This isn’t whining, I swear.

It goes away for a couple of days, and then it comes back, like a virus.

Will I make it? Will I succeed? What if I do? What if I don’t?

What’s my future? Hell, where is my future? Why is it elusive? I mean, if a girl is playing hard to catch, I get it: if I don’t step up, she will end up with somebody else, move on with her life. Simple. 

But she’ll continue to exist; she’ll have a life. But the future? It needs to hang on to me to become more than just a possibility. Without me, it will die without living up to its potential, beaten away by the odds, and replaced by another future, the one that ends up happening.

Who wants that? Who wants to be replaced? Who doesn’t want to come of age and become all they can be? And why the hell am I thinking about the future as if it’s a person with goals and dreams and all those things that are inherent to humanity instead of just a time concept? That’s just stupid. 

Why do I regret going out and regret staying in? Wishing I was home when I’m out, and wishing I was out when I’m home. Perpetual uneasiness.

Why do I feel so lethargic sometimes? Why am I afraid of being bored? Why am I afraid of being boring?

Why do I have so many questions? Why do I question so much? Why do I question my questions so much?

Who am I? No, really. Who the fuck am I? What am I doing how can I change this how do I get out of this machine where do I go from here … you know?

Why can’t I be content why don’t things add up why the hell does sleep leaves me at night but comes back during the day how can earbuds entangle themselves so much in so little time why does it has to be just one sock that gets lost? Am I losing it? Shit.

Then all that goes away, and everything will be all right, and I’m okay. And then it all comes back, and nothing will be okay, and I’m not.

I know I’m not the only one with these questions; I don’t consider them special. But the fact that it’s the norm doesn’t mean that it’s all good, right?

Goddamn virus.

Footwear reuse.

My mother and I had a conversation today. Nothing heavy, just a chat. Hadn’t done it in a long time. It proved to be a little hard at first, like breaking in an old pair of shoes that have been left to dry in the sun for a long time.

I did the talking, for the most part. She dozed off a couple of times—it was late at night—and every time it happened I caught myself in the need to waken her up in a delicate manner, just to keep rattling on. About time travel, killer clowns and dreams of falling.

After a while the conversation became a monologue; follow-up questions gave way to silence. She’s a peaceful sleeper. I kissed her goodnight and came to my room. I’m glad it happened, and honestly wish it isn’t too long before it happens again.

On Creativity

What nobody tells people who are beginners—and I really wish someone had told this to me … is that all of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, and it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not.

But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase. They quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know it’s normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story.

It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions. And I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It’s gonna take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You’ve just gotta fight your way through.

—Ira Glass

Parallel Universes, Part 2

You know how, when an intense events takes place, some people say the spot where it happened is marked forever? Nobody knows exactly how—or what—but many believe something stays there, imprinting the spot forever.

It’s a classic paranormal movie trope; if somebody was murdered at the house, that place will be haunted forever.

Of course, said assertions stem mostly from superstition, but what if it’s like that after all?

What if the variable that’s tampered with is the very fabric of time-space itself? What if after something intense happens somewhere, time-space branches out into another current, and then another, and then another, and so forth?

I always think of that when something powerful happens, like the collision-that-really-wasn’t. Perhaps the other me did suffer a horrific death, and I became the alternate version of myself, as silly as that sounds.

Maybe it is true, maybe I’m already dead, I don’t know, and while it’s thought-provoking, it’s far more intriguing to think that somewhere, somewhen, I’ve made something else of myself. The possibilities are endless. A prisoner serving a life sentence, a movie star, a regular person with a 9-to-5 job, a homeless person, a successful lawyer with a crippling drug habit, a pimp, Batman himself. Batman … that’s a nice thought. 

So here I am, thinking I should stop musing, go to sleep; but then again, maybe somewhere, I already am.

Parallel Universes, Part 1

I remember it clearly.

Even though some of the details escape my memory, I can remember the exact moment with particular clarity. But that’s normal, right? I believe I’ve read it somewhere—when you have an intense experience, so much information goes in that the brain leaves out the trifles to retain what really matters.

The two-way road was dark, and the speed was around 65. Not many cars around. A curve came up and with it, a patch of sand. I lost control, and the car began to swerve with increasing violence. From above it must have looked like a pendulum that had just been set in motion, each swing more pronounced than the one before.

And the semi, that goddamn semi. As if I didn’t have enough. Didn’t really see it so much as I made out the lights and shape. Not that it would’ve made a difference anyway, since there wasn’t anything I could do—other than steering the wheel frantically. This is it, I must’ve thought. 

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A double edged sword.

Passion has always been dangerous to me.

I mean, it absolutely contributes (rather than makes, as many would have you believe) people to succeed in life, and I’ve always admired people who aren’t afraid to be ridiculed or vilified and are unabashing in their talks and behaviors about a certain subject. It makes them look crazy and ridiculous to those who don’t share their opinions, but it takes a lot of courage.

However, I believe it has a dark side as well, when it becomes obsessive, borderline fanatic, sometimes even transforming into fanaticism, zealotry, blind devotion.

I see it happen all the time in academics, sports, careers, philosophies, religion, what have you.

It can go wrong on so many ways, which is why I have avoided it for most of my life. Many people I know have heard me say “I hope I never have such a fanatic attitude for anything in my life. It causes tunnel vision, like a scotoma of sorts.” Doesn’t let you see the bigger picture.

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4.060057582e+52 Planck.

What is it that makes people hope when a year is about to end? What grants them a sense of closure or new beginning? I mean, if you think about it, nothing really changes. You just throw away one calendar that has been pinned to some wall for a long time and replace it with another.

Not that it’s stupid. In fact, cycles are necessary if we want some order in our lives. They help us keep track of deadlines, people, events, wasted time and how much is left on the washing machine.

But using cycles can be dangerous as well, because we have a tendency to put things off indefinitely. We love phrases like “in about…” or “around” and when it comes to setting goals, those phrases are trouble.

The thought of an ever present future is comforting—the idea of sometime. However, it’s a double-edged sword, particularly if we take into consideration that we can be gone any minute. Procrastination is a powerful thing. It can patiently shatter dreams, change ideals and persons if left uncontrolled.

Why not begin something new right now, as opposed to waiting a whole week until the calendar says January 1?

If you are wondering, the title is the average life expectancy of any given person on the world, in the smallest time unit possible, as of 2009. It’s 69.4 years. You may ask why I didn’t put it in years in the first place. I say: when it comes down to it, does it really matter?