I faded into my music. Nights awake, downstairs at the computer, blue night sky behind me as I tunnelled into an entire universe of moods and melodies. 

Outside, it snows. 

Small tiny flecks that float on down from the sky, gently tumbling through the air until they land quietly on the ground. It’s barely enough to constitute  an actual snowfall, but the crisp cold air and the smell of firewood says otherwise, because that old friend nostalgia has come home to roost and it’s almost beautiful out tonight. 

I’m standing in the middle of a high school parking lot, located somewhere south of where I used to live and a whole lot north of where I live now. Nothing about this place is familiar, but it feels like as if it should be because it all looks the same. For the two guys standing beside me though, this is their home, their old stomping grounds, and for a while, they make it feel like as if I spent my days here with them as well. 

The joint goes around, but it takes a while to circulate with the cold air continually putting out the tiny embers. Dylan holds it to my mouth while I curve my hands and give it a light. I inhale and let the smoke rush in, the orange glow pulsing with every puff like a heartbeat. I hold the air in my lungs as Dylan pulls it away towards his own mouth, inhaling the smoke and pulling the orange closer towards him. 

And then it begins: my mind races through a million thoughts per second  in complete awareness of every thought and sense receptor that passes through my body—the cold, the tingle, the heat, the sky, the lights, the colours, the smells and more, it rushes in on me like a wave and I struggle to fight the beautiful nausea that rides me like the tide. We begin talking about our lives, moving from our sordid sexual exploits to the futility of family, government and protest. But somewhere between multiple personalities and the cult of Facebook, I lose them and retreat into my own twisted spiral of darkness. 

The world grows silent. The two of my friends notice that I’ve checked out, and I can feel their eyes on me like a million tiny needles digging in at me through my skin. I close my own eyes, but I can still feel them prodding at me in an attempt to elicit any sign of life, something, anything to cure them of their paranoia.

And then it happens. 

Why this body? 

Why this earth? 

Why this race, this culture, this moment in time—was I nothing but a series of chemical processes—? A fluke, a mistake, a disposable outcome of this great beast called life—where was God, where was faith and hope and all these totems of human greatness that we’ve struggled for centuries to discover and conquer, all for what? Rivers of blood down city streets, shattered bones and mangled flesh; just look at what we’ve done to each other! How can you stand idly by and not say a word? Men and women combusting in self immolation—throw yourself upon your sword, death before dishonour, don’t let them see you die, but how can you not? Death is so beautiful, such a mangled twisted experience, what a show, what a show this all is… So bare your ugly soul for a measly photo. Capture yourself in this moment, because it will never happen again; you standing beside your mother, her arm around you, the long curls of her hair brushing along your face, the smell of her perfume and the taste of iced tea that hit your lips, when you rushed inside immediately after that photography was taken! You won’t ever be as happy as you are now, you won’t ever be as young, pretty, smart, intelligent or alive… Can you feel the Earth shifting? Can you feel yourself being pulled further and further out to sea? Can you feel yourself drowning and coming to peace with letting it all go?

Can you feel yourself giving up?

His hands, hot like embers, touch my cheek and I’m roused awake, pulled out by Dylan’s eyes. They look deep into me, searching for a trace of where I went, a postcard, anything to give an explanation, but instead I smile and let the paper burn out at the edge of my fingertips, the smoke vanishing, never to be seen again.

Why can’t any of us seem to fucking focus on shit? 

I don’t think I have ADD. My younger cousin of 13 has ADHD, so I know what that looks like. But I’m not a doctor so I can’t diagnose myself, and I also can’t pretend to know what it looks like just because my cousin has it. My older sister has ADD, and she never figured that out until later on in life, which to be quite honest, explains a lot. Everything explains a lot once you get older. But my inability (our inability, come on people, I know I’m not alone) to focus and take on one task at a time is fucking bullshit. 

I gave myself a guideline to finish my Pilot by my 26th birthday. I’m two days away, and I’m still not done. Instead, I’ve got multiple drafts of the same idea, each with a different tone and direction for each character. It’s fucking frustrating. I wake up early, go to some chic, cool, coffee shop to try and do some writing, but it never really works. I sit there for about three hours, work for about 45 minutes, and the rest I’m bumming around online reading the “news” and getting depressed about the world. 

I also can’t do any work at home. I have no space. I have no desk. I need a desk. But it can’t be just any desk, it needs to be the perfect desk with the perfect hight and the perfect chair. This may sound insane, but it’s actually not. I need to create the perfect environment, a space that is conducive for creation so that I can (pretend to) create.

Sometimes I think being a writer is the easy way out. It’s an excuse most dreamers use for ten, fifteen or twenty years of their lives so that they can bum around, “do things” and call it “research”. But out of those thousands, maybe 5 become actual writers (and by that, I mean they can make a living without working in retail or some silly desk job). Am I one of those people? Is my destiny set for mediocrity? Am I just delaying the inevitable? My dream is to produce television, but first I want to write for television. I want to tell stories about Canadians, stories that visibly reflect what I see and what I think other people around me see. I want to put Toronto on the fucking map. Toronto deserves to be on the fucking Map. Toronto deserves to be destroyed by Aliens on the silver screen!

But the big questions is: Am I on the right path?

