I am such a failure. Such a wreck. A real train wreck. I didn't pass school. I have no job, no income. I have no apartment, starting August. I have no car. And everyone I'm friends with keep letting me down, they just keep letting me down, I keep helping friends in need, they keep ignoring my problems, they keep not helping me back.
Sometimes it's not what you do, it's what you don't do.
I don't know what to fucking do, I just don't know what to do. I'm so blank and so torn. I'm so sad and so angry. I have no outlet.
I have no creativity.
I have no words.
I have no skills.
I have no talent.
I'm just pestering this Earth with the burden of my existence.
Everything just totally fucking sucks.
POET IN THE JAR
Saturday, June 8
Thursday, May 23
Repairman
I was a castle, made of sand,
Made of millions of grains.
I stood guard, proud and tall,
Until I was washed away.
The grains spread out and separated,
My castle walls torn down.
The rooms that I had decorated,
Sent to sea to drown.
Then, planlessly I drifted,
Undesired and ungifted,
Until the ocean shifted,
And a single grain was found.
Then, you rebuilt my castle walls,
And brought me back from sea.
And you sought out to find them all,
The grains that once were me.
Now every time I feel despair,
When I remember washing away,
I know that I can be repaired,
And time can still be made.
So should your castle ever fall,
I'll fix up your broken walls,
And collect your scattered pieces all.
If I have to search the entire sea,
I'll do it for you,
Like you did it for me:
Unconditionally.
Friday, May 17
A Tiny Sketchbook
So I just wrote a poem. Or rather forced it out of me. I quite dislike it. It's just missing something, that I'm sure my old poems used to have when I was still feeling creative and ached to write. But then again, maybe that depends on how you look at it. Maybe I used to be able to write better poems because I didn't give a fuck about how it turned out. Instead of what I was doing now, weighing words against eachother, changing sentences, rearranging, staring at the page, wondering what it was that I wanted to say.
A couple of weeks ago I bought a sketchbook. A tiny one, the kind of pad that you can shove down your jeans pocket. I thought that if I started writing things down in it when they came to me I wouldn't have to spend so much time posting on Facebook and Twitter. That maybe if I wrote them down by hand they would have to mean something. That I might find my way back to the words that way. I don't know if it's been working yet. I've written a few things down in it in crazy spurts of racing thoughts, but when I look at it, well. It feels like it wants to be more than it is. I guess I should just let go of trying to make it anything else than what it is. And not beat myself up about not filling the pages with masterpieces of poems or profound thoughts and ideas (not to mention excellent drawings and yes, no less than excellent). I think I still have to get used to having a physical book to write things in. I still have to make myself used to the idea that whenever I think about something I should want to grab that little book and jot it down. It seems like I have no particular thoughts to jot down. No particular ideas. I feel rather strangely blank after everything's that's happened for these past couple of days. The good thing about writing in a physical sketchbook is that you don't have to share it with the world. Which means you can write down things that are really personal and private.
Things I couldn't even share here.
I wonder if all my obsessiveness with medias and with my own trainwreck of a mind is making me appear heartless. If maybe people don't really get how my mind works. When I worry sick about something, like now; I just rather preoccupy myself with anything I can think of rather than deal with it. Perhaps a sickness, but then, at least I'm aware of it. At least I could do something about it (if I ever felt like it). I wonder if other people also contemplate how their minds work or if they just sorta go with it.
Can I entitle myself a poet when I hate my own words?
Can I exist when I don't struggle to write?
POET IN THE JAR
A couple of weeks ago I bought a sketchbook. A tiny one, the kind of pad that you can shove down your jeans pocket. I thought that if I started writing things down in it when they came to me I wouldn't have to spend so much time posting on Facebook and Twitter. That maybe if I wrote them down by hand they would have to mean something. That I might find my way back to the words that way. I don't know if it's been working yet. I've written a few things down in it in crazy spurts of racing thoughts, but when I look at it, well. It feels like it wants to be more than it is. I guess I should just let go of trying to make it anything else than what it is. And not beat myself up about not filling the pages with masterpieces of poems or profound thoughts and ideas (not to mention excellent drawings and yes, no less than excellent). I think I still have to get used to having a physical book to write things in. I still have to make myself used to the idea that whenever I think about something I should want to grab that little book and jot it down. It seems like I have no particular thoughts to jot down. No particular ideas. I feel rather strangely blank after everything's that's happened for these past couple of days. The good thing about writing in a physical sketchbook is that you don't have to share it with the world. Which means you can write down things that are really personal and private.
Things I couldn't even share here.
I wonder if all my obsessiveness with medias and with my own trainwreck of a mind is making me appear heartless. If maybe people don't really get how my mind works. When I worry sick about something, like now; I just rather preoccupy myself with anything I can think of rather than deal with it. Perhaps a sickness, but then, at least I'm aware of it. At least I could do something about it (if I ever felt like it). I wonder if other people also contemplate how their minds work or if they just sorta go with it.
Can I entitle myself a poet when I hate my own words?
Can I exist when I don't struggle to write?
POET IN THE JAR
Where Do You Wander?
Where do you wander?
When every second feels like an hour
When every moment is eternal
When you're lost in thoughts,
Lost in contemplation
In concern
When you burn
Where do you wander?
When you've emptied yourself of everything
When you've looked for yourself everywhere
When you can't breathe,
Can't oppose desperation
When you're inconsolable
When you're uncontrollable
I wandered the world, observed it in words
I trusted my eyes, and the whispers I heard
I dismissed what I learned,
I spent what I earned,
I lost myself
Until you returned
Where did you wander?
Sunday, May 12
Incompetence
Seemingly, late night rants is what I'm capable of these days.
As usual I can't sleep and this time it's for... different reasons. I've hit this period of weird insomnia. I'm just not friends with sleeping, from time to time. I don't know. Or well, I do know. My head is just too busy THINKING, that I can't possibly focus on DOING, and making anything actually HAPPEN. Instead I stay awake over every piece of dread I can possibly collect from my own head and heart, and maybe if I ponder them just ENOUGH, it might not just keep me awake for the night; it might just keep me awake for the rest of the WEEK. And yes, this CAPS use is necessary to convey my point.
I don't even know why coming here soothes me. It's just what I do whenever I'm going through a... crisis, or what to call it. I don't know a lot of things, these days. Everything feels unplanned. The future should be shining brightly ahead of me. Instead it's like this massive, poet-eating void of non-knowing. I've lived my whole life with a plan. Even when I thought I didn't have a plan; I definitely had SOME kind of plan; this time, everything is out there, everything is open, everything is closed. Geez, I fucking worry about everything. If I was a friend of mine, instead of being me, I might slap myself in the face and tell me to get off my high horses and stop feeling so goddamn fucking sorry for myself. What can I say? I can't help it. It's my "weak and sensitive nature". No, seriously, I can't relax until I've just SOLVED everything. And if that's your current main goal in life, imagine not being able to solve ANYTHING. Imagine not being able to solve your unemployment; your fear of abandonment, your family issues, what to do with your pets. Not being able to solve school, not being able to solve your writer's block, not being able to solve your insomnia. Not being able to solve the fact that you're considered a bad friend. Not being able to solve your recent passive obsessiveness with TV series that you can't quite explain except that it gives you a temporary moment of RELIEF. Relief from the guilt you feel about your inability to solve your given situation. Relief from all the chores you put off and all the achievements you couldn't accomplish. I'm in the middle of some weird fucking age crisis, or something, bloody hell knows what it is. I feel weak. I feel exposed. I feel disliked. I feel unloved. I feel alone. I feel completely, utterly, fucking INCOMPETENT and POWERLESS.
I guess the only reason I feel soothed by spilling this out into a blank text box online is that the written word doesn't judge me. Doesn't call me cowardly. Doesn't mock me. If, you don't count the fact that I've been dying to write something more CREATIVE without it ever spilling into this blank, empty, text box online. Let's say we don't count that. Let's say those veins of creativity are still flowing and are going to just pop open when they're ready. Because I swear to no particular deity, if those veins don't pop open soon, I'm going to have to resign my calling as a self-appointed world observer a.k.a. verbal describer of personal, subjective emotion and thought.
4, 8, 15, 16, 23, 42. Yep, I'm watching LOST. I can't even write a bloody blog post without the comforting background sound of the TV, assuring me that there are voices in the room, presence in the room, that the room isn't empty, that it's not just me, it's not just my voices.
The sun's up. I've got to be in university in... 3 hours. We'll see if I've got it in me to wrestle my own arch nemesis, called Sleep.
POET IN THE CHIPPED GLASS JAR
As usual I can't sleep and this time it's for... different reasons. I've hit this period of weird insomnia. I'm just not friends with sleeping, from time to time. I don't know. Or well, I do know. My head is just too busy THINKING, that I can't possibly focus on DOING, and making anything actually HAPPEN. Instead I stay awake over every piece of dread I can possibly collect from my own head and heart, and maybe if I ponder them just ENOUGH, it might not just keep me awake for the night; it might just keep me awake for the rest of the WEEK. And yes, this CAPS use is necessary to convey my point.
I don't even know why coming here soothes me. It's just what I do whenever I'm going through a... crisis, or what to call it. I don't know a lot of things, these days. Everything feels unplanned. The future should be shining brightly ahead of me. Instead it's like this massive, poet-eating void of non-knowing. I've lived my whole life with a plan. Even when I thought I didn't have a plan; I definitely had SOME kind of plan; this time, everything is out there, everything is open, everything is closed. Geez, I fucking worry about everything. If I was a friend of mine, instead of being me, I might slap myself in the face and tell me to get off my high horses and stop feeling so goddamn fucking sorry for myself. What can I say? I can't help it. It's my "weak and sensitive nature". No, seriously, I can't relax until I've just SOLVED everything. And if that's your current main goal in life, imagine not being able to solve ANYTHING. Imagine not being able to solve your unemployment; your fear of abandonment, your family issues, what to do with your pets. Not being able to solve school, not being able to solve your writer's block, not being able to solve your insomnia. Not being able to solve the fact that you're considered a bad friend. Not being able to solve your recent passive obsessiveness with TV series that you can't quite explain except that it gives you a temporary moment of RELIEF. Relief from the guilt you feel about your inability to solve your given situation. Relief from all the chores you put off and all the achievements you couldn't accomplish. I'm in the middle of some weird fucking age crisis, or something, bloody hell knows what it is. I feel weak. I feel exposed. I feel disliked. I feel unloved. I feel alone. I feel completely, utterly, fucking INCOMPETENT and POWERLESS.
