A Clear Pool

At work they like to talk about sex and glorify things like the improbable or the past... My human tendency to attempt to blend in with my surroundings is suffocating there. It's not that I don't want to talk about it, but that the atmosphere is all wrong. It messes me up a little bit. Lately I've noticed that I have many details of my life summarized, categorized and filed away to be brought up casually in small-talk and conversation. Maybe this is normal. But I hate it. It's true that I have very few friends. And anyone who tries to convince me otherwise is either too kind hearted or they don't know me. I thought it was kind of funny at first... then lonely... and now I realize that it is me. This small number of people I like and trust... in a way it makes up my idea of "who I really am". When I talk to them about the improbable or the past (or sex), I mean it. I really want to communicate with them. I want to have a connection, I want to share ...

It's ironic that I felt that I did not want to paint trees. "I'm bad at it." I protested.... "I prefer to painting people..." But I haven't painted that many people... ...and it seems that most of my more successful and emotionally invested work depicts them... bare, full, but always tall... always reaching. Maybe they are too much like a mirror for me. It's too frightening. As I draw them, I feel like my mind is weaving through the branches. Like I am the growing branches...reaching higher and higher. In so many directions. I think what scares me most in our similarity is that growth. The tree is almost always growing upwards and out... sometimes even conflictingly. Sometimes, it looks like the branches are growing downwards...but at one point, there were upwards... and out... But over time, those branches weave into one other, point down and inward. And to the tree, it must feel so counter-productive. It has spent lifetimes trying to re...

After the immense stress of finals and the end of the semester, I kind of feel broken. Like I need to reboot. Sleep. I didn't die that one time. I was almost vying for it, but who cares? At this point, it's just another failed expectation. Though, I feel like I'm a bit burnt out on expecting anything. I still have both eyes. Something did change, though, on that day. I didn't feel disappointed, like I thought I would. But, I started to feel suspended, in time. Like the aspects I tried to separate from each other suddenly looked around and realized they were all the same thing. And the feeling was just, "huh, so that's how it is, I guess". I still feel a little anxious sometimes, when I contemplate just how big my expectations were. And even more so, when I stop to realize just how big many of my hopes still are. But if I don't expect anything, can I really materialize my hopes and dreams? Maybe not. And I won't know unless I do. At this p...