Self imposed identity is like building a house when you don't know how. You may know the general shape of things to come but not the full story of the innards. You're also not so great making clean cuts and what you end up with is a facsimile of a home. It looks like the hand drawn caricature of a home that we all draw when we're uncoordinated children. Proudly upon the cardboard mailbox my seal of approval gets slapped on top because I gave the whole thing a name and brought it into existence.
Identifying myself helps in this perpetual process of enlightenment but it is only a portion of the story. My identity is irrevocably intermingled with the inner thoughts of those around me and will always remain impossibly indecipherable because of the impassibility of the veil between minds.
A key aspect of identity are the roles given to us by others. These roles often have more duality than they should for accurate diagnosis so I shy away. In order to be a writer, I need to listen. I need to hear the voices in my head forming words and then my fingers need to listen to the electrical impulses sent down my nervous system to move muscles and click keys. I need to have read (because reading is a type of listening) all of the words organized here, elsewhere organized differently. I need to listen to inspiration in whatever form it takes before I can even begin.
Listening is also an important part of observing. In order to get those impulses to fire from brain to word I need to see the scene. Conjure it in my mind so that I can describe it here in words that have never been sufficient. An astute reader may have been able to intuit that my sense of smell is the worst of the bunch. I rarely, if ever, describe a scene with smell. Is my smell sense so weak because a good portion of my life has been spent with my nose buried in books?
Yesterday I did a series of experiments to determine the status of my mind-body connection. I ran for 3.55 miles to check the limits of my endurance. How far could I push my body until it decided to fight back? It didn't give me much push back. I was able to finish with less than maximum effort so either my body is obedient, I'm far fitter than I had expected, or the connection is still weak. My mind can force my body to do things it doesn't want to like run a 5k off couch or drink too much or smoke too much or do whatever too much.
I also went out and had one drink. One drink to see if the connection is being repaired or not. When I used to drink I'd never wait for the effects of the first before the second was already ordered up. I would then never wait for the effects of the second before the third, and so on. Four or five and my body was well into the feelings by then but my mind would still be racing, seeking extra from the past that I'd never been able to mimic and knew I never would.
During this drink I was serenaded by an animatronic sorceress on percussion with a backup string section. I think sound might be a shorter avenue to the heart because it's usually through sound that I feel most moved. Sound can almost always make me feel something. The lyrical and the rhythmical combine to move the heart and mind. Songs are thought processes you feel.
My decidedly not but assuredly so inebriated brain chose to decline the second round. Triumph? Only insofar as the siren in the corner of the cantina keeps captivating the audience with pipes like the grandest church organ. From Winehouse to Nicks and back again, I felt like I was getting a flight of heavenly treats invading my ears only periodically punctuated by background music of California burn out rock.
Comfort music for the ears, more or less. But most certainly more. I got lost in that savory sauce every third song. Imagine if the call of Cthulhu had a female voice and it was all part of some surreal Five Nights at Freddie's show. Beautiful and terrifying yet irresistible on a level I'm unequipped to handle.
"Knowing ain't half the battle, that's a bullshit quip written by some asshole." - Aesop Rock
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