I guess the only reason I feel soothed by spilling this out into a blank text box online is that the written word doesn't judge me. Doesn't call me cowardly. Doesn't mock me. If, you don't count the fact that I've been dying to write something more CREATIVE without it ever spilling into this blank, empty, text box online. Let's say we don't count that. Let's say those veins of creativity are still flowing and are going to just pop open when they're ready. Because I swear to no particular deity, if those veins don't pop open soon, I'm going to have to resign my calling as a self-appointed world observer a.k.a. verbal describer of personal, subjective emotion and thought.
4, 8, 15, 16, 23, 42. Yep, I'm watching LOST. I can't even write a bloody blog post without the comforting background sound of the TV, assuring me that there are voices in the room, presence in the room, that the room isn't empty, that it's not just me, it's not just my voices.
The sun's up. I've got to be in university in... 3 hours. We'll see if I've got it in me to wrestle my own arch nemesis, called Sleep.
POET IN THE CHIPPED GLASS JAR
Tuesday, April 23
I Provided For Myself
Hell, I'm such a wreck. Can't sleep, can't sleep, can't sleep. Funny how stress can make you feel so catatonic. There's a hell of a lot of things I could spend my time doing that would be more productive than how I've spent the last week. Games. Comics. TV shows. They all seem more important than straightening out my own life. How is that? How did this happen? I want to get my old energy back. I wonder where it went.
I was going to do Camp Nano for April, hell, I was looking forward to it. Haven't written a single word and won't write one. I feel so frustrated when I can't write. I have so many ideas, but every time I try to put it in words it's like I've lost my magic. Lost my touch. Words just come out wrong, sound cliché, every line is tired old crap. It's become somewhat... achievement-focused, my writing, and when I feel I can't achieve, I am blank. Out of words. It's like that time I used to spend thinking has gone haywire and I'm instead filling it with fictional universes, fictional characters, delving deep into plots behind make-believe stories. I guess this would be a good thing, if I was actually using it for something; but it's become a replacement for writing. Don't get me wrong... not looking for sympathy or for writing tips. Heck, if I wanted writing tips I could just follow my own. Heck knows I've got a lot of them. Doesn't help. I've fallen into a black hole of creativity. When I want to do something, everything else that I have to do piles up on me, and kills that little joy of creating that once flourished.
I mean, I could do so many things, I don't even need to write. I could draw or animate, whatever. But I just don't DO any of these things. I just feel so emptied. And what bugs me the most is, that I feel like I'm wasting every minute of every day. I have no idea what the future looks like for me. I don't know what the NEAREST future looks like for me. I'm trying to decide whether or not to give up this apartment, and I have to decide before May. It's risky trying to keep it, seeing as I don't even know if I'll be able to provide for myself after I graduate. Everything... not just school... my future... my summer... my life... my family... everything, everything, weighs on me. Maybe I shouldn't trouble myself... but I do.
I've been up all night, my sense of day and night is so fucked up. When I couldn't sleep at like 5.30 because I kept crying; I decided I might as well stay up all morning. Fuck sleep. Who needs to sleep? I'll try to get as much done today as possible and hopefully I'll fall down into bed exhausted tonight. Hopefully. Today I still have to finish my laundry, work on my thesis, clean up the apartment, prepare and host a work session for my extracurricular group and spend a few hours doing that. I need to apply for a couple of jobs and make a couple calls. This is what I plan to do and still I know I won't do them all. I'm always avoiding some chore or task. I've had enough, I don't even feel like an adult the way I'm living my life right now. I feel especially guilty that I haven't been to the office for over a week. But what can you do, right? I had to wait for my grade, so there wasn't much I could do really; but I should still have gone. Without a place to be each day it feels like my life has just been slipping away. And still I'd love to do what I choose with my life. I just want to get a steady income, doesn't have to be much, from a job that I don't hate and that doesn't bore me to death. I just want to feel good about life and enjoy living it. I don't want to be entangled this way. I don't want to be this far away from people I love. I don't want to keep looking back at memories because they make me feel better than the present moment does. I don't want to become frozen every time I even think of straightening out my life.
Funny, huh. Straightening out my life. There are people who would say I've got everything going for me, you know. About to graduate, the whole future ahead. Some kind of talent for some kind of creativity somewhere deep, deep down inside. Able to talk to people. Able to make people listen. Steady boyfriend. All that jazz. They say I'll work things out because I'm ambitious, things will work out. But they won't. I don't mean to be a cynic. They just won't. Things have never just "worked out" for me, at any point, in my life; the times they have worked out it's been because I made them work out. I made it work. It wasn't divine in any way. No one provided for me. I provided for me. And that's where the shoe fits, isn't it. I'm tired of making things work out. I feel bad when my projects and plans fall through; even when I've known from the beginning it'd be impossible to do it all. I feel bad when I don't spend my time doing chores, studying, applying for jobs or working on my portfolio. Thing is school is occupying my mind like HELL. And at the same time I just can't focus on it. It seems so trivial. What does it matter if I get a diploma in my hand in June? It doesn't. It's not gonna get me a job. A portfolio is going to get me a job. It's not gonna pat me on the back saying, Hey, you did GOOD! And it's certainly not going to pay off three years of studying loans. People just don't get that you can be completely broken, under a polished, seemingly alright surface. Why is this? Why don't people get that they're not the only ones who are more complex than a box of cereal?
Oh, I don't know. It felt like the right thing to do to come here, and I've learned so, so much. I thought three years spent at a fun education would be better than five years at an education I hated. I thought that if I spent three years here and then still didn't get a job, I could take any job, I'd still have those three years to remember. This just didn't happen. Now I'm panicking because I can't sort out what's going to happen. I'm unable to look past even a day at a time. I'm going to lose my apartment. My independence. Stuff is going on with friends and family. I worry to BITS. I've told myself to focus on my thesis for now, but I can't even do THAT.
To top it off this may very well be the most disorganized post I've ever made here. I apologize, or rather, I don't. I'm shit tired and I've gotta stay up for the rest of the day too. Yay. Yay!
POET IN THE BREAKING JAR
I was going to do Camp Nano for April, hell, I was looking forward to it. Haven't written a single word and won't write one. I feel so frustrated when I can't write. I have so many ideas, but every time I try to put it in words it's like I've lost my magic. Lost my touch. Words just come out wrong, sound cliché, every line is tired old crap. It's become somewhat... achievement-focused, my writing, and when I feel I can't achieve, I am blank. Out of words. It's like that time I used to spend thinking has gone haywire and I'm instead filling it with fictional universes, fictional characters, delving deep into plots behind make-believe stories. I guess this would be a good thing, if I was actually using it for something; but it's become a replacement for writing. Don't get me wrong... not looking for sympathy or for writing tips. Heck, if I wanted writing tips I could just follow my own. Heck knows I've got a lot of them. Doesn't help. I've fallen into a black hole of creativity. When I want to do something, everything else that I have to do piles up on me, and kills that little joy of creating that once flourished.
I mean, I could do so many things, I don't even need to write. I could draw or animate, whatever. But I just don't DO any of these things. I just feel so emptied. And what bugs me the most is, that I feel like I'm wasting every minute of every day. I have no idea what the future looks like for me. I don't know what the NEAREST future looks like for me. I'm trying to decide whether or not to give up this apartment, and I have to decide before May. It's risky trying to keep it, seeing as I don't even know if I'll be able to provide for myself after I graduate. Everything... not just school... my future... my summer... my life... my family... everything, everything, weighs on me. Maybe I shouldn't trouble myself... but I do.
I've been up all night, my sense of day and night is so fucked up. When I couldn't sleep at like 5.30 because I kept crying; I decided I might as well stay up all morning. Fuck sleep. Who needs to sleep? I'll try to get as much done today as possible and hopefully I'll fall down into bed exhausted tonight. Hopefully. Today I still have to finish my laundry, work on my thesis, clean up the apartment, prepare and host a work session for my extracurricular group and spend a few hours doing that. I need to apply for a couple of jobs and make a couple calls. This is what I plan to do and still I know I won't do them all. I'm always avoiding some chore or task. I've had enough, I don't even feel like an adult the way I'm living my life right now. I feel especially guilty that I haven't been to the office for over a week. But what can you do, right? I had to wait for my grade, so there wasn't much I could do really; but I should still have gone. Without a place to be each day it feels like my life has just been slipping away. And still I'd love to do what I choose with my life. I just want to get a steady income, doesn't have to be much, from a job that I don't hate and that doesn't bore me to death. I just want to feel good about life and enjoy living it. I don't want to be entangled this way. I don't want to be this far away from people I love. I don't want to keep looking back at memories because they make me feel better than the present moment does. I don't want to become frozen every time I even think of straightening out my life.
Funny, huh. Straightening out my life. There are people who would say I've got everything going for me, you know. About to graduate, the whole future ahead. Some kind of talent for some kind of creativity somewhere deep, deep down inside. Able to talk to people. Able to make people listen. Steady boyfriend. All that jazz. They say I'll work things out because I'm ambitious, things will work out. But they won't. I don't mean to be a cynic. They just won't. Things have never just "worked out" for me, at any point, in my life; the times they have worked out it's been because I made them work out. I made it work. It wasn't divine in any way. No one provided for me. I provided for me. And that's where the shoe fits, isn't it. I'm tired of making things work out. I feel bad when my projects and plans fall through; even when I've known from the beginning it'd be impossible to do it all. I feel bad when I don't spend my time doing chores, studying, applying for jobs or working on my portfolio. Thing is school is occupying my mind like HELL. And at the same time I just can't focus on it. It seems so trivial. What does it matter if I get a diploma in my hand in June? It doesn't. It's not gonna get me a job. A portfolio is going to get me a job. It's not gonna pat me on the back saying, Hey, you did GOOD! And it's certainly not going to pay off three years of studying loans. People just don't get that you can be completely broken, under a polished, seemingly alright surface. Why is this? Why don't people get that they're not the only ones who are more complex than a box of cereal?
Oh, I don't know. It felt like the right thing to do to come here, and I've learned so, so much. I thought three years spent at a fun education would be better than five years at an education I hated. I thought that if I spent three years here and then still didn't get a job, I could take any job, I'd still have those three years to remember. This just didn't happen. Now I'm panicking because I can't sort out what's going to happen. I'm unable to look past even a day at a time. I'm going to lose my apartment. My independence. Stuff is going on with friends and family. I worry to BITS. I've told myself to focus on my thesis for now, but I can't even do THAT.
To top it off this may very well be the most disorganized post I've ever made here. I apologize, or rather, I don't. I'm shit tired and I've gotta stay up for the rest of the day too. Yay. Yay!
POET IN THE BREAKING JAR
Wednesday, April 3
Emotion Explosion!
