usualvernacular

usualvernacular

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lust

Love is an amazing thing; a force that can uplift, motivate, drive, inspire, heal and more. It is something worthy of aspiration and often fills cracks in our soul that we may not even have realized existed. But love can also be hard and devastating, it can be larger than life and too much to handle. Lust is simpler. Intoxicating, exciting, and a spark that ripples through your veins like electricity or liquid fire. It's a basic need that can be solved in a basic action. It's a wanton need that is almost as much fun to crave as it is to sate. But love lasts. Or, at least, it can.

I believe it's true that if you don't learn from history you'll be doomed to repeat it, but I don't think history can teach us everything - or even much more than anything - about the future. The future is always full of unexpected turns that could not and will not be anticipated; though when the future becomes history, those who study and catalogue its events will surely rationalize, with the clarity of hindsight, why we should have expected this or that. Learn from the mistakes of the past, but be on the lookout for new mistakes in the future, and always try to roll with the punches. That's all any of us can do.

This is a word that is inherently definitive and rather hard to write about off the cuff. I feel that nothing I write, inspired by this word, will be intense enough to live up to its own specific inspiration. Suffice it to say, then, that I value the reality of this concept in most situations. Intensity, passion, moments that contain an energy so great they shock your conscious from the flow of life and draw you to a vibrating standstill in the very experience.

I think I've always had a deep, though small (or maybe, more accurately, contained) desire to predict the future; to know what's coming in specific situations at my discretion. However, a major reason I want that ability is so I can change the future to suit me, which raises an interesting question: is it really predicting the future if you change it into something else? Additionally, since the future is always changeable, what more is gained by predicting one outcome that will only come to fruition if nothing is changed, something that is moot simply by knowing the result before it arises.

I feel like my first association should be with the likes of "awe" and "amazement" or massive and iconic sights throughout the world. However, I instead think more of the pondering, curious and imaginative use of the word. Often I find myself wondering what would have, could have, might have happened in a certain situation. Quickly I create and think of all the different forks that could have been taken from a specific point of my path in life. It is a mostly unproductive thought spiral that can get so big, so far-reaching, and in such a short amount of time that it sometimes inspires the other sense of the word in me. That and a bit of fear.

There is a volunteer fire station house right around the corner from me and when I was little we would go to their fire prevention week event every year. I was entertained to ridiculous extents by "prank-calling" at the demo 9-1-1 table ("my tongue is stuck in the refrigerator!") and the few years they had a hose and cardboard façade of a house with knock-down fire targets. That and the free McDonald cheeseburger certificates they gave out. I got to keep half a box of them when I was 10 because my Dad was on the board and they had a bunch leftover. I got cheeseburgers every day for weeks on end.

I couldn't explain why, but my first thought was of someone having their wrists shackled with heavy cuffs. Their arms being embraced in manacles, limbs hugged with chain, as they feel the tangible signs of freedom being squeezed out of their grasp and left with the security of imprisonment. I hope this doesn't come from a subconscious desire for mandated routine.

I once thought that makeup was oft overused, to the extent that it hid the real face of women like a mask I felt they didn't need. However, in the last 4 years I've had my body painted with needles and ink to leave marks I would have never been born with because I felt they belonged; additionally, the marks I have are a drop in the bucket to the ones I want before I'll feel like my skin is complete. So who was I to judge how someone uses makeup?

plaid

Always makes me think of flannel. For years I thought they were interchangeable and inseparable, as if the pattern itself could not exist on anything but a thick, soft, warm fabric. It was just the same with the vice versa and I remember one Christmas, my parents gave me flannel sheets and they were solid white with NFL helmets and logos on them. I didn't believe it was flannel, because it wasn't plaid.

Funny, I was just eating pretzels a little while ago. It was odd that I was doing that because I didn't have anything to drink and, while I love pretzels, I usually find them too salty to eat without a beverage. I think I just needed to snack though, just to be doing something.

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writing since 2010 · 72 entries · 70 days shown up

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on this day 16 years ago

Rob wrote about grown
“This is probably what a lot of people will write about, but by my age I think I'm considered grown up. However, compared to how I view and have always viewed grownups I don't necessarily think I fit …”

the words Rob reaches for

oftenwordhoweverwrongfuturekidpastfullleastfirewishsensehappenablerathersometimes