I haven't published much lately. Its on purpose. Its not that I haven't been writing, its that what I have been writing is complete horse shit. Not that most everything I write isn't, but the past 2 weeks of drafts are just toilet paper. Horrible, horrible stuff. Truly.

I skim through this journal every once and a while and see where I've been heading or what insights I've stayed true to or where I've come up short. To be honest, this hole blog is bullshit. At least 90 percent sheer bullshit. I'll be honest when I say that I haven't stuck to one god damn thing that I've wrote about. Positive at least. And that makes me feel shitty. It makes me feel fake. Like I just want to put on a front like I'm doing really amazing shit when really I'm sitting on the couch with my dick in my hand. Then I realized that the majority of what I put out on these pages is what I'm hoping to receive someday. I dont know if I've ever claimed to have embraced anything FULLY or began to transition into a different mindset FULLY but I have wrote some nice ideas I guess. Have I held onto them? Nope. Not one bit. I guess most of these posts have been personal pep talks for me to not give up yet.

I tend to write quite a bit about trying to like myself, trying to understand who I am. All that nonsense. The reason why I say that shit so much is because I fucking hate myself. 110 percent. Theres not one thing that I really 'like' about myself. Physically, emotionally, anything. And every time I try to rationalize some good or at least acceptable quality, I tend to tune myself out. I've heard it all before. " Love yourself because you're all you got". "You gotta love yourself before you can love anyone else". Blah blah blah... none of that makes any difference. I still dont like waking up. I still dont enjoy being this person. I've turned all the mirrors in my house around because I'm straight sick of looking at myself. I'm not who I thought I was. I'm not a good person. I'm a waste of skin and on most days, the only time that I actually feel alive is when I'm asleep. And thats fucked up. I've gotten to the point where I've just accepted all of this. I hate on myself so much that I believe thats all I really deserve. And if no one else has seen me as useful or worthwhile, why the fuck should I? I'm not going to waste my time with all that positive hoop blah any more. I am this way. It's not changing.

Anyway, I dont have anything prolific or uplifting to share. Shocker, I know. I'm really on my last foot right now. Every day when I wake up, I spend a good hour thinking if I'm okay with killing myself yet or if I should just check myself into a psyche ward or googling toxic home remedies. Fucking morbid. I broke down last week while I was doing the dishes and told my dad that I dont know what to do anymore. I kept saying 'I got nothing'. Every time he'd ask me what I'm gonna do, that's all I'd say. I told him I have no quality of life anymore. I dont even try to leave the house. I've given up all forms of communication. I gave up on my job. On school. On working out. I stopped eating for a few days. I'm confused and broken and slowly giving up and I dont know what theres left to do.

I'm done crying and being a bitch about everything though. I understand that my story isn't different or worse than probably anyone else so I can't sit around crying about shit. All I can do is try to not let my toxic behavior effect anyone else. This year has sucked. And I've said this every fucking year since 2008. Exponentially, every year since has been the pits. I've gone through every obstacle, falling at every given moment and doing it without any grace or tact. Just falling face first into drugs or relationships or low self esteem or lower self esteem or whatever. I just flop through life like a fish out of water and I dont see a pond in sight so I'm about to just kick it where I'm at.

shackles

theres been a few things in my life i've been a slave to. i've had chemical handcuffs. chained to bottles and hammy down phone numbers. i've worked for ass hats. tons. people who didn't see me as anything more than a tucked in shirt, a mop and another person to fire. i've stolen. alot. mostly from people who love me the most.

as far back into my past as these things are buried and will remain there, the one thing that still whips me when i turn my back and shackles me up at night is whatever is inside of me. that brooding ballsy bloodsucker that feeds on my foundation and my smiles.

i dont know what your purpose is. i dont know how to get rid of you. i have a hunch im not supposed to. you feel like you're attached to more than i know about. maybe your my heart. maybe your an infection.

whatever you are, i'd like my life back. thank you.

There is such a complex beauty to artists and their art. Truly is. Every one. At least thats how I see it. Some might call it other things like being fucking weird or off or " I just dont get him sometimes"; to each their own. I'm sure there's plenty of people who get hurt by artists ( cause we are crazy in doses) and then expect all of us to be demented drug addicts with long hair and small jeans, drinking coffee with a cigarette in one hand, art in the other who care about nothing but ourselves...

That actually doesn't sound too far off from me...

But seeing how I am myself though, I have to start to like that person some where along these lines. Eventually it'll happen. So on my way home I was thinking to myself how vague and unspoken creativity is to live in. Really. If you find an artist who's capable of doing their art in public, watch them. Not that its going to be a huge spectacle or anything, its just going to look normal. Its going to look like their doing what they're supposed to. Theres no conversations. Nothing gets between them and their focus. Their hand and the paper, eyes forward and straight putting the peddle down. Now, I'm sure theres artists on every extreme I left out; ones with complete distractions, with no drive and even less work ethic and others that just go fucking insane and mumble to themselves naked by an easle. Dont worry, I have not forgotten you.