I'm having one of the strangest surges of emotion in my life. I'm bursting with pride, with sadness, with frustration, a glimpse of hope, a pinch of anger, and with an overwhelming topping of happiness and self-confidence. I wonder if other people are like this sometimes, or if it's just me. Seems to me that if a normal person had all these emotions at once they would explode. And I also feel as if I might explode any second - but I'm trying to keep it back, because I don't know if this explosion would take the form of laughter or choking tears. Life stretches out ahead of me, and it beckons with its inviting fingers, beckons me to better times and greener fields; but the road is lined with fear, fear of death, fear of age, fear of worse times, and withered fields. The future is a treacherous term. It should be treated with care and respect. Instead it has been hailed to the skies. "The future" is always something positive, something we should work towards and want for ourselves; but what is it really? Seconds that tick by counting down to the day we leave our bodies and this existence; seconds that fly by the older you get, seconds that are grains in the hourglass of human life and not even worthy of mention in the greater perspective of the universe.
Recently I applied for an animator's position at a local, rather successful, game development studio. I passed the first round, and got asked to do a work sample. Passing the first round was an achievement for me, seeing as it proved somebody had seen potential in my showreel, even though the reel had older material and wasn't optimally or professionally presented. With full time in school, I spent as much time on the work sample as I could, yet I told myself I wouldn't put any more time into it than I felt that I could afford. A decision thereby followed by an all-nighter before the deadline, creating animations in as little as four hours per animation. When I handed in a quarter before the deadline and stumbled exhaustedly into bed, I didn't feel achieved. What I did feel was a hunch that handing in despite the quality of the material, didn't mean I had wasted my time. And it turns out I hadn't. I didn't get the position, but I didn't expect to. What I did get, and what I didn't expect; was a written feedback on what was good in my material, and what I could have improved. Somewhere among the lines there was one line that seemed to stand out to me. The line was something like this: "It's clear that you have a good sense for animation". And this is when this email becomes good news - despite the fact that I didn't pass the second round.
Here's why.
A simple "You didn't make it" would have been convenient for the studio, but useless to me. I would know I wasn't good enough for their standards, but I would have no idea of what to improve or what to learn. A written feedback proving they have evaluated my content is generous for the studio, and useful for me. Now I know what I need to work on, and which my strengths are. Hearing this outside of a study environment, is extremely educational for me.
So I'm quite relieved my work wasn't hated, proud that they gave me positive feedback among the negative, happy that I took the chance to hand in and learning something, frustrated that I didn't put more time and effort into the sample, and finally I'm hopeful, because I know that I'll eventually learn these things, and eventually work with what I dream of working with - when I'm ready, and when I'll be needed.
I bet you couldn't guess this simple email was what caused my introductory philosophical stanza about life and the universe, now could you?
POET IN THE JAR
Recently I applied for an animator's position at a local, rather successful, game development studio. I passed the first round, and got asked to do a work sample. Passing the first round was an achievement for me, seeing as it proved somebody had seen potential in my showreel, even though the reel had older material and wasn't optimally or professionally presented. With full time in school, I spent as much time on the work sample as I could, yet I told myself I wouldn't put any more time into it than I felt that I could afford. A decision thereby followed by an all-nighter before the deadline, creating animations in as little as four hours per animation. When I handed in a quarter before the deadline and stumbled exhaustedly into bed, I didn't feel achieved. What I did feel was a hunch that handing in despite the quality of the material, didn't mean I had wasted my time. And it turns out I hadn't. I didn't get the position, but I didn't expect to. What I did get, and what I didn't expect; was a written feedback on what was good in my material, and what I could have improved. Somewhere among the lines there was one line that seemed to stand out to me. The line was something like this: "It's clear that you have a good sense for animation". And this is when this email becomes good news - despite the fact that I didn't pass the second round.
Here's why.
A simple "You didn't make it" would have been convenient for the studio, but useless to me. I would know I wasn't good enough for their standards, but I would have no idea of what to improve or what to learn. A written feedback proving they have evaluated my content is generous for the studio, and useful for me. Now I know what I need to work on, and which my strengths are. Hearing this outside of a study environment, is extremely educational for me.
So I'm quite relieved my work wasn't hated, proud that they gave me positive feedback among the negative, happy that I took the chance to hand in and learning something, frustrated that I didn't put more time and effort into the sample, and finally I'm hopeful, because I know that I'll eventually learn these things, and eventually work with what I dream of working with - when I'm ready, and when I'll be needed.
I bet you couldn't guess this simple email was what caused my introductory philosophical stanza about life and the universe, now could you?
POET IN THE JAR
Saturday, March 9
Do I Write Because I'm A Wreck Or Am I A Wreck Because I Write?
What could be said that hasn't already been said? What could be done that hasn't already been done? Welcome inside my head, it's a pinball machine, it's a storm of chaos and rage. I can't stop to think or I'll break. I can't stop to feel or I'll break.
There's a million things I should be doing right this moment, rather than typing this. A million things all weighing on my heart together with questions asked, questions unanswered, questions with answers I never wanted. Everything blurs together, races, is limitless. It's like my head is a ticking time bomb and sooner or later it's going to explode.
I can't stop to think.
I can't stop to feel.
The only thing I feel like doing creatively is writing and yet I haven't touched any of the stories I've been dying to write. There's so many options as to what I could spend my time doing, so many areas in which I need improving, so many things to practice, so many things to learn. It's all too much, too heavy. It's fucking with my head. I don't know what to think anymore, don't know what to do.
Today I read a passage from Stephen King's masterpiece handbook of how to write fiction. It said remember your character's back story. It felt like a whole world opened up to me. It felt like I could see all the lives of the characters I've created, each life as jagged as mine, each life so unruly, spreading out in multiple branches. It felt like I could just reach out and touch their darkness. Touch my own darkness.
I recognize these feelings, recognize the dark well of potential they are opening. It's like I'm being revisited by my muse. The one that used to burn so bright. The one that spread throughout my mind as if it was cancer but instead seemed to grant me an unlimited supply of words.
This is what I do when that happens. This is where I turn. The only craft I ever felt like I was close to mastering. The only craft so subjective, so persuasive, so tempting. The only craft that was ever fully mine. That felt like the area where I belonged.
Writing is an addiction to me. I've abandoned it and returned to it more times than I could possibly account for. When I'm not writing, my fingers are itching, my mind is racing. I feel like a traitor for not maintaining the only thing in the world that ever made me feel like I was immortal. I fight writer's block. I fight my own hubris. Most of all I fight life. With the attitude I've seemingly been gaining lately - the idea that life sucks, and is always going to work against you.
Why is it that when the world seems the most pointless, the words appear; why is it so easy to fall into the fantasy of my own head when life doesn't play out like I expected? Can you call it a muse, can you call it a craft? Can you call it the downside of any creative work? Are all writers like me? Is everyone who appreciates the work of written words a self-doubting wreck? Or do I write, BECAUSE I'm a self-doubting wreck?
I think I turn to art when I feel lost in the world. When the way of things seem meaningless. When there are things going on out there that I don't understand. When the world saddens me. When I feel like I'm miles behind everyone else. When my life makes no sense.
I feel like I'm not in control of my own life. I feel like it's spinning ahead without my consent. Like I couldn't affect it even if I wanted to or if I tried. I have to rewrite parts of my report for my thesis in order to get a passing grade. My practical work is fun and teaches me so much, but what I create is hardly state of the art. I've defined to myself the kind of artist I would want to be, but how does that help, when I've realized there's no way I'll ever become that artist?
Good news pour in with the bad news. If I go into any detail about the bad news I'll break. I feel so confused, so split in half. I'm doing great at the same time as I'm doing terrible. I feel more and more distanced from the world at the same time as I feel more and more connected to it. I think this might just drive me crazy. The only way I know how to deal with it is this. Writing. Again. Maybe if I pour my racing thoughts onto paper they'll stop haunting me inside my head. Maybe if I leave the real world long enough to enter a fantasy world... things will stop sucking. Or at least provide me with some kind of concrete escape. Something more tangible, something more respected, something more valuable, than escaping into a game world for hours on end. I have to do something with my time. I have to create.
I have to create or I'm going to burst.
See you at Camp Nanowrimo.
POET IN THE JAR
There's a million things I should be doing right this moment, rather than typing this. A million things all weighing on my heart together with questions asked, questions unanswered, questions with answers I never wanted. Everything blurs together, races, is limitless. It's like my head is a ticking time bomb and sooner or later it's going to explode.
I can't stop to think.
I can't stop to feel.
The only thing I feel like doing creatively is writing and yet I haven't touched any of the stories I've been dying to write. There's so many options as to what I could spend my time doing, so many areas in which I need improving, so many things to practice, so many things to learn. It's all too much, too heavy. It's fucking with my head. I don't know what to think anymore, don't know what to do.
Today I read a passage from Stephen King's masterpiece handbook of how to write fiction. It said remember your character's back story. It felt like a whole world opened up to me. It felt like I could see all the lives of the characters I've created, each life as jagged as mine, each life so unruly, spreading out in multiple branches. It felt like I could just reach out and touch their darkness. Touch my own darkness.
I recognize these feelings, recognize the dark well of potential they are opening. It's like I'm being revisited by my muse. The one that used to burn so bright. The one that spread throughout my mind as if it was cancer but instead seemed to grant me an unlimited supply of words.
This is what I do when that happens. This is where I turn. The only craft I ever felt like I was close to mastering. The only craft so subjective, so persuasive, so tempting. The only craft that was ever fully mine. That felt like the area where I belonged.
Writing is an addiction to me. I've abandoned it and returned to it more times than I could possibly account for. When I'm not writing, my fingers are itching, my mind is racing. I feel like a traitor for not maintaining the only thing in the world that ever made me feel like I was immortal. I fight writer's block. I fight my own hubris. Most of all I fight life. With the attitude I've seemingly been gaining lately - the idea that life sucks, and is always going to work against you.
Why is it that when the world seems the most pointless, the words appear; why is it so easy to fall into the fantasy of my own head when life doesn't play out like I expected? Can you call it a muse, can you call it a craft? Can you call it the downside of any creative work? Are all writers like me? Is everyone who appreciates the work of written words a self-doubting wreck? Or do I write, BECAUSE I'm a self-doubting wreck?
I think I turn to art when I feel lost in the world. When the way of things seem meaningless. When there are things going on out there that I don't understand. When the world saddens me. When I feel like I'm miles behind everyone else. When my life makes no sense.
I feel like I'm not in control of my own life. I feel like it's spinning ahead without my consent. Like I couldn't affect it even if I wanted to or if I tried. I have to rewrite parts of my report for my thesis in order to get a passing grade. My practical work is fun and teaches me so much, but what I create is hardly state of the art. I've defined to myself the kind of artist I would want to be, but how does that help, when I've realized there's no way I'll ever become that artist?
