Where my Time goes, to Think

“When was the last time you felt like this?”

My mind went deep into my dreams to talk, but I woke up, which ended the conversation before I had time to hear the answer. I walked over to the window and watched outside quietly move behind the glass wall, which kept me inside the 25th floor. A few cars crossed the bridge, it was nearly 4am. The people in their cars, what were they doing? Sometimes I find myself wandering into the car, just to find out where my imagination would reveal ‘why I was driving so late’. Just like my dream, I transported to the car on the bridge, I saw the dashboard and streetlights. I felt the chair. But I soon realised I was in the passenger seat, and wondered why, which snapped me out of the daze.

I touched my phone to see the time, and my chest & face briefly appeared in front of me in the glass, floating above the water on the other side. Why do I feel so full of strange thoughts all the time? I feel like I’m wasting them sometimes. Like, if I figured out a channel to make them useful, I’d feel with more purpose.

I remember when I started this site. It was a communication tool, mostly, and not just to myself. I didn’t want to forget the way things felt at the time, because I knew I wouldn’t always feel like this. Nostalgia traps windows of those feelings, it’s like holding a lobster (they’re biologically immortal) but holding it by it’s back. It can’t grab you, but can try.

I don’t remember the last time I was nervous. It’s not an arrogant comment, but I truly don’t remember being nervous. I get anxiety sometimes, but it’s usually self-inflicted. Maybe I drank too much, maybe the fear caused from a non-decision. I love to be in control of things, it burns me to lose it. But nervous?

A few months ago I was turning right at a set of lights, waiting for the light to change into orange to complete the turn. There was a large 4WD in-front of me, which semi blocked my vision, but I knew I would wait until it was safe to turn. The light changed, the 4WD took off and out of nowhere a red Ford came flying through the red light, splitting between the 4WD & me, forcing me to swerve into the otherside of the intersection to miss it. It was probably going 80km/h and the red light camera flashed. I saw the face of the guy driving, he looked angry. As I completed the turn, the 4WD had pulled over. He must’ve believed a crash was imminent. In the milliseconds, I didn’t think at all. Not one thought popped into my mind. It actually gave me anxiety thinking about it afterward, that I didn’t feel anything, just moved. It’s why the search for capturing how to feel is so important to me, on retrospect it can be even more moving.

I hate the idea that mistakes can be made which can alter trajectory or lives. It creates a sense of urgency whenever I feel the pinch of deadlines, because the control has a timeline, yet it forces you to do something. Shouldn’t that be all the time then? I’m very impatient,  and recently when I was driving behind an older person, I had a thought. Are they driving so slow, because they weren’t ever in a rush anymore? Is being in a rush correlated to age? When does the clock tick over to calm?

As I’ve gotten older, I find it harder to correlate my thoughts into depth. It seems the more brief I can communicate, the more authentic it can be. I once needed 10 words to describe something, now I just need the first.

It makes me feel that most people around me don’t speak ‘real’ in text anymore,  it’s like music. Words are becoming lost in an overly stimulated world, that half of what actually works is only top-line & vague, whilst raw honest thoughts are more likely to be misinterpreted. The guy who writes poems is intense, whilst liking someones photo or syncing on tinder is exciting. The top-line superficial generation are easily fooled by profile pictures, It’s really not that complicated anymore. Only fools don’t know that words mean more.

How can I possibly write in such a way that is read the way it was written? Take the a-cappella off the drums, and tell me does it make you feel the same? No. How do you write something that has beat? It’s hard. I want to reach you with written words, because I can be the most vulnerable here. To be honest, I don’t really care, as I can speak the language of the shallow; I just enjoy the depth when I swim further out.

It’s why writing is so subjective, and honest. The sad song on the radio can make you relate to something, because it has tone, emotional instruments and if done well, pain comes through the vocals. But to write, to genuinely write and make people feel, seems brutal by itself. It seems more distant to reach people, when the message is dependant on your mind creating the scene, rather than a filter. It’s why there are emoji’s, bitmoji’s, and social media – where ‘romance’ is broadcast. I’ve always felt, the line between romance and cheese is split by a toothpick, and social media is most commonly fake – #nofilter. Romance is about listening and the nervousness of love- not likes.

They say you fall in love hardest the first time, and you spend times searching for the feeling again if you lose it. Searching for the same feeling, but with someone different. Please tell me that isn’t Einsteins theory of insanity? It’s less genuine when you place it like that, which I didn’t mean to, but what is the variable? Put that a-cappella on a different beat and it will sound different. That’s better. Einstein probably had it better when he said –

“No problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it.”

See, I am a romantic, stick with me.

So maybe the 4am reflection was to remind me, that in-front of the phone, I’m alive? Being the passenger shows me that I don’t have control over where that person was driving, which is trust. Being nervous is a good thing, it shows you really, really care and don’t have the control you’re searching for. And the answer to the question in my dream isn’t meant to be known just yet, it’s not that easy.

C.f