When I'm sixty-three point two one eight...

It's official, I think, I'm old. I'm sitting here in front of a group of mostly twentysomethings, completing a Certificate IV level qualification and, it seems that unless I "drive" them, they sit idle. I remember "when I was a boy", you were given the requirements of the task to be completed and off you went. I guess that's why maybe to this day , I like to learn by discovery. Piaget's theory of cognitive development is probably one of the few things that really spoke to me during my time my time studying for my diploma.

To illustrate my frustration somewhat, here's an example from this morning. I demonstrated to a student an accurate and simple process to draw a circle to a particular size, a compass big enough was not available for the process. I then sent him on his way and he drew his circle. He then approached me some twenty minutes later asking me to show him how to draw a circle, again. What was wrong with the method that I showed him before? He explained to me that the circle was a different size. Of course it was, silly me!

Now, I do realise that people are unique and learn in different ways but to me this is an example of laziness. Needing to be spoon fed.

So, is my frustration a case of me being a grumpy old man?

Hello, is it me...

Look hard at the darkness,
And you will see,
Just call my name and I'll be there.
You cannot touch me,
You would not dare,
I am the chill that's in the air.

And I try to get through to you,
In my own special way,
As the barriers crumble,
At the end of the day.

Dark rivers are flowing,
Back into the past,
You are the fish for which I cast.
And what of the future,
What is to be,
As the rivers flow into the sea.

And I try to get through to you,
In my own special way,
As the barriers crumble,
At the end of the day.

Do not take for granted,
Powers out there,
Don't step into the demon's lair.
Time is an illusion,
Rising from dying,
Steep is the mountain which we climb.

And I try to get through to you,
In my own special way,
As the barriers crumble,
At the end of the day

-The Small Hours.

By: Holocaust

Come In Spinner

Sometimes my existence feels like I'm living in a casino, the odds so stacked against me.

Heads, the "house" wins, tails I lose.

Prolly.

This is a war universe.

War all the time.

That is its nature.

There may be other universes based on all sorts of other principles,

but ours seems to be based on war and games.

-William S Burroughs.

Hey buddy...

Time is not perpetual

It is being swallowed by itself

Tail first, flailing despite

Our corrupt intervention

Umm...

Some days are better than others...and some days are better than others.

When the machine is working as it should, or, more appropriately, as we would like, time stands still as we wield our mastery of life upon an unsuspecting universe. There is no doubt, no error, nothing is too onerous, too cumbersome. We wear our existence like a bespoke suit, tailored to fit our very being. These are the days when life truly is a gift.

Then, there are the other days, when just "being" is a fraught experience. Moments of self doubt elongate into minutes, hours of a disturbed reality. Everything takes an immense, aching effort. Decisions that on another day would feel like but a reflex, become protracted, confounding, weighty anchors around our necks.The ignominy that infuses our character with shame, apprehension and repulsion of ourselves makes us a mere vestige of our optimum self.

So, I guess when days are like that, the best option is to grasp life as tightly as you can and believe in it?

You're living in the past...man.

So, a work colleague showed me this photograph today and I almost started tearing up. It rankles me to get emotional about the past because, well, the past is the past.

I don’t know what this photo means to me, whether it harkens back to old times, to bad times and so that pushes a button somewhere inside. Or whether it’s just plain old nostalgia, reminding me of a simpler, gentler time when the world wasn’t in quite such a rush to self-destruct.

It does, however, remind me of summers spent riding my bike around the “tougher”, “meaner” parts of the neighbourhood, when you were always just a little bit scared , making sure you didn’t slow down for fear of a bully, or worse still, an angry dog trying some freedom on for size, just waiting for a juicy seven year old to torment with it’s own special brand of canine persecution.

Nevertheless, I don’t know exactly what it is, if it’s all of these things or none of them but…yeah. Oh, did I mention that said photograph was taken but four weeks ago?

Breathe for freedom.

In an age where, at least to me anyway, imagination is not valued, or at times even seems to be discouraged, I find I'm asking myself; "What is wrong with ambiguity?"

I like to be able to read a line in a poem or hear a line in a song and be able to carry it with me for an hour, a day a week or even a month for that matter until I can decide what the writer/singer means or even more satisfying, what it means to me.

The deliciousness of the ambiguity can feed my imagination for hours if I want it to. To be able to just sit with something and pull it apart, reassemble it in different ways until it "fits", that's one of the beautiful processes that my mind allows me in a world that is all too quick to want to catergorise, compartmentilise and move onto what's next. A world where everything, everything must be explicit.

Well, I for one want some mystery, some ambiguity in my appreciation of art, music, literature, even conversation. Sure, it can be frustrating, exasperating, unnerving, even just plain scary at times but for the most part it feeds me in a way that gives me, I dunno, not joy or exhultation but it's one of the things that makes me gratified/satisfied?, to still exsist.

Anyway...