Good news pour in with the bad news. If I go into any detail about the bad news I'll break. I feel so confused, so split in half. I'm doing great at the same time as I'm doing terrible. I feel more and more distanced from the world at the same time as I feel more and more connected to it. I think this might just drive me crazy. The only way I know how to deal with it is this. Writing. Again. Maybe if I pour my racing thoughts onto paper they'll stop haunting me inside my head. Maybe if I leave the real world long enough to enter a fantasy world... things will stop sucking. Or at least provide me with some kind of concrete escape. Something more tangible, something more respected, something more valuable, than escaping into a game world for hours on end. I have to do something with my time. I have to create.
I have to create or I'm going to burst.
See you at Camp Nanowrimo.
POET IN THE JAR
Thursday, January 31
Everything Starts Out Chaotic And Fumbling
Honestly I'm more than exhausted. Everything I see on the screen in front of me is literally blurring and skewing my eyes. But I promised myself I'd be back behind the wheel again soon, and frankly I have missed writing. Even spontaneous thoughts like now. I have missed being able to spill everything out onto pages, into words. Maybe it's just easier to write everything down instead of locking it up in your head, or tiring all your friends with the same old stories and same old problems. Maybe. Or, maybe I just missed the craft.
I have been writing all day, in fact, but on a considerably duller text - my thesis. Things are going rather well at the studio, I really like it there. Everyone's cool, talented and hard-working, and still there always seems to be small talk and break time going on everywhere. People dart between eachothers' offices asking for files and delegating work and fetching fresh coffee. I'm essentially getting an exclusive sneak peek into the daily life of real game developers. Wow, sounds so amazing when I put it like that. Me and Lotta are the lowlives of the food chain, currently. The closest verbal description to what we're doing would be that we're "interns", but we're not really interns. The actual interns are there pitching in to the workload wherever possible. We're just there to get an insight into the worklife, and to write our thesis in cooperation with the company. As soon as the first, theoretical report has been written, though, we'll begin our practical work; and I'm hoping that'll make us feel like we're not taking up all their space. (I don't feel like that now either, but it's going to be nice to actually be helpful.) My thesis investigates the possibility of applying typical human movement patterns to non-human creatures, and how this affects player perception of character personality. It's a really interesting starting point, and I'm slowly getting somewhere with my report, but there's still a long way to go. Either way I'll just keep on pushing throughout the week. The first draft is due to my tutor on Tuesday. Hopefully he can tell me whether or not I'm going in the right direction with this whole thing. I thought writing academically would be easy, or well, usually it is. It's just that the whole essay is looming up over me like the exaggerated shadow cast by a comic book villain in a dark back alley. Whenever I start writing and referencing, I tangle myself up in my own arguments that I completely lose myself among all the words. But hey, that's okay. I just read today in a book on research methodology that a finished report may look very polished and perfect, but that it started out chaotic and fumbling; which made me feel a lot better.
I've heard our grades from our individual projects are going to be announced next week, by the way. I'm nervous to get the results. I think I did a huge job on both the practical and the theoretical level, but it all depends on what grade I get on my final report. So let's, let's just drop that for now.
Here's another thing that may look polished and perfect but started out chaotic and fumbling: my life. Nah, except for the perfect part. And the polished part. My point is, my life has been messy from time to time, messy as hell. There have been so many times when I've just seen no way out, and I've been convinced that I'm never going to be happy or be able to fulfil any of my dreams. On paper, things are looking up for me right now. But mentally, I am a shipwreck, an utter and complete shipwreck. The only time I don't feel like that is when Dear One is near. Or here.
This is depressing me. Signing off,
POET IN THE JAR
I have been writing all day, in fact, but on a considerably duller text - my thesis. Things are going rather well at the studio, I really like it there. Everyone's cool, talented and hard-working, and still there always seems to be small talk and break time going on everywhere. People dart between eachothers' offices asking for files and delegating work and fetching fresh coffee. I'm essentially getting an exclusive sneak peek into the daily life of real game developers. Wow, sounds so amazing when I put it like that. Me and Lotta are the lowlives of the food chain, currently. The closest verbal description to what we're doing would be that we're "interns", but we're not really interns. The actual interns are there pitching in to the workload wherever possible. We're just there to get an insight into the worklife, and to write our thesis in cooperation with the company. As soon as the first, theoretical report has been written, though, we'll begin our practical work; and I'm hoping that'll make us feel like we're not taking up all their space. (I don't feel like that now either, but it's going to be nice to actually be helpful.) My thesis investigates the possibility of applying typical human movement patterns to non-human creatures, and how this affects player perception of character personality. It's a really interesting starting point, and I'm slowly getting somewhere with my report, but there's still a long way to go. Either way I'll just keep on pushing throughout the week. The first draft is due to my tutor on Tuesday. Hopefully he can tell me whether or not I'm going in the right direction with this whole thing. I thought writing academically would be easy, or well, usually it is. It's just that the whole essay is looming up over me like the exaggerated shadow cast by a comic book villain in a dark back alley. Whenever I start writing and referencing, I tangle myself up in my own arguments that I completely lose myself among all the words. But hey, that's okay. I just read today in a book on research methodology that a finished report may look very polished and perfect, but that it started out chaotic and fumbling; which made me feel a lot better.
I've heard our grades from our individual projects are going to be announced next week, by the way. I'm nervous to get the results. I think I did a huge job on both the practical and the theoretical level, but it all depends on what grade I get on my final report. So let's, let's just drop that for now.
Here's another thing that may look polished and perfect but started out chaotic and fumbling: my life. Nah, except for the perfect part. And the polished part. My point is, my life has been messy from time to time, messy as hell. There have been so many times when I've just seen no way out, and I've been convinced that I'm never going to be happy or be able to fulfil any of my dreams. On paper, things are looking up for me right now. But mentally, I am a shipwreck, an utter and complete shipwreck. The only time I don't feel like that is when Dear One is near. Or here.
This is depressing me. Signing off,
POET IN THE JAR
Tuesday, January 29
I'm Good At Giving Myself Advice
Writing used to be so easy to me. I mean, at times it was hard; really hard. There were times when I stared at a blank page for hours on end and times I got entangled in impossible plot holes. There were times I dropped a novel because it just got out of hand. Times I didn't write at all. But even in those times, keeping a journal, or whatever you might call this place, has been easy. It's been easy to write about my everyday problems, my thoughts on the universe, and anything that might stray into my mind while I was typing. Poetry and spontaneous blog posts have been easy. Everything used to be so easy to write about, because I clung on to writing. Clung on to the words I could create. They were my lifeboat, and the way I handled everything.
And now I don't write. I don't plan writing sessions. I don't write spontaneously. Every line of every poem I've tried to write in the past few months has felt out of place, stereotypical or plain terrible. My main outlet of creativity has become to obsessively research obscure TV series trivia while I watch said series on TV. This is not good. Not good at all.
I've hit rock bottom of the valley named writer's block, and I've hit rock bottom hard this time.
If you google "how to overcome writer's block", you get 2,580,000 hits. That's right. Two million five-hundred eighty-thousand hits. I could pick up on any one of these 2,5 million hits and magically start my journey out of writer's block valley. Easy as that.
But it wouldn't be as easy as that. Time after time, in this very specific and intuitive field of writing, I've found that writing can't be taught to you. Sure, you can learn the language better. Expand your vocabulary and improve your grammar. You can learn how to analyze litterature. You can pick up tools from your writing teacher at your expensive but most likely fruitless writer's school that have names like protagonist development and the dramaturgical curve. And you can follow the tips on how to overcome writer's block that you find on Google. The thing is, no one can pick you up and lift you out of that valley but you. And if you're not going to work for it, there are no handy tips in the world that is going to help you. There are no quick fixes in writing or in writer's block. There's only you, and the words you put on that page. I have a very simple definition of my own of what teaches someone to write, and to constantly develop as a writer. Since I'm so incredibly adaptive, I shall commit to the popular "bullet list" format for this cause of noble wisdom-sharing.
Here's how to become a better writer in
3 easy steps!
1. Write, write, write.
2. Read, read, read.
3. Experience, experience, experience.
Repeat.
There you have it. It's all very admirable to consciously study the art of writing and the written word itself. I used to study litterature myself. But in essence, I see writing as something more intuitive, more artistic, than technical. All of the writing tools available are great to have at your disposal. Somewhere in the back of your mind, stashed away in your subconscious toolshed, where it can secretly influence your skills without drawing attention to itself. See, whenever I start to analyze my own writing TOO consciously; I'm sent down writer's block valley.
I only know one way to battle writer's block, and I don't need to browse any of Google's 2,5 million suggestions for it to work. It's like writing was car driving, and writer's block was an unexpected car crash in which you were slightly wounded, but you'll live; and the metallic sound of the crash was the heaviest burden you took with you from the accident. If you don't drive again soon after the accident, you're going to start to fear driving that car, fear causing another crash, fear not knowing where the road might take you. If you don't get back in the car right away and drive it off to somewhere things might be better, you're never going to get back in that car. Now imagine there were no buses or trains or other vehicles at all that would get you to that destination you used to go or to take those rocky terrain roads that you used to take. You're going to have to be driven around to your every errand by your off-the-bat uncle.
Beat the hell out of your own fear. Beat the hell out of writer's block. Start writing again. Force yourself to. Because the only thing keeping you from doing it, is you.
So that's what I'm doing here. I'm forcing myself to put myself behind the wheel again and steer out on unknown roads. Forcing myself to write.
Funny how the first thing I write is a guide for writing, when I have been out of business for months.
POET IN THE JAR
And now I don't write. I don't plan writing sessions. I don't write spontaneously. Every line of every poem I've tried to write in the past few months has felt out of place, stereotypical or plain terrible. My main outlet of creativity has become to obsessively research obscure TV series trivia while I watch said series on TV. This is not good. Not good at all.
I've hit rock bottom of the valley named writer's block, and I've hit rock bottom hard this time.
If you google "how to overcome writer's block", you get 2,580,000 hits. That's right. Two million five-hundred eighty-thousand hits. I could pick up on any one of these 2,5 million hits and magically start my journey out of writer's block valley. Easy as that.
But it wouldn't be as easy as that. Time after time, in this very specific and intuitive field of writing, I've found that writing can't be taught to you. Sure, you can learn the language better. Expand your vocabulary and improve your grammar. You can learn how to analyze litterature. You can pick up tools from your writing teacher at your expensive but most likely fruitless writer's school that have names like protagonist development and the dramaturgical curve. And you can follow the tips on how to overcome writer's block that you find on Google. The thing is, no one can pick you up and lift you out of that valley but you. And if you're not going to work for it, there are no handy tips in the world that is going to help you. There are no quick fixes in writing or in writer's block. There's only you, and the words you put on that page. I have a very simple definition of my own of what teaches someone to write, and to constantly develop as a writer. Since I'm so incredibly adaptive, I shall commit to the popular "bullet list" format for this cause of noble wisdom-sharing.
Here's how to become a better writer in
3 easy steps!
