Telepathy and A Nice Bottle of Wine...

Every once in a while I post something here that seems to really resonate with people.  Last week was one of those posts.  I got a ton of feedback.  It's nice, you know.  Reminds me that I'm not as alone as I'd sometimes like to believe.  There are people in the world who understand all too well exactly what I'm going through and empathize in ways I'll probably never even know about, much less fully understand.

It makes me wonder just how much we really know about the people around us.  Even our closest friends and lovers must just be a treasure trove of, not secret, but unshared thoughts.  I know I am.  Some people know how to be super-zen and turn off their minds for a while - zone out if you will.  Not me.  My mind is constantly going from the moment my eyes pop open in the morning to the moment I have that little death of a system crash every night...I can't stop it, no matter how hard I try.  To write, I don't even have to think about anything in particular, I just have to listen to what's already playing in my brain and try to type it as fast as I can think it. 

Anyway, all this is to say that despite me writing things down nearly constantly and sharing my thoughts and feelings with whoever happens to be in the room with me as well, I still only really share about 0.5% of all the stuff that goes through my mind in a day (percentage completely arbitrary and made up on the spot).  I suspect that most people are like that.  Really it makes me wonder, just how much can anyone really know anyone else?  However it is comforting in that you know if everyone is similar to this than there are lots of people who probably think the same as you and you just never knew.  I happen to know it's true because, like I say, every once in a while I post something that resonates.....

So the relationship I was most jealous of as a teenager, and one that I still miss today, was the relationship between Scott "Cyclops" Summers and Jean "Phoenix" Grey of the X-Men.  Not because of the individuals (I've always disliked Scott and thought Jean should be with Logan!) but because due to Jean's telepathy, these two shared a mental bond that allowed each full access to the others thoughts and feelings.  I suppose a Vulcan relationship would be the same - I've always been fascinated with the mind-meld.  I would prefer a little more passion in my relationships though...I'm all too human.  Just imagine, being with another person who could never misunderstand you, who would know you as they knew themselves, who would FEEL what you feel and would STILL want to be around you!  Seems pretty unlikely, doesn't it?  Maybe that's just me.  Still, it's what my ideal relationship would be like and what I try to emulate in the real world by being as open an honest and trusting as I possibly can with the ones I love, despite my sometimes jaded and cynical nature.  Of course, so far relationship-wise this has only resulted in me being used, abused, lied to, cheated on and then left, broken hearted to laugh at myself and the idiocy of it all.  Strangely, I still believe in the idea though.  If you can't give as much of yourself as is possible to a relationship, why bother having it at all? 

Perhaps this explains why I am still single.  I'm waiting for someone "mind-meld" trustworthy.  I had lost hope that it was possible, but hey....turns out a lot more people identify with me than I suspected.  I may have to conclude that if that is true, than anything truly IS possible.

Oh hey, PS - It's snowing in Toronto as I write this!  First time!!!  As the Starks are wont to say, Winter is Coming!

Reaching Out...

First, an excerpt of what happens when I begin to hate.  I wrote this little bit last week when humanity had sickened me in a variety of ways in only a few hours.... 

Sometimes I feel as though I've spent half my life trying to move out of earshot of these ridiculous fools and the intrepid, moronic bile that spews from their bloated, greasy lips. 

When I was a child, other children literally thought that I was an alien being because of how very, very different I was from them.  How I wish that this was the truth.  I would delight in the knowledge that I was not a member of this dark and demented species. 

This is how I felt, at least for one night last week.  However, it's not how I want to feel about people.  I've lived in this city for most of my life.  I was born here, My first words were here, I had my first kiss, my first love, my first apartment and my first heartbreak within these borders.  All day every day I make a living moving the people of Toronto from place to place, interacting with the multitudes.  I don't want to hate these people and I don't want to stop caring about Toronto or what happens here.

Despite this, lately I've had a few close friends independently mention to me that I've gotten pretty dark.  Too negative and too cynical.  I can blame some of that on my current situation in life, but not all, I think.  It scares me cause the weather's still nice and the sun's still shining on me.  If I'm already this bad, what will February bring??  What has caused me to grow so cold in the last couple of months?  What can I do to stop it?

I came to the conclusion that, as much as I like to brag about my independence, and as much as I truly feel that I am both self-sufficient and in many ways better off alone, my main problem is loneliness.  Not that I am without companions!  I feel well loved and have many great friends that care about me!  Rather, I feel like I am missing out on that one truly intimate connection that everyone wants and a few lucky people have.  I feel isolated even in the midst of millions of people, many of whom are friends!  This isolation is leading to bitterness and negativity.  A common complaint for a writer, I suppose, but one that is slowly and steadily making me less and less inclined to enjoy my fellow humans.

Well, I can't do anything about wanting to establish a (for lack of a more realistic term) soulmate.  If it's gonna happen, it will.  I have my doubts.  What I can do something about is feeling isolated in the midst of crowds.  I just have to meet these people and make them my friends!  Get to know them, their interests and cares!  Once I know a person, I can forgive all manner of faults and fallacies!