Fuck if I know, but I’m going to give it a shot. I’m going to work part time, party, see things, travel, take classes, do some recreational drugs and call it research. 

for the first time in my life, i don’t want you. i want so much more than you. instead, i want to give the world to myself. i want the sun and the trees and the air and the sky to breathe for me. i want to treat me like i’ve always wanted to treat you; a shapeless figure of my own demented imagination, a fantasy born our of a romantic topography; a hopelessly devoted dream. 

It’s mid-September and the wind pushes against us as we move through the street. Your windbreaker that you leave open blows back behind you like an angry cape, thrashing left and right against the rippling of the breeze. When we approach the bridge that runs over the train tracks, you turn and smile and reach out for my hand. As soon as your fingers touch mine, you grasp tightly, pulling me forward, and I follow. Across the bridge and down the path, we duck under tree branches and find a makeshift trail that leads us beneath Toronto’s main arterial highway, the one that runs along the original lakeshore from so many years ago. Skipping over mud puddles with our shoes wet and pants dirty, we run towards the glowing blue light, not too far off in the distance. It pulses and moves, beckoning us to towards it, and I’m intrigued. We hear nothing but the rush of wind and our feet squishing through the soggy dirt as we trek our way over. The smell of fresh rain on the wild grass, damp and sweet, reminds me of springtime.

Two seasons later, we stand beneath the Gardiner Expressway, some 100ft above our heads, and all is silent. We never would have known this existed, had you not gotten high last Wednesday and went off exploring on your own. But you needed to show me your discovery, a massive art installation, the surprise in your very own backyard.

Fifteen strings of wavy, electric blue light radiates downwards onto our faces as we stare up in awe. The speakers let loose the rhythmic sound of the waves, matching the movement of light, south to north, like the waves from the lake two blocks down. 

We huddle together, and every few moments we can hear a car rush by on the roads above us. But the two of us below, beneath the electric waves, kiss; standing still against the movement of the universe around us. 

there was that one time where we dangled between the evening hours, where your hands slipped around my waist and your face nuzzled against mine. slowly, spinning, we danced to the hum of your voice, a familiar tune i couldn’t place. my hands, covered in suds; our bellies, full with dinner. you stole me for a minute with a smile on your face, our first slow dance.

the night moved in quick. I watched the shadows slip across our bodies, disappearing into the dark as it filled our room. with my ear against your chest, your heart kept count as I lay awake, unable to sleep. i listened to you breathe; the slow rise, the long exhale, the tide of your breath escaping through those lips. in a few hours, deep into the night, you will wake to find me on the other side of the bed, blue with moonlight. you will reach across the expanse and cradle me close, your chest against my back, my legs intwined with yours, one last time. 

It is now 11:25 pm, and I’ve been sitting at my computer, trying to figure out what I want to write about for the past hour and a bit. My mind has been blank, so I’ve been cruising the web, visiting various news sites while shuffling my iTunes playlists in a vague attempt to get the creativity flowing. At the same time, my mind is moving back and forth between all the stuff that has happened in the last few days, wondering if I should spend the free time I have now to process it all, or instead focus on being productive. 

And I’m going through old notebooks. And I’m completely astonished at some of the words and quotations I’ve written down. 

“The world is a tragedy to those who feel and a comedy to those who think.” - Unknown

“All through this life, the only kind of love he’s ever felt has been inexpressible.” - Paul Russell

“Effective insurrections don’t happen spontaneously. They require organization, and with the rising tide of anti-terrorism legislation all around us, serious organization. We can’t take on the state in a head-to-head battle and win, no matter how organized we are. But we can foster rebellions that win the hearts and minds of the people. And that is where the true battleground lies: the battle for imagination, the battle for spirit.” - Andrew Stern

“Platonic love is an absurdity, a self deception, a misnomer for kindred spirits.” - Kraft Ebing

“All you can do is be gentle. Be nice. Be courteous. Go through life with a solid heart. Be strong, flexible, compassionate… keep it centered in your chest, your emotional core, your mental motherboard. Reconcile your heart and mind, let them work together, but not for too long; they too need their space now and again.” - Me, though I’m not sure what prompted me to write this. 

and this was it.

there was no more turning back, no more forced words disguised as passion, desperately trying to reignite something that could not be found. our anger wavered, faltered into restlessness and settled deep into a complacency that neither of us could pull ourselves out of.

we had noticed it slowly, our hearts changing, turning, shifting like two opposing seasons found on opposite sides of the world.

it became lesson after lesson, an anthropological study of our arguments, our decisions, our lives, our things, the artifacts of a relationship dispersed throughout our own belongings. searching for the pieces that no longer belonged, their lending agency having expired long ago. 

the shape of significance had changed before our eyes,

but like most people we were scared to see

what our hearts were trying to tell us.

time after time,

     you tell me I’m head over feet crazy for you,

don’t you remember the reason why?

don’t you remember the reason why?

     Sigh no more.

     Oh my love, sigh no more because

         I’m a soldier of love,

                     my sweet daydreamer,

                     saving all my love for you.

roll away your stone

and remember what the snowman learned about love:

that time can never kill the true heart,

                  my boy,

that love is a battlefield,

                  my boy,

that love will keep us together

                  my boy,

                  because, look up, rain is falling, looks like love.