1. Write, write, write.
2. Read, read, read.
3. Experience, experience, experience.
Repeat.
There you have it. It's all very admirable to consciously study the art of writing and the written word itself. I used to study litterature myself. But in essence, I see writing as something more intuitive, more artistic, than technical. All of the writing tools available are great to have at your disposal. Somewhere in the back of your mind, stashed away in your subconscious toolshed, where it can secretly influence your skills without drawing attention to itself. See, whenever I start to analyze my own writing TOO consciously; I'm sent down writer's block valley.
I only know one way to battle writer's block, and I don't need to browse any of Google's 2,5 million suggestions for it to work. It's like writing was car driving, and writer's block was an unexpected car crash in which you were slightly wounded, but you'll live; and the metallic sound of the crash was the heaviest burden you took with you from the accident. If you don't drive again soon after the accident, you're going to start to fear driving that car, fear causing another crash, fear not knowing where the road might take you. If you don't get back in the car right away and drive it off to somewhere things might be better, you're never going to get back in that car. Now imagine there were no buses or trains or other vehicles at all that would get you to that destination you used to go or to take those rocky terrain roads that you used to take. You're going to have to be driven around to your every errand by your off-the-bat uncle.
Beat the hell out of your own fear. Beat the hell out of writer's block. Start writing again. Force yourself to. Because the only thing keeping you from doing it, is you.
So that's what I'm doing here. I'm forcing myself to put myself behind the wheel again and steer out on unknown roads. Forcing myself to write.
Funny how the first thing I write is a guide for writing, when I have been out of business for months.
POET IN THE JAR
Thursday, December 13
Stress, And All Things Related
I need to write, my fingers are aching to, my mind is about to explode and burst out streams of words unless I jot them down. As usual I'm trying too hard, thinking of too many things at once, trying to make sense of the chaos in my head.
Lately it seems everyone has come to me with their problems. I guess I should be taking this as a compliment. Like Dear One said, I've got all the pieces in the right places, and that's why. I don't know. I appreciate that I am regarded trustworthy and sensible, but at the same time there's a voice deep down in me just screaming out loud, rageing inside. Who will tell me everything will be alright? Who will give me suggestions of how to work things out? Who will be for me, what I have become for everyone else? I don't know. Like I wished for once, I wonder what it'd be like if there was someone else out there like me. Would I find this person to be great, would we have so much in common? Or, more likely, would we hate eachother's guts because both of us are so damn impossible to understand? Don't get me wrong. My friends are the best in the world and always there for me. It's just that sometimes I seem to be unable to talk of the heaviest things weighing on my heart.
I had a dream last night that bothers me. I dreamt of talking to an old friend, when we were joined by someone who once left me to the wind after a great betrayal committed by someone she was covering up for. (I'm aware this sounds like something from a TV drama series.) And she just sat there, staring at me, as if she was asking me to explain myself. As if she was asking me to lay all my cards down on the table and show her what I've managed in life, where I've gotten to without her. The truth is, once I realized what she and everyone else I used to be around stood for, how blind they were to reality, and the amount of time and effort they were all willing to spend on forgiving unforgiveable things; I haven't missed them, any of them. I don't feel I owe any of them an explanation of my life or the choices I've made. And still, when confronted with this in a dream, I had nothing to show for myself, and couldn't find the words. Analytically speaking I'm thinking this might be a sign of all my busy thoughts about the future that I've been going over lately. Everything's so uncertain. What will happen after I graduate? When I have to stand on my own feet again? When I have to fight and struggle my way through life again; standing without any form of safety, again. I have already studied here for two and a half years. Already at the end of my education. A program I never thought I'd even get to start, back in that year when everything went to hell and back. I've been taking loans for these years, and after I'm done here, it's not possible for me financially to study anymore. It's a shame really, because one of my options was to study for the master's program. Now I'm going to have to look for work instead, something I both dread and look forward to. With any bit of luck, I can get a job in the industry, and I'm working hard to make that dream come true; but there are no such things as guarantees in this business. Hell, there's not even a guarantee there'll be a position I'm qualified for somewhere. My best hope is to make the best of my thesis next term, and take it from there. I dread having to leave the industry and the creation of games and life in my animations. I dread having to resign myself from this apartment, from this life, move back home and take a job that will kill braincells in my head for each day that passes. I dread the future so much right now, and that's despite the fact that Dear One now considerably brightens my future. But in some ways that's exactly what fuels my fear. I'm afraid that Dear One will leave me, that I'll leave Dear One, that we'll fall apart, that love will cease, that one of us dies and leaves the other. I'm afraid of every one of these things, and still, right this moment, I feel like I can do anything when Dear One is with me.
It's confusing, frightening and pleasant at the same time. Maybe that's how love's supposed to be, and I didn't even know it until now. Who knows?
To top off all my post-graduation stress, we're nearing the deadlines in two term-long project courses at the same time as we're preparing intensely for our thesis work. I'm quite proud to announce I'll be writing my thesis in cooperation with Ludosity Learning, a local game studio. I'll be looking at how a given human personality can be implemented practically in the movements of an animated non-human character. I'm pretty excited to get started with that in January as I'll be joined by two terrific classmates of mine also doing their thesis at Ludosity. However, before that can happen, we've got the project deadlines coming up. I'm basically finished with my individual project - I just need to light and render my scenes - and I'm making a lot of progress in my mini project as well. For that project, I'm lipsyncing a character to a voiceclip, and animating him in a modeled environment. So far I've modeled the environment, and completed about 80 percent of the basic lipsyncing. I'll have to tweak the timing and poses a bit once the basis is done, but it'll be fast work. After that, round about next week, I'll be working with animating the rest of his face and his upper body. The result will be really cool I think. A friend from the sound design class helped me record the voiceclips and the result was great, and it's been fun to lipsync to. I only hope there's still time to tie everything together into a good-looking result.
Since all our deadlines are set to mid-January, holidays over Christmas will feel incredibly stressed if I don't get as much work as possible out of the way before then. There's been so many discussions with my family regarding me not coming home for Christmas. But say I'm Hermione, and I'm spending this Christmas at the Burrow. I don't know when I might have time to go home and visit, but it's looking grim to have time for it right after Christmas and I might have to go home after New Year's. All I want to do is visit at home when I have time and energy to. Since when was it so important to stick with dates?
But yeah... I think I've ranted enough for now. See you on the other side of exploded-worry-head-land,
POET IN THE JAR
Lately it seems everyone has come to me with their problems. I guess I should be taking this as a compliment. Like Dear One said, I've got all the pieces in the right places, and that's why. I don't know. I appreciate that I am regarded trustworthy and sensible, but at the same time there's a voice deep down in me just screaming out loud, rageing inside. Who will tell me everything will be alright? Who will give me suggestions of how to work things out? Who will be for me, what I have become for everyone else? I don't know. Like I wished for once, I wonder what it'd be like if there was someone else out there like me. Would I find this person to be great, would we have so much in common? Or, more likely, would we hate eachother's guts because both of us are so damn impossible to understand? Don't get me wrong. My friends are the best in the world and always there for me. It's just that sometimes I seem to be unable to talk of the heaviest things weighing on my heart.
I had a dream last night that bothers me. I dreamt of talking to an old friend, when we were joined by someone who once left me to the wind after a great betrayal committed by someone she was covering up for. (I'm aware this sounds like something from a TV drama series.) And she just sat there, staring at me, as if she was asking me to explain myself. As if she was asking me to lay all my cards down on the table and show her what I've managed in life, where I've gotten to without her. The truth is, once I realized what she and everyone else I used to be around stood for, how blind they were to reality, and the amount of time and effort they were all willing to spend on forgiving unforgiveable things; I haven't missed them, any of them. I don't feel I owe any of them an explanation of my life or the choices I've made. And still, when confronted with this in a dream, I had nothing to show for myself, and couldn't find the words. Analytically speaking I'm thinking this might be a sign of all my busy thoughts about the future that I've been going over lately. Everything's so uncertain. What will happen after I graduate? When I have to stand on my own feet again? When I have to fight and struggle my way through life again; standing without any form of safety, again. I have already studied here for two and a half years. Already at the end of my education. A program I never thought I'd even get to start, back in that year when everything went to hell and back. I've been taking loans for these years, and after I'm done here, it's not possible for me financially to study anymore. It's a shame really, because one of my options was to study for the master's program. Now I'm going to have to look for work instead, something I both dread and look forward to. With any bit of luck, I can get a job in the industry, and I'm working hard to make that dream come true; but there are no such things as guarantees in this business. Hell, there's not even a guarantee there'll be a position I'm qualified for somewhere. My best hope is to make the best of my thesis next term, and take it from there. I dread having to leave the industry and the creation of games and life in my animations. I dread having to resign myself from this apartment, from this life, move back home and take a job that will kill braincells in my head for each day that passes. I dread the future so much right now, and that's despite the fact that Dear One now considerably brightens my future. But in some ways that's exactly what fuels my fear. I'm afraid that Dear One will leave me, that I'll leave Dear One, that we'll fall apart, that love will cease, that one of us dies and leaves the other. I'm afraid of every one of these things, and still, right this moment, I feel like I can do anything when Dear One is with me.
It's confusing, frightening and pleasant at the same time. Maybe that's how love's supposed to be, and I didn't even know it until now. Who knows?
To top off all my post-graduation stress, we're nearing the deadlines in two term-long project courses at the same time as we're preparing intensely for our thesis work. I'm quite proud to announce I'll be writing my thesis in cooperation with Ludosity Learning, a local game studio. I'll be looking at how a given human personality can be implemented practically in the movements of an animated non-human character. I'm pretty excited to get started with that in January as I'll be joined by two terrific classmates of mine also doing their thesis at Ludosity. However, before that can happen, we've got the project deadlines coming up. I'm basically finished with my individual project - I just need to light and render my scenes - and I'm making a lot of progress in my mini project as well. For that project, I'm lipsyncing a character to a voiceclip, and animating him in a modeled environment. So far I've modeled the environment, and completed about 80 percent of the basic lipsyncing. I'll have to tweak the timing and poses a bit once the basis is done, but it'll be fast work. After that, round about next week, I'll be working with animating the rest of his face and his upper body. The result will be really cool I think. A friend from the sound design class helped me record the voiceclips and the result was great, and it's been fun to lipsync to. I only hope there's still time to tie everything together into a good-looking result.
Since all our deadlines are set to mid-January, holidays over Christmas will feel incredibly stressed if I don't get as much work as possible out of the way before then. There's been so many discussions with my family regarding me not coming home for Christmas. But say I'm Hermione, and I'm spending this Christmas at the Burrow. I don't know when I might have time to go home and visit, but it's looking grim to have time for it right after Christmas and I might have to go home after New Year's. All I want to do is visit at home when I have time and energy to. Since when was it so important to stick with dates?
