IF

It occurred to me the other day that "What if?" is one of the most useless questions ever. But I thought about it a little bit longer and figured it had to be valid since it's so cliche. Maybe it could help one prevent repeating past errors, if it doesn't lure one into living in the past.

So I did a little research, and turned a corner when I found this. "IF" all by itself is a pretty big word, and this poem reminds me of all the important things I need to remember when I'm brought down by "the emotionless mediocrity of day-to-day living". (from 'Living Life' by Daniel Johnston).

IF

If you can keep your head when all about you

Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or, being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with triumph and disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with wornout tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on";

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings - nor lose the common touch;
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run -
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Man my son!

by Rudyard Kipling

healthy, happy truth

What I seek is unattainable and defeating;
My heart will be blank when it stops beating.

It isn't exactly blank, but it isn't broken either.
I've never seen true love, but I am a believer.
If that's the way I am, that's the way I'll be.
I surrender to the war that's been raging in me.

I will never be perfect.

No feeling is right or wrong, and I can't choose how I feel. It's what I decide to do about the feeling that is important. There are no right or wrong choices; what matters is that I am the one making the choice. If the result of that choice is undesirable, I will choose a different path the next time around. But God help me own my choices, and may those choices be made consciously.

Amen.

sick sad truth

all my stories end the same

I'm alone and I'm ashamed

Someone else is hurt and I'm to blame

If I was so in love with what's-his-name

Why'd I play my same old game?

But I don't know what I can do to change

I set myself up to fall

they're all a waste of time

I feel bored without the drama

of 2 or 3 on my mind

All confusion, no conclusions

from the choices that I make

My heart won't ever heal when I'm the one

who loves to see it break

BLANK-HEARTED

So I've been working on this song since September 6th. I was dog-sitting for Kerri and Lori and just started jamming in drop-D and came up with this driving head-bobbing rock stuff. Then later I was mowing their backyard and I started belting out the melody with these words.

It's an aspiration, because I'm not sure if it's entirely possible. The last I recall going a significant period of time without any sort of crush was 3rd grade. Apparently my emotional hands hate being empty, because I've always seemed to need someone to hold on to.

It'll be difficult getting it just right, describing what I really mean, because I have a hard time wrapping my own mind around the concept, but this is what I have so far:

BLANK-HEARTED

is better than broken-hearted to me

To be blank-hearted is to be free

Oh I have loved and lost, so I know it's worth the cost

But I need a break from love for a while

Don't think I'm making this up,

It's not that I'm giving up,

But I don't need romance to make me smile.

BLANK-HEARTED

is better than broken-hearted any day

If I were blank-hearted, I wouldn't give my power away

Wanna break the fixation, I'm done with the frustration,

I'm not losing sleep at night on the phone

I have willful determination for non-affiliation

And an inner glow from being on my own

My sought-after rarity is emotional clarity

A clean slate, a heart without scars

Won't settle for familiarity

Or a life spent writing forlorn memoirs

Just be free

Just be me

A fresh start

With my blank heart

***

c2009 Haylee Slaughter Music

elbertmoyboyiii

We were dear friends way back then. He was dating a friend of mine and we became buds at some debutante function in Jacksonville and then hung out more in earnest when I was living in Chapel Hill and Raleigh. There was one summer we tore it up and kicked it all the time. He was torn up over some J girl and I was mourning some C boy and so we had a reason to sit on the porch of Los Pos' on Rosemary Street and eat our enchiladas in the silence of understanding.

There was this weirdness once, I was playing my regular gig at Pasta Bella a couple nights after I finished my master's and had some revelations surrounding the pervert producer I'd been working with on a new record. I must've been ovulating or something, but my hair was down, and iii was there and he had that Look. The Look you get from dudes who fall victim to the siren effect, bless their hearts. It's not something I aim for, it just happens and I know the Look when I see it. So anyways, later that night we were at Goodfellows and he kissed me and it was weird and I made excuses as to why we couldn't evolve (his ex-mutual friend of mine was my first reason). Haha, so he calls me the next day (my phone accidentally recorded it so listened to it over and over for years!) and he's all "hey how're you doing?" and I said "I'm doing well, ya know..." and he interrupts me and blurts out, "Hey why'd we make out last night?" and I'm all uh "I don't know man, it was your idea!!". So funny! So we were alright and it wasn't that big a deal. It was just funny we'd been so dumb.

I think it was after this, we'd had an angry whiskey-pounding night. I mean we were bitterly broken-hearted, suffering it through together. Well I felt like fighting or having someone beat me up so I talked him into a Fight Club sort of thing. We went out in to the alley behind Goodfellows and had a few swings for a couple seconds, nothing too major but still satisfying, until he dropped me on my elbow. That sucked. And I was like, "Oww man, I'm hungry!". So we walked up the hill to Hector's for burgers. Mmmmm.

Well, he was leaving a few months later for his first big boy job out of college at Carolina, so for whatever reason I started thinking that him and me together made perfect sense. He'd been off and on with some ho we'll call Maria that none of his other friends liked (you know how that goes). It was dumb. I think I wanted to feel that way about somebody and he seemed logical and safe, but of course after he got up to DC he was cool enough to reject me straight up and say he'd rather be with her, which was aight. We're still buds.

I think it was after a long while that he'd been up in DC learning Arabic or something at Georgetown that he finally came home to Raleigh to visit. He came out to meet me in his driveway, and he lived in a bunch of woods off the road. We stood out in the driveway shooting baskets for no less than an hour, just talking. We were surrounded by the most brilliant display of North Carolina in the autumn - oranges, yellows, bright red, it was surreal but fitting. I'll never forget that afternoon.

Now, we aren't as close as we used to be. Wish we could talk more but he works on the other side of the world half the time and we both have our different lives. iii is just another very special guy friend who has graced my life (Bill Cape would be a comparable example) and I miss his company.

09/2/09 Quote of the Day

"All that is necessary to break the spell of inertia and frustration is this: Act as if it were impossible to fail."
– Dorothea Brande

About Dorothea Brande

Dorothea Brande wrote the quintessential how-to-write book,Becoming a Writer, which was among the first to address every writer's core problem: How to sit down and let the words flow. Her book, published in 1934, remains in print today. She was born in 1893 in Chicago. She worked as an editor on the Chicago Tribuneand The American Review and married the latter journal's owner. She also wrote Wake Up and Live, which was adapted into a movie in 1937. She died in 1948.

Random Paper In My Backpack

I've always wanted

to be a figment,

go to that extent,

crampin' my style.

Such a gentle spirit -

I fell like the Hendinburg.

Nevertheless -

Not speaking is a lot easier

than trying to figure out

what to say.

I'm not into the Beatles

like I used to be

But where we gonna go boys?

To the top of the most

To the top of the most

Be careful who you tell

but just be you.

God already knows

you can't pray a lie.

I want that to be

my final memory.

The rock makes ripples.

Prayer is what

gives meaning to my life.

Quote of the Day

August 27, 2009

"You're only given a little spark of madness. You mustn't lose it."
– Robin Williams