All of this goes to my point which is: anyone who knows an artist, of any kind and any caliber of insanity, has to want to know whats going through their head. Maybe not on a day to day basis, but when they come up with shit, they do something brilliant or they do something completely bizarre that leaves you questioning if your even okay with that- thats when people start asking questions. They get curious. See, that right there is the artists card: NO ONE will ever see what goes on behind your eyes. THEY WONT KNOW! And confusing shit always makes people try to understand it. Thats why art always has some sort of interpretation to it. Its essential for art. Its a component to it. There has to be some way to look at what ever it is, whether it be a dance routine, a painting, a novel, in a way that isn't for plain face value. Because at face value, honestly, a lot of art is down right silly bullshit. And other times, its just intensely perplexing. Structure doesn't exist. Aesthetics, manners, barriers of any sort- no where. But because art is beautiful and its not something everyone can do, it is appreciated and analyzed and picked apart and put up on walls and tattooed on bodies. This almost gives the artist an inherited brilliance. A endowed meaning that, for all you know, might be completely undeserved. He might have just drawn a raven... because... he likes birds. YOU'LL NEVER KNOW!


Knowing would ruin shit though. Symbolism in itself would be completely wrecked. There would be signs and paintings and letters that would mean distinctly different things then they do to us now, and that would be lame. We've handed down hundreds of symbols from places that we aren't 100% positive of their true intended meaning. And thats half of the fun- getting to create our own meanings. Now, sometimes it might be fulfilling to know the story behind some work or hear how the gears move, but then again, we are the artist. We might not be able to fully articulate that process or what happens during it. Sometimes I black out. Then, I'll just go back and fill in the blank as creatively and meaningful as possible. THEY WILL NEVER KNOW! WE CAN ALL MAKE UP

CRAZY

SHIT!

For this reason, the vague is a powerful place to stay in. Especially if you aren't destructive. If you're destructive, you can't take on this responsibility correctly. You'll produce bad. Lots of bad. Not that I'm not destructive in ways, or that every artist for that matter is, but the ones who know how to hone it and create positively from that odd negative area are the ones who get noticed. They're also the ones who can extend this grey area into other dynamics of their life. Actions, phrases, character, the work place.

So today, I went into work. I sat down for the best salad in my life and started discussing the program I wrote up last week. I didn't hear back from my boss for almost 6 days and I was beginning to feel that he might have hated it, realized how incompetent I am and already contracted someone with a PH.D to write a program that didn't look like a fucking one legged monkey wrote it upside down and blind. But sure enough, he liked it. I asked him if there was anything he wanted me to note and he said

' Well, we'll have to work on the video selection that you decide to show and when. But other than that, I was asking myself for a second why you picked certain topics for certain days. Then I realized that each day was like a building block for the next. Certain topics can't be discussed with out the others already there and so on.'

I looked at him confidently and said

'Yup. Thats how I wanted to do it too. I couldn't just start off talking about the big stuff at the end because that wouldn't make a cohesive meaning. I'm not here to shove the kids.'

As I was driving home tonight, I tried to think about if I actually creatively thought that out. I will not share that with you.... But I will tell you... I fucking didn't. Straight up. I didn't sit there and say ' Oh, how can I make this look like I'm building up to something AMAZING? ' or ' This is going to fucking matter'. I just did it. I wrote down some ideas on a bunch of paper, watched some t.v and drank some water, looked down at the paper and said ... nothing. It just happened that way.

Maybe the vague isn't something we even know about. It can even be confusing to the artist. Its sorta violent that way. It just comes over us like an demon, gets left in areas we allow it and later, when the clouds pass, the wind stops and everything settles down, we look back and say

Yup. I wrecked that shit.

Thats art. Thats our exclusionary clause right there. We dont have to explain. Your minds will explain it perfectly for us. We depend on your judgment and your criticism. Your stares and confusion. Without them, we might not even understand that what were doing- matters at all. However, there is this one rad super power to being an artist and thats this:

We can just make shit up and take credit for being awesome.

Not much beats that.

head still ringing

What a hell of a weekend. Theres only a few experiences in life that help you understand you're apart of something much bigger than yourself. This was one of them. I feel blessed. And thats a total understatement.

We'd been planning to go to Lollapalooza since April of this year. We just had to go. It was going to be on my brothers birthday, there was tons of amazing musicians we wanted to see and on top of that, we both were do for a much needed reward. Life hasn't been the kindest these past few years. I've struggled in almost every possible way; through addiction, heart ache, homelessness and fights. However, everything up until a few weeks ago was telling us it wasn't going to happen. I barely had enough money to feed myself, let alone throw down 200 some dollars for a concert. Then, the universe began to work with me. I found myself a source of funds that allowed us to just barely buy tickets before they got ridiculous. This helped me realize that sometimes, hoping is half the battle. I simply had faith it was going to work out. Everything. We WERE going to get our tickets. We WERE going to get down there. We WERE NOT going to be sleeping on the streets. And thankfully, it all paid off so awesomely.