But yeah... I think I've ranted enough for now. See you on the other side of exploded-worry-head-land,
POET IN THE JAR
Wednesday, November 28
The Hammer
All these images of you
All these connections
And strange associations
I thought I had assassinated
Every thought of you, for now
Thought I had eliminated
Every image of you, for now
But the sight of a streetlight can hammer into my chest
Pounding, beating, every mile into my heart
Every minute ticking down, like time does best
Clubbing, whacking, deep angst into art
I channel the voices, channel the words
My only means of protest
And what I do best
These thoughts are too brittle
To withstand my inspection
My inward reflection
I thought I was in control
Of my treacherous self, for now
I thought I had a hold
On my traitorous self, for now
But the sight of a streetlight can hammer into my chest
Pounding, beating, every mile into my heart
Every minute ticking down, like time does best
Clubbing, whacking, deep angst into art
I channel the voices, channel the words
My only means of protest
And what I do best
Can I force you down if I try
Can I sink you down if I try
Can I repress you if I try
Until I'm blind
And I've forgotten why I tried
All these puzzle pieces of us
All these shattered shards
And stitched-up hearts
I thought I had validated
Their existence, by now
I thought I had evaluated
Their emergence, by now
But the sight of a streetlight can hammer into my chest
Pounding, beating, every mile into my heart
Every minute ticking down, like time does best
Clubbing, whacking, deep angst into art
I channel the voices, channel the words
My only means of protest
And what I do best
The very moment I'm away from you
Everything fades, like memories do
All the affection, thwarted transparent
All the confidence, gone insignificant
But when I'm curled up in my most malicious doubt,
Unwillingly neglecting what it's all about,
Every image of you that I consciously reject
Fights its way right back again
Finds its way right back again
Into my chest
And then, the sight of a streetlight can shiver through my chest
Shining, shining, every smile into my heart
Every minute ticking by, like time does best
Beaming, beaming, my longing into art
I channel the light, channel the world
My only means of comfort
And what you do best
POET IN THE JAR
All these connections
And strange associations
I thought I had assassinated
Every thought of you, for now
Thought I had eliminated
Every image of you, for now
But the sight of a streetlight can hammer into my chest
Pounding, beating, every mile into my heart
Every minute ticking down, like time does best
Clubbing, whacking, deep angst into art
I channel the voices, channel the words
My only means of protest
And what I do best
These thoughts are too brittle
To withstand my inspection
My inward reflection
I thought I was in control
Of my treacherous self, for now
I thought I had a hold
On my traitorous self, for now
But the sight of a streetlight can hammer into my chest
Pounding, beating, every mile into my heart
Every minute ticking down, like time does best
Clubbing, whacking, deep angst into art
I channel the voices, channel the words
My only means of protest
And what I do best
Can I force you down if I try
Can I sink you down if I try
Can I repress you if I try
Until I'm blind
And I've forgotten why I tried
All these puzzle pieces of us
All these shattered shards
And stitched-up hearts
I thought I had validated
Their existence, by now
I thought I had evaluated
Their emergence, by now
But the sight of a streetlight can hammer into my chest
Pounding, beating, every mile into my heart
Every minute ticking down, like time does best
Clubbing, whacking, deep angst into art
I channel the voices, channel the words
My only means of protest
And what I do best
The very moment I'm away from you
Everything fades, like memories do
All the affection, thwarted transparent
All the confidence, gone insignificant
But when I'm curled up in my most malicious doubt,
Unwillingly neglecting what it's all about,
Every image of you that I consciously reject
Fights its way right back again
Finds its way right back again
Into my chest
And then, the sight of a streetlight can shiver through my chest
Shining, shining, every smile into my heart
Every minute ticking by, like time does best
Beaming, beaming, my longing into art
I channel the light, channel the world
My only means of comfort
And what you do best
POET IN THE JAR
Sunday, November 25
Eliminate Self-pity
I just read this quote by Stephen Fry about the way to happiness. Fry says he wants to publish a self-help book, entitled "The way to happiness by Stephen Fry". In the beginning of the book he would write "Stop worrying and be happy." The rest of the book's pages would be empty. According to Fry, self-pity is what stands in the way of people's happiness.
I started thinking about it. Self-pity is an emotion that encapsules many other emotions. You consider yourself unlucky, the circumstances unfair, whenever life doesn't go the way you would have wanted; it's easy to blame it on other people and on the world, considering how unfortunate you truly are. It's easy to fall down the path of self-pity, feeling unwanted, underachieving, unlucky, mistreated. But what if you eliminate your self-pity? Would that automatically make you happy? Or would the lack of self-pity simply pave you the circumstances you need in order to be happy?
I pity myself more than I would like to admit. I constantly think of my own failures in life and how I could possibly correct them. I think of all the things I never have the time to do, all the things I can't afford to do, all the things that are impossible for me to do, all the things I once did and that I regret. All dreams dead. All happiness suffocated.
But when I peel all that off, I'm left with a strange sense of calm. Apparently, it took me some time to figure out what Stephen Fry phrases so perfectly in his quote. Without self-pity, without self-blame and self-loathing, the foundations of happiness seem clear. The road seems wide enough to walk. You seem to forget about what goals await at the end of the road or if you'll ever get to see them. You become aware of the air you breathe, the steps you take, the amazement inside your mind.
This is the moment I have wanted to treasure for so long, that one second of insight, awareness, and calm. What I have always meant when I've said, "live in the present!", without truly understanding it myself. When I force the negative emotions out of my thoughts, the voices clear, the fog clears, I feel aware, I feel at ease, or at as much ease as I'll ever be.
Stephen Fry, huh.
Clever guy.
Thanks for the tip.
POET IN THE ANTI-DEPRESSANT JAR
I started thinking about it. Self-pity is an emotion that encapsules many other emotions. You consider yourself unlucky, the circumstances unfair, whenever life doesn't go the way you would have wanted; it's easy to blame it on other people and on the world, considering how unfortunate you truly are. It's easy to fall down the path of self-pity, feeling unwanted, underachieving, unlucky, mistreated. But what if you eliminate your self-pity? Would that automatically make you happy? Or would the lack of self-pity simply pave you the circumstances you need in order to be happy?
I pity myself more than I would like to admit. I constantly think of my own failures in life and how I could possibly correct them. I think of all the things I never have the time to do, all the things I can't afford to do, all the things that are impossible for me to do, all the things I once did and that I regret. All dreams dead. All happiness suffocated.
But when I peel all that off, I'm left with a strange sense of calm. Apparently, it took me some time to figure out what Stephen Fry phrases so perfectly in his quote. Without self-pity, without self-blame and self-loathing, the foundations of happiness seem clear. The road seems wide enough to walk. You seem to forget about what goals await at the end of the road or if you'll ever get to see them. You become aware of the air you breathe, the steps you take, the amazement inside your mind.
This is the moment I have wanted to treasure for so long, that one second of insight, awareness, and calm. What I have always meant when I've said, "live in the present!", without truly understanding it myself. When I force the negative emotions out of my thoughts, the voices clear, the fog clears, I feel aware, I feel at ease, or at as much ease as I'll ever be.
Stephen Fry, huh.
Clever guy.
Thanks for the tip.
POET IN THE ANTI-DEPRESSANT JAR
Thursday, November 22
Little Dear Sister
Hello there, little sister. Little, dear sister.
I know that in fact you're my older sister and I'm the youngest of the bunch, but I'll always remember you as little. I know that you are dead and can't hear these words, and that if you were alive today you wouldn't understand them. But what if, what if things had played out a bit differently, little girl? What if you had been born healthy? We might be playing through the LEGO video games right now together. We might have spent each moment together as we grew up. Things, for the both of us, for the rest of the family, might all have been easier.
Little sister, I miss you sometimes, even though I never knew you, even though I barely remember you. I keep wondering what might have happened if you hadn't been ill, if you hadn't died. Would I even be alive? Would our parents have called it quits once you were born and never given me the chance to live? Once I was told that the reason I exist is because the doctors adviced our parents to get another child while they could. I was told that if it weren't for you, love, I wouldn't be here today. Sometimes those words ring true in my mind. Other times it feels useless to dwell on the past.
I'm sorry I didn't come to see you on All Hallow's Eve. I would have liked to come over and light a candle to chase away some of the storm. I would have liked to drop off some flowers like I did on Midsummer's Eve. I would have liked to pay you my respects, because in all essence, the roles could be reversed. I could have been the one born a year before you, I could have been the one to carry all your pain and burdens. You could have been the one to live my life, and maybe you would have done better with it than I have.
You see, I feel a lot like a failure even when the wind's blowing my way. Even when there's no sorrows to bother with or when my problems are so, so small compared to the world and the great scope of things, I can feel so low, so under-achieving, so hopeless. Like I can't fight the demands I set up for my own demise. Like it wasn't voluntary of me to caress the busy moments, so I wouldn't have so much time to think.
But sister, I would like to take some time to think every once in a while. Take a breather from all the stressed out routines. And maybe then I might light a candle, here in my own home, and take a moment to think of you, or to talk to you.
How come it works so well, talking to someone who's dead? Is it because there are no replies? Is it because what I really want to do is just to spill my heart out, in any way, to let the words flow through my fingers when I'm too sore to speak?
If you had been born free, free and healthy, I'm just certain that everything would have been different. I'm certain you and I would have so much in common. With just one year, one tiny little year, to set us apart, we could have become eachother's comfort, eachother's heals. Maybe in some other dimension, some alternate reality where this option really did play out, we're comforting eachother as I speak. Maybe we know nothing of hardship or death there. Maybe we know all too well, but can find comfort in our loneliest moments. We can stand against this whole world together, in that reality.
If everything had just played out differently.
I won't take more of your time now. I'm sure there are greater, grander things in play where you are right now, than my small and insignificant problems here. In many ways, sister, you won this game. This world has gone insane. So full to the brim with evil that you would be too innocent to understand. It would just harm you. Leave it to me to fight these images in this age of information. I promise I will fight for you, and I'm sure your memory will give me strength to pull through. We never give up, little sister. In this family we never give up.
I love you. Even the faintest memory of you. It reminds me how brittle everything is. How quickly it all can just go away. And it reminds me that even when the odds seem impossible, we can keep fighting. Keep fighting until the last drop of blood, even when everyone believes the war has already been lost.
Until next time, little Carolina.
POET IN THE JAR
I know that in fact you're my older sister and I'm the youngest of the bunch, but I'll always remember you as little. I know that you are dead and can't hear these words, and that if you were alive today you wouldn't understand them. But what if, what if things had played out a bit differently, little girl? What if you had been born healthy? We might be playing through the LEGO video games right now together. We might have spent each moment together as we grew up. Things, for the both of us, for the rest of the family, might all have been easier.