Simple right?  Not in one of the largest cities in North America.  It's too much.  I don't know where to start.  So I've decided to leave it to random chance.  I've started leaving little "calling-cards" inconspicuously around the city of Toronto.  I got the idea from a girl who gave me one of her own (for her tumblr blog ).  Mine are little folded pieces of paper, hand-written.  Each one has a peace sign and my eclipsed moon symbols, as well as some questions marks on it.  Folded inside is a random obscure quote, the words "Stryder's Dementia" and my twitter address (@StryderWolfe).  In this way I will reach out to the city in a tiny way.  If anyone finds one of these, I hope they check out the site and message me!  If they find and keep one to return to me, I'll buy them a drink!  Uh...19+ of course.  Come on, Toronto!  Prove to me that you are worth caring about!!!  Don't let me fall down a dark hole of my own imagining.  You can do it!!!

Just take a deep breath...

I've not really been myself lately.  The last few weeks, as October inevitably gave way to November, have been both rewarding and educational.  I haven't really even begun to process all the interesting little things I'm learning about the people in my life and yes, about myself as well.  However, these weeks have also been incredibly stressful for me.  My tranquil little life, so carefully built over this last year, is being shattered daily.  I've both lost and found my "zen-like" edge.  Peace of mind is a funny thing, slippery when wet.

In any case, in one more week I will at least be back on a more normal schedule.  Normal for *me* anyway.  I'll have had another seven days to evaluate my own feelings and desires and just to watch the wheel turn.  It's always turning, even if it only matters to those of us on the edge. Heard that somewhere...

I'm reminded today why I've held on to the name, the identity of "Stryder Wolfe" long past it's expiry date...I grew out of the name's original meaning years and years ago.  I keep it now simply to remind me, no matter what happens, no matter how dark (or how light - let us admit the possibility of light!) things get, no matter how I'm feeling, I need to take everything in stride.

I've said it before and I'll say it again.  "Nothing very very good and nothing very very bad lasts for very very long."  The highs and lows may be intense and occasionally quite fun, but it is what you do, what you feel and who you associate with in the middle realms of life that define who you are and whether you have a good and happy life overall.  If such a thing is possible.  Let's say instead that these factors, rather than the dramatic outbursts of life, are what contribute to a life of fulfillment and perhaps even contentment.  The quiet moments are what make you essentially you.

At this point in time I feel good about my life.  It's not perfect and never will be, but it's mine.  I'm constantly trying to make improvements to myself and to my situation in life and I'm a very patient man when it comes to realizing my goals.  Even when it's a hard, hard thing to be.  I realize that I've been neurotic lately, but it's just because I've been focusing on the drama and not looking at the bigger picture.  Today that has changed.  Today I'm just taking it all in stride.

Day and Night, Night and Day...

4:26 p.m.

The sunlight falls
on my face and in my eyes
and makes me cry

Something inside me breaks
Just a little more
every day

I am starting to find it funny 

4:26 a.m.

I realized tonight just how alike we really are. 

You're just as dark as I am
You're just a little better at hiding it. 

I'm sorry.

I thought I could trick you into thinking that

the world

was a nice place
and then maybe
for you 

It could be.

I can't.
It's not.

I'm sorry.

Devestation Emancipation

Halloween night and I walk alone through the electric dark in the company of my own private ghosts, more frightening by far than any ghouls, real or imagined, that I may have encountered in so-called "real" life.  Haunted thoughts and ghosts of ancient pains, what have you taught me?  Only that if I still had a heart, I would want it to be like yours.

Suddenly I am reminded of a time long, long ago.  First grade recess and the first stunned contemplation of my own emerging consciousness and thus of my own mortality.  An awakening!  Aside from the extra large coffee and iPod earbuds, I realize that my current mental playground neatly mirrors the thoughts and feelings of my little 5-year old self, standing alone at recess on a cool Autumn morn.  The day that I awoke to the knowledge that everything is always changing.  When I awoke to find that I was both devestated by and in awe of the Earth, people, life...everything!

It makes me wonder if my recent quest for detachment and sobriety and always truth, truth, truth...if my recent reduction both physically and emotionally might be spurned by some subconscious desire to go back to that state of mind I left behind me at 5 years old.  Be a simpler kind of man.  Perhaps turn back the clock and be like all the other little kids.  Take back the Pariah in me....

So yes, whenever I walk alone on Halloween or anytime in the Fall, I feel haunted.  Not by any ghosts but those of my own design.

For the record, I don't believe that I *am* trying to regress, or even have a real desire to do so, except perhaps as one step on a path of progression...If I need to find and recreate all that I once was in order to evolve into whatever I've yet to become, so be it.  It is an occasionally painful and frightening process, but one that is not without it's own rewards.

I don't want to be like the others.  I just need to be more and more like myself.  If I can someday know what that is.  It shouldn't be too hard.