Last week was hectic though. I had mad work on my plate to accomplish before setting sail. And after all that was done, we still had to find a place to stay once we got to Chicago. Tickets were one thing. We knew we would be seeing our shows. But up until last Wednesday, we didn't have a floor to crash on. Everything just fell into place for us though. Everything. One of my brothers friends moms was kind enough to take us in. And not only that, but she was kind enough to feed us delicious home cooked meals and stories that I'm not sure can ever be topped. I'm still weighing out which was better- seeing our favorite dubstep groups or meeting someone who played Risk in the nude with Alan Ginsberg. Tough one right there.

Saturday was nuts. For a lot of reasons. For one, having numerous people we were trying to meet up with every hour was so intense to keep up on. With 300,000 people packed within a couple miles of each other, phones just didn't work how they should. Texts wouldn't send, phone calls could be made in disappointing intervals. It was ridiculous. For two, I can say now, even though I realize how sad it is to say this at my age, I definitely should have stretched out before going to the park. Full fledged, every body part, neck, shoulders, back, everything. With trying to find all those people, and trying to get to shows on time, we were standing/ walking/ dancing for 8 hours. Apparently, that does more to a body than I anticipated. Even with the laziest dougie and head bob I threw down, I still ended up stiff as fuck by 9:30. I had to push through that shit though. There was too much to enjoy to worry about my back snapping in half. Beats Antique, Pretty Lights, Super Mash Bros ugh... too much deliciousness for my ears and mind to worry about stupid body parts. I do have to say that Cee Lo... was so... fucking... wack. I really want to know whats going on with him. He needs to go back to his Gnarls roots. Just stop dude. Seriously. Stop.

The train ride back that night felt like hell. Literally. The train was pack front to back and on top of that, it was a sauna. No joke. Just hundreds of sweating, drunk zombies sweltering in this hot box waiting for their stop. It was so rugged. So. Rugged. I think the shower that night was one of the highlights.

The next day, I could barely move. I had this beautiful migraine setting up shop EVERYWHERE in my head. Front, sides, back by my neck. It was great. The bass in Perrys tent was getting so loud that peoples noses were bleeding. Sound ordinances were getting broken. Sets were getting shut down. I think a couple of screws in my head were coming loose too. Anyway, I woke up and had a beautiful conversation with a fellow artist/ writer for about 2 hours. Talked about everything. It got real. I like that. Then, I walked into where my brother was sleeping and said " YO, so its getting late and we need to figure shit out. ONE MORE DAY, lets get it buddy." He looked like ass. We got moving though, and made it down to the park in time for me to catch the last half hour of The Cool Kids, who also got cut off right before Asher Roth came on stage for some shit. He came all the way there for just that little part... and he couldn't even do it. Whatever, I dont really like that guy anyway.

We spent about 45 minutes sitting down after that. We found a nice little spot where grass still existed and sat like pros. Another hot ass day. Everything was throbbing. In the back ground we could hear the constant rattling of 12th Planet and Chuckie, so we weren't missing out on much. I still heard what I needed to. Then, I looked at the sky line and noticed the clouds were coming in fast. And dark. I was happy. A little rain would be fucking great right about now. It was getting close to Jr. Gong and Nas' set, so we hiked our way over to that side of the park. By the time we got our spots, the rain came. And I dont just mean drizzling, little cooling type rain. This was a down pour. It looked like something straight out of the catacombs of Woodstock. The ground quickly turned to half inch mud. Peoples clothes came off. We got drenched from head to toe. Everything. Shorts, shoes, my wallet is still soaked. The crowd would cheer every time the rain came down harder and harder. It was hard not to appreciate the elements at that point. Then the sound of guitars and tambourines came on through the speakers and suddenly, the rain stopped. The clouds parted for Nas and Damian to come out and wreck shit. They came out so hard. That set was so hard. Period. Hands down, one of my favorite shows of the weekend. Ailments and all. Probably the only songs I actually sang along with. They didn't let me down at the Rock the Bells two years ago, and they definitely didn't let me down this year. Amazing.


Afterward, I had to fuckin sit down for a second. I had to. My back was done for. I was shivering. I had to take my shoes off and try to squeeze as much water out as I could. The streets were filled with muddy, ready to go folks. We sat by the fence eating some shit and people watching for a little bit. We had about an hour till Deadmau5 came on. My brother started trying to set up our ride back to the burbs when I looked up and noticed ANOTHER fucking storm was coming. Much more dark than the last one. And this one was coming in fast. We looked at each other and agreed that we couldn't make it through another downpour. We were still wet from the last one. So I had to make one of the hardest decisions in my hole life: stay for Deadmau5 or make it to safety.

We left. Reluctantly and pissed off at my wussy behavior, we decided to walk. As we left, we heard just as many people walking around us pissed off that they had to leave too. So at least we weren't alone in the decision.

All in all, this was a hell of a weekend. A music festival is something everyone should experience at least once in their life. It was a utopia. Tons of great people all gathering together to appreciate life and music and each other. A place where drugs are used like water out in the open, where people let go of who they were on the outside of those gates and a place where everything going on is something worth partaking in.


But god, these were some extremely fancy Pretty Lights huh?