Little sister, I miss you sometimes, even though I never knew you, even though I barely remember you. I keep wondering what might have happened if you hadn't been ill, if you hadn't died. Would I even be alive? Would our parents have called it quits once you were born and never given me the chance to live? Once I was told that the reason I exist is because the doctors adviced our parents to get another child while they could. I was told that if it weren't for you, love, I wouldn't be here today. Sometimes those words ring true in my mind. Other times it feels useless to dwell on the past.
I'm sorry I didn't come to see you on All Hallow's Eve. I would have liked to come over and light a candle to chase away some of the storm. I would have liked to drop off some flowers like I did on Midsummer's Eve. I would have liked to pay you my respects, because in all essence, the roles could be reversed. I could have been the one born a year before you, I could have been the one to carry all your pain and burdens. You could have been the one to live my life, and maybe you would have done better with it than I have.
You see, I feel a lot like a failure even when the wind's blowing my way. Even when there's no sorrows to bother with or when my problems are so, so small compared to the world and the great scope of things, I can feel so low, so under-achieving, so hopeless. Like I can't fight the demands I set up for my own demise. Like it wasn't voluntary of me to caress the busy moments, so I wouldn't have so much time to think.
But sister, I would like to take some time to think every once in a while. Take a breather from all the stressed out routines. And maybe then I might light a candle, here in my own home, and take a moment to think of you, or to talk to you.
How come it works so well, talking to someone who's dead? Is it because there are no replies? Is it because what I really want to do is just to spill my heart out, in any way, to let the words flow through my fingers when I'm too sore to speak?
If you had been born free, free and healthy, I'm just certain that everything would have been different. I'm certain you and I would have so much in common. With just one year, one tiny little year, to set us apart, we could have become eachother's comfort, eachother's heals. Maybe in some other dimension, some alternate reality where this option really did play out, we're comforting eachother as I speak. Maybe we know nothing of hardship or death there. Maybe we know all too well, but can find comfort in our loneliest moments. We can stand against this whole world together, in that reality.
If everything had just played out differently.
I won't take more of your time now. I'm sure there are greater, grander things in play where you are right now, than my small and insignificant problems here. In many ways, sister, you won this game. This world has gone insane. So full to the brim with evil that you would be too innocent to understand. It would just harm you. Leave it to me to fight these images in this age of information. I promise I will fight for you, and I'm sure your memory will give me strength to pull through. We never give up, little sister. In this family we never give up.
I love you. Even the faintest memory of you. It reminds me how brittle everything is. How quickly it all can just go away. And it reminds me that even when the odds seem impossible, we can keep fighting. Keep fighting until the last drop of blood, even when everyone believes the war has already been lost.
Until next time, little Carolina.
POET IN THE JAR
Saturday, November 10
Sleepless In Scandinavia
I'm up sleepless again and I don't know why. That is to say, I have a few qualified guesses but then there's only so much I can do with those. A lot of things on my plate right now is causing my stress level to skyrocket and the less I sleep, the harder it gets to sleep. I'm tired, in the way that I can't really focus or have patience for anything, but when the time of day comes when I'm supposed to let my head fall down on the pillow and my mind enter the dreamworld, I am reluctant to sleep. Reluctant to let go, I suppose. Usually happens when I've got too many things to get all worked up about. I've slept so badly since Tuesday that my left eyelid has been twitching for the last two days (that's my body telling me I need sleep). Unfortunately, I won't be able to really enjoy this weekend, because I'm attending a writer's retreat all day tomorrow and have to spend Sunday on an assignment I never handed in at the beginning of the semester. I just spent the last hour and a half on the phone with my nearest and dearest. There're no words for how much I appreciate calling a friendly voice, someone who knows me and keeps me at heart, and hearing their encouragement and love flow through time. Through the distance that sets us apart.
Damn, it gets dark early these days. Bloody winter indeed. Next winter I'm emigrating.
I figured, since I can't sleep (or as of right now, don't want to attempt it), I might as well come here and rant on about a few things so I can get them out of my head. Perhaps my head will clear a bit and allow for sleep to invade my world once these thoughts have been jotted down.
At least one stress element was eliminated today as I found out I passed all four assignments on the first half of one of my two main courses this semester. Passing those assignments means no extra work or details to complete, but I can now focus entirely on what's remaining. In our individual projects, work has been progressing since day one, but in the advanced 3D course, our mini projects are just starting. I can't start working on it quite yet as I've chosen to work with lipsyncing and I'm still waiting for my voice clips (busy as everything's been, I sent the script way late to the sound designer, so it's my own fault). I'm excited to work with lipsync again and to work with animation not intended for ingame uses. I'm sure this will look good in my portfolio and if I manage to do it well, it might be the one piece of work that decides whether or not I get a position I apply for. So I really want to put in some hard work into it. Apart from lipsyncing and animating the character's face and upper body, I also want to model and light the environment he's in, so that the material in the end will have true potential as showcase material. I'll start working on it next week. In the individual project, I'm about a week behind schedule, but not really worried. I've planned about one week for each animation and just yesterday, I created a cycle in less than two hours, complete with fine details and followthrough. Today, I've finally gotten a base worked up for the "ride elevator"-animation that I was scheduled to work on. I've looked over it all week and just been stuck, which has added to my stress. At last I put the animation on hold and went ahead to create one of my bonus animations, a "scout ahead" for ingame camera tilts (the animation I made in less than two hours). This seems to have done the trick and served as a break from my usual work, since it was considerably easier to pick up the elevator animation again today and achieve quite a lot of progress in just a short matter of time.
Other things are troubling me as well. Sudden memories awoken. I feel like I'm walking down a long hallway with door after door and I have to open each one to look inside, and some doors should be left closed and locked. I worry, for family, for friends.
I worry about me. About the future. About aging.
I argue. I argue inside my head constantly.
It makes me feel like I'm Zach, the office guy (which is probably partially true).
Once upon a time a life blossomed in a little white house on the mountainside, near the forest and the lake. Tunes were sung in these halls and instruments played delicately, echoing between the walls. Words were written. Walks were taken. Smiles. Many, many smiles.
I think of my nearest and dearest.
I saw a commercial on TV today showing an elderly couple standing on a beach in the sunset. They're smiling, ruffling eachothers' hairs with their towels, bringing out wine. Standing in the sun and in the breeze, in the sand.
I think of my nearest and dearest and I become certain, convinced, that I want to grow old with you. That you are unusual. Special. Because you never tried to take a part of me. You never wanted to overshadow the sides of me that were too dark for your liking. You never cease listening, even when the words just spill out of me without reason or context. Even when I'm so full of words that I'm about to burst and I have to interrupt what you're saying to do so, you listen to me. You give me more than I deserve. You let me be me, without trickery. You give me freedom. Do you know what freedom is to me? Do you know that with everyone else I came close to, made me feel like I was shut in a cage, wingless and dead? Do you realize how unique it makes us that with you... this feeling of imprisonment is completely absent?
I think I can deal with pretty much everything life may serve me, if only you're with me.
Without you I'll die. Once and for all.
So just don't go and get yourself all dead, and we should be good...
Loved one.
POET IN THE PICK AND MIX RANT JAR
Damn, it gets dark early these days. Bloody winter indeed. Next winter I'm emigrating.
I figured, since I can't sleep (or as of right now, don't want to attempt it), I might as well come here and rant on about a few things so I can get them out of my head. Perhaps my head will clear a bit and allow for sleep to invade my world once these thoughts have been jotted down.
At least one stress element was eliminated today as I found out I passed all four assignments on the first half of one of my two main courses this semester. Passing those assignments means no extra work or details to complete, but I can now focus entirely on what's remaining. In our individual projects, work has been progressing since day one, but in the advanced 3D course, our mini projects are just starting. I can't start working on it quite yet as I've chosen to work with lipsyncing and I'm still waiting for my voice clips (busy as everything's been, I sent the script way late to the sound designer, so it's my own fault). I'm excited to work with lipsync again and to work with animation not intended for ingame uses. I'm sure this will look good in my portfolio and if I manage to do it well, it might be the one piece of work that decides whether or not I get a position I apply for. So I really want to put in some hard work into it. Apart from lipsyncing and animating the character's face and upper body, I also want to model and light the environment he's in, so that the material in the end will have true potential as showcase material. I'll start working on it next week. In the individual project, I'm about a week behind schedule, but not really worried. I've planned about one week for each animation and just yesterday, I created a cycle in less than two hours, complete with fine details and followthrough. Today, I've finally gotten a base worked up for the "ride elevator"-animation that I was scheduled to work on. I've looked over it all week and just been stuck, which has added to my stress. At last I put the animation on hold and went ahead to create one of my bonus animations, a "scout ahead" for ingame camera tilts (the animation I made in less than two hours). This seems to have done the trick and served as a break from my usual work, since it was considerably easier to pick up the elevator animation again today and achieve quite a lot of progress in just a short matter of time.
Other things are troubling me as well. Sudden memories awoken. I feel like I'm walking down a long hallway with door after door and I have to open each one to look inside, and some doors should be left closed and locked. I worry, for family, for friends.
I worry about me. About the future. About aging.
I argue. I argue inside my head constantly.
It makes me feel like I'm Zach, the office guy (which is probably partially true).
Once upon a time a life blossomed in a little white house on the mountainside, near the forest and the lake. Tunes were sung in these halls and instruments played delicately, echoing between the walls. Words were written. Walks were taken. Smiles. Many, many smiles.
I think of my nearest and dearest.
I saw a commercial on TV today showing an elderly couple standing on a beach in the sunset. They're smiling, ruffling eachothers' hairs with their towels, bringing out wine. Standing in the sun and in the breeze, in the sand.
I think of my nearest and dearest and I become certain, convinced, that I want to grow old with you. That you are unusual. Special. Because you never tried to take a part of me. You never wanted to overshadow the sides of me that were too dark for your liking. You never cease listening, even when the words just spill out of me without reason or context. Even when I'm so full of words that I'm about to burst and I have to interrupt what you're saying to do so, you listen to me. You give me more than I deserve. You let me be me, without trickery. You give me freedom. Do you know what freedom is to me? Do you know that with everyone else I came close to, made me feel like I was shut in a cage, wingless and dead? Do you realize how unique it makes us that with you... this feeling of imprisonment is completely absent?
I think I can deal with pretty much everything life may serve me, if only you're with me.
Without you I'll die. Once and for all.
So just don't go and get yourself all dead, and we should be good...
Loved one.
POET IN THE PICK AND MIX RANT JAR
Monday, October 15
Rains & Trains
Falling rain. Passing trains. Thinking time.
