Tuesday

Voicemail

I hate the way you smell

Not this week next week

Fail

You hate that my lipstick stained your pillow

 I haven’t been around

I threw your vintage tee out my window

Slight meltdown

Oh hello

My long hair is gone now

You look the same

Whats your friend’s name

Climax

Sure of himself

Knows what he likes

Respectful but no pushover

Smart but not an intellectual snob

In control but knows when to take a step back

Can hold a conversation but not afraid of silence

Appreciates the arts but would never call himself an artist

Sure in his beliefs but not before considering the opposing perspective

Can be silly and playful but knows when to put away the games

Confident and charismatic but never arrogant or contrived

Compassionate and loyal without a self sabotaging pride

Spontaneous with a reasonable sense of practicality

A gentle giant with a pair of handcuffs

Physically strong but not aggressive

Thoughtful without asking

He’s an honest listener

An amazing lover

To Wage A War In This Weather

Going to college wasn’t discussed growing up, it was assumed. Both of my parents have degrees and a child of theirs was not a child of theirs unless they too had an expensive sheet of parchment displayed in an overly priced frame. And you’d think parents of this delusion would have at least prepared the funds for such an overt expectation. However, I suppose they fell in the same category most parents now find themselves in; a college education or the mortgage? (and with twins? please!) After all, college is costing more and more every year and it now takes an average of 5 years to complete a bachelors degree program. Is it all really worth it?

Honestly, a diploma doesn’t mean much more than the preparatory certification I received after my state exam in piano when I was 7. Yes, after a year of private lessons I am now officially  prepared to study the piano.

Don’t get me wrong. I think college is an invaluable tool for networking and establishing “street cred” in the world of academia. It can open doors that might take years to get to otherwise. But in the time it has taken most of my peers to get a bachelors degree I have been able to gain enough working experience to fall in the “degree or equivalent experience required” category. However, the difference is that I’m debt free and won’t spend a lifetime trying to pay off a depreciating piece of paper, make more than most entry level positions are paying, and am more equipped to navigate a world they’ve not yet experienced.

What could be the other side of this coin?

The job market is a very discriminating place. On one hand you have the old boy corporation where the college issuing the degree is more important than the actual accomplishment – or any real accomplishment for that matter- and then you have the “or equivalent experience required” corporation- a bigoted spawn of the first with a separate but equal mentality of the concept. This corporation would like to think they’re the next Facebook or Youtube with fantasies of a particular breed of employee that is young, smart, and forward thinking; a glorified drop-out with traits only incubated within the walls of an institution as old and antiquated as the material used to build it. But in reality, the ‘equivalent experience’ gets a back seat to the college stamp of approval.

So all I can do is distract the interviewer with my track record and passion for [industry] just  for them to take “an out of character chance on me’. Only so that I may prove my way into the actual position I’ve applied for and be looked upon as a meager intern from my colleagues who are degreed. And the irony? I’ve interviewed these kids. I’ve hired, fired, and promoted them.

Going from assistant to managing director is an exhausting climb I realize wouldn’t have been as steep if I had graduated. But will it be in my future? Perhaps. I take classes now on a case by case basis as it relates to my current experience. If I need to brush up in accounting, I’ll enroll in a night class. Marketing? There’s an online class for that. My education has worked for me this way. It allows for a practical application of what i’m learning and more flexibility than a counselor telling me I’ve taken too many units. The information I’m getting is current and therefore interesting. I’ve learned to take my education on as my life long responsibility and have embraced the fact that it is dual sided- the practical and the institutional- and you can not rely too heavily on one over the other.

“I [will] never let my education get in the way of my learning” – Mark Twain

Nine Eleven/11

Over and over again it played on the mounted TVs in every classroom as an eerie silence from the neighboring airport whistled through the deserted halls. Teachers were replaced with newsmen and each class began to the tune of a breaking update. Most parents took their children out of school, at first because of the proximity to the airport, but later to mourn in the presence of family. Mine wasn’t the only school disrupted by the tragedy of what happened, but a mere reflection of a nation whose hearts were glued to New York.

A hole remains in the skyline of a city that still beats and whether you believe it was an inside job or an act of terrorism, the fact still remains that thousands of people lost their lives while others have been changed forever. Let our memory serve as a reminder never to take the days afforded us for granted because we can never predict when or where our last moment will fall.