Currently, I'm thinking about the many projects I want to do or am in the process of doing. It seems like just managing my courses is enough workload to kill a fullgrown horse, and still I'm inspired to keep working, keep developing outside of school and improving miscellaneous skills. One project I'm particularly keen of, I've drawn a character concept from my neverending novel project "Chasing Ella". I'd love to create a few orthographic images, turn them into a 3D character and then texture and animate it. It's the typical kind of project that I feel I could really be proud of once it's done since I'll have been responsible for all the stages of the process, from concept to animated and textured model, and it'd look really neat in my future portfolio. Which brings me to my most highly priored project for the time being; the creation of my portfolio. What I want to do is collect the work I've done within the field of animation and put it together in a showreel that will then work as my portfolio. I plan to create this collection towards the end of my current courses when I feel like I'll have a lot more material to showcase. Also I want relatively recent material in the reel that I can stand for, you know. The problem with this plan is that I'd like to apply for a trainee position at one of the local game studios while I study my last term, and to do this I'd have to put material together much sooner than the end of this fall, and write to possible studios as soon as possible. My friend gave me a pretty good tip though, to just put together some samples of the work I've done so far as a 'placeholder portfolio' and use that when I write to the studios. Hopefully what it'll show is my passion for learning animation without the content having to be perfect, and it'll beat writing to studios without any material to showcase. So that's also a project on its own, putting together a temporary showreel.
Not to mention all the writing projects... two contests coming up that I wanna participate in, one assignment for my writer's group, and then of course, the annual Nanowrimo hovering on the horizon far, far away. I have no idea what I want to write about for this year and even less of an idea how to pull that off in time. Got. So. Much. Work. Ahead.
Without much further ado, might see you on the other side of the dreamscape. Until then, rested sleep to y'all.
POET IN THE JAR
Saturday, September 8
Journeyman
Weren't you my journeyman
Didn't we watch the stars together
Didn't we map the world together
Weren't you my journeyman
When we set sails together
For ages we rode the vast uncharted sea
You still remember the oldest fragments of me
You should be able to see patterns, pictures
I should be able to see constellations
We should still be charting the seas
Somehow we both wandered
Somehow we lost ourselves
Among the islands
Weren't you my journeyman then
Weren't you always
What happened to us
When the falling snow draped the landscape
When the northern lights were what lit our way
When the mist tried so desperately to lead us astray
We navigated together
Through reefs and cliffs
Cleaving the waves
Journeyman,
We could have been saved
You should have held on to every silver key
When I drifted, you should have held on to me
I can't trust a journeyman who'll let me drift
Who'll let the winds carry me away
Did you know I lost everything
In those storms
Did you notice,
Journeyman?
What have we become by now but caricatures
Hardened hearts and dying desires
Drenched in salt and scorched by fires
What have we become by now but stone
Stone statues with memories of old days
Carved into our withering hands
Weren't you my journeyman
Didn't you explore the fields with me
Didn't we search the forests and hills
Before we wandered, before we lost ourselves
Didn't we laugh together, and gaze at the glimmering, frozen water
Weren't we on the same crew, the same ship
Hurdling together with shivering fingers and freezing lips
Now I'm fighting with a loneliness
That slowly kills
There's nothing left for us to chart
Nothing left for us to say
Even thoughts are obsolete
When time has swallowed everything that was
It's too late to save us
Too late to find our way home again
Too late to be my journeyman
Sunday, September 2
Inaudible Music
Why do we care what other people think of us? Are we that narrow-minded, as human beings, that we think it really matters? Are we even individuals, capable of thought and emotion, are we anything more than specks of dust against the universe? We strive and strive for an image of perfection that we'll never achieve, try so hard to maintain this image of ourselves as intelligent beings, while in essence we aren't much more than animals equipped with a certain level of self-consciousness. We're dependent on the world around us to even be able to breathe, we're dependent on the sun to be able to live our small, small lives. Our whole life's order is arranged after day and night cycles created as the world spins around its own axis. When we lie down in the grass and stare at a blue sky we're still staring into space, all stars visible at night hidden by the sun and disguised as a cloak of color and clouds. That man exists is a wonder in itself and yet all we can focus on are trivial things. When you think about it - what should one achieve with life? Is the meaning of life to be successful, to be liked and respected, to have a job and a house, to be free of drugs and addiction, to contribute to society? Why can't the meaning of life, viewed by the masses, be to fulfill your own dreams and to live by a code decided by your heart? When I think about how fragile man is, how easily we die, how easily we live, it seems foolish and primitive how people tend to turn the most insignificant things into problems weighing in heavily on their lives. I look at the people around me and watch them dance as though to inaudible music, watch them prance as though they could achieve immortality that way. They drink themselves senseless, backtalk eachother, sleep around, in every photo it's the same shallow story being told all over again. I can't even say I'm not like them, not even when I spend my time with friends and games and writing and other things I'd like to call intellectual. In the end I'm equally primitive and equally worried about what rumors run around, how others see me, and I adapt myself equally much to avoid being seen as out of place. We divide ourselves into groups of us and them when we're actually the very same. Who can control when their hearts bleed, who can grasp the emptiness with open arms? The same way we're all the same, all watching the stars and thinking of what infinity is like, one day we'll all die, and these moments will be gone. I don't want to spend my moments of consciousness, moments of awareness, moments of living and being a breathing, feeling creature, living up to other people's standards. I want to spend my moments being safe, expanding my train of thought, experimenting, discovering, learning. I want to spend my moments around people I trust, people with mindsets like my own, people who don't dwell in silly pictures they can't remember when they were taken.
POET IN THE JAR
Wednesday, July 18
Everything That Shines Isn't Gold
So what if my shoes are a bit worn, if I don't own more than a handful of towels, if I have to wait for my salary to buy paint to restore my wall? So what, what does it really matter? As long as I've got my music, got my friends, got a roof over my head and food on my table, as long as I'm ambitious with my studies, trying to learn outside of school, trying to develop myself as a rigger and an animator, as long as I've got words to get me by. It's like everything else is just distant, like I'm pushing all other responsibilities away. I've made the calls I need to make, I'm taking care of the details of moving to a new apartment, I'm taking care of myself and my life. I just spent a whole month on the west coast, near Strömstad, working at a nursery home, earning enough money to pay for my bills in both July and August. It's only right now that I don't have enough, only now that I'm living on borrowed money, only now that I'm really treating every penny with respect. I'm living off of money lent to me by Mom, which I feel bad about, because she had just scratched half of the debt I already had to her... I wish I didn't have to intrude on their money. I don't think of myself as poor, just the way every student is; but I do wish that sometimes, for once, I could buy something without gasping over the price tag first, that I could buy something that was brand new and wasn't found on a sale rack, that I could join a friend for spontaneous lunch; just every once in a while. I'm so scared I won't find a job when I graduate from university, so scared I WILL find one and fall back into the comfort of having a job, forgetting everything I strived for when I knew what money was worth. I'm so puzzled and worried about distant things, at the same time I can't seem to get myself together and sort my remaining stuff before moving or washing a plate after I used it. I hope that I'll be able to stick to all my principles, stick to all those beliefs I have about the world and the people in it, about myself and about what living is worth.
What if I wake up, years from now, and realize I've become a vegetable, completely deadened to everything that used to cut and tear?
POET IN THE JAR
Tuesday, June 26
Haphazard, Chaotic Attic
Isn't it easy, delving into your own mind when the world peels off the better of you? Isn't it done by magic, in a matter of only seconds, when everything you see becomes too sharp, too real, for your own liking? Isn't it easy to head blindly into imagination, when reality hurts, when mortality knocks on your door, when you're reminded how frail you are?
LIVE LIFE, you can read on my knuckles, Absolution, you can read on my wrist. Illusion and dream is written in my neck, turtles and lotus flowers are drawn on my arms. All of this art I've inked onto my skin, all of it on such different occasions for such different reasons, and still their message seems so incredibly similar in retrospect, seems to ring so incredibly clear. It all seems to come down to the same thing - reality, mortality, and making use of the moment. So why is it so hard to stay on the outside, to not float off into a daily dreamland, drenching ourselves in daydreams when we aren't allowed to sleep and scaring ourselves awake with nightmares when we're supposed to?
I wonder if everyone's dreamers, if everyone dreads to be entirely present, entirely absorbed by what is happening around them this very second. I want to be more like those people who forget everything but what needs to be done this here and this now, want to be more like those people who can care so much that they can forget entirely about themselves. I want to be in the moment, want to be here, want to be now. I want to be less forgetful, less abstract, less enclosed in a prison made of moving patterns turning me sea-sick, less chased by constant inner arguments, less troubled, less worried, less afraid. More than anything else I want to be less afraid. I'm so tired of waking up in the middle of the night scared half to death by my own nocturnal and haphazard visions, so tired of twitchingly tricking myself into sleep, so tired of counting minutes and seconds until the next time I'm required to present myself somewhere, so tired of not being able to choose what to think.
Is it supposed to be this chaotic? Is it supposed to be this dizzy? Am I supposed to shift this swiftly between emotional extremes? Am I supposed to spend this much time inside the messy attic I call mind? Am I supposed to latch on so easily to what lives and breathes?
"What you live and breathe is why you're dying"
~ Poets of the Fall
I'll leave you with those words for now...
POET IN THE CHAOTIC JAR
LIVE LIFE, you can read on my knuckles, Absolution, you can read on my wrist. Illusion and dream is written in my neck, turtles and lotus flowers are drawn on my arms. All of this art I've inked onto my skin, all of it on such different occasions for such different reasons, and still their message seems so incredibly similar in retrospect, seems to ring so incredibly clear. It all seems to come down to the same thing - reality, mortality, and making use of the moment. So why is it so hard to stay on the outside, to not float off into a daily dreamland, drenching ourselves in daydreams when we aren't allowed to sleep and scaring ourselves awake with nightmares when we're supposed to?
I wonder if everyone's dreamers, if everyone dreads to be entirely present, entirely absorbed by what is happening around them this very second. I want to be more like those people who forget everything but what needs to be done this here and this now, want to be more like those people who can care so much that they can forget entirely about themselves. I want to be in the moment, want to be here, want to be now. I want to be less forgetful, less abstract, less enclosed in a prison made of moving patterns turning me sea-sick, less chased by constant inner arguments, less troubled, less worried, less afraid. More than anything else I want to be less afraid. I'm so tired of waking up in the middle of the night scared half to death by my own nocturnal and haphazard visions, so tired of twitchingly tricking myself into sleep, so tired of counting minutes and seconds until the next time I'm required to present myself somewhere, so tired of not being able to choose what to think.
Is it supposed to be this chaotic? Is it supposed to be this dizzy? Am I supposed to shift this swiftly between emotional extremes? Am I supposed to spend this much time inside the messy attic I call mind? Am I supposed to latch on so easily to what lives and breathes?
"What you live and breathe is why you're dying"
~ Poets of the Fall
I'll leave you with those words for now...
POET IN THE CHAOTIC JAR
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