Dreams

I’m on a beach, around me is my family, parents, brothers, sisters-in-law, nieces and nephews. The mood is good, it’s a holiday. People smile, share laughs and enjoy the beautiful weather. Others around are doing the same. Suddenly there is a noise that breaks the tranquility of the moment. It’s shattered and every previous thought is lost, the beach is no longer a place of relaxation and happiness. It is a place of danger, and those around me I care the most for, are there too, in that danger. On the horizon over the water an explosion rises into the air, a volcano. I’d not noticed the volcano before, it was not a tall one, it just looked like a small rocky island. Why had I not sensed the danger, how could I’ve been so engrossed in a blissful moment that I hadn’t envisioned it could ever be destroyed so instantaneously. Rocks and giant boulders shot up into the air. People screamed. Children were grabbed by their arms and dragged off like rag dolls as the imminent tsunami announced itself with a rapidly rising wave which grew each second that it came closer. In the panic and terror the adrenaline kicked in, this was fight or flight and death was set to visit many. We ran for a building, with no hope of higher ground, this was as good as it got. Huddled indoors, terrified glances were exchanged as the seconds felt like hours.

This was it, it was the last moment, the tension was like a guitar string tightened till it was ready to snap. All muscles strained, teeth gritted, eyes wide open. Then it was there, the last moment of my dream.

The awakening was as confusing as those moments would of been had the tsunami hit. Unsure of who or even what I was, but as quick as death would of come, realisation came. I was me again, I knew where and what I was. In such a situation, at least in heinsight the expectation is for this to be calming, or to offer some sort of relief. The fact it wasn’t offered added to the confusion and kept the adrenaline going.

In what seems now seems like a continual story I was now elsewhere, a place I could not describe, although not because it lacked notable features, but more because I was not fully present. What I can describe is where I went. A gun shop, although I couldn’t describe many features of this gun shop, I can describe the gun. It was a rifle, bolt action with a beautiful silver barrel contrasting to a wooden butt. The action was certain, meaningful and without question. It knew what it was to do, it had no doubts of its purpose. Holding it was like holding a book of the future, with an infectious aura it cooled and calmed. It encouraged one to use to, to brandish it without fear and with purpose so resolute it not even time could tame it.

The target was agreed upon by my brothers, the deed was mine to do; my father must die. The moment had come and this beautiful gun did not have time for any doubts, objections or misjudgments. It would serve its purpose and I was its tool. Squinting I took aim, I did not tremble, nor did I stutter, it was all clear, until it was not. The unfamiliar, those recent emotions returned. Who, what and where was I. But again in an instance it all returned. I knew what I was, I was awake. Confusion remained having recalled what I was about to do, or did do. I was no longer so sure.

100 word flash fiction

My thighs and backside ached. Sitting in that chair helped with the lower back though. I had sat monitoring the cities pulse for hours. Sip of tea now, sip of tea then. My cocoon.

She walked in. She was tired but didn’t show it. Our four pupils met, communicating in ways that defied spoken tongue. Her cocoon and cup alongside mine.

Her hand in my hair and smell in my nose. Thigh and backside tingles replaced by ones received from my head. She turned with a simper, with whispering eyes that asked me to ‘steep another teapot and then fuck her gently.’

Living in other peoples insecurities

The boundary where someone finishes and the INFJ begins is often all too misconstrued, blurred. In the mind of the INFJ that is. From an INFJs perspective that is.

Ever wonder why INFJs are some of the best listeners? We absorb the stances that those we share our lives with take, both defensively and offensively. We hold these stances temporarily, putting our feet in the warm, hopefully not sweaty, shoes of those around us. I gravitate toward people that wear Converse for that reason. Walking around in soemone else’s functional, trendy and comfortable Chuck Taylors for quite some time isn’t too much to ask for, is it?

A problem, a conundrum of epic proportions starts here.

I wear Chuck Taylors. See they are often not only the choice of shoe that those closest to me sport but also the shoe I wear habitually. And I am guilty far too often, of wondering just who’s shoes are on my feet. ‘Are these mine or yours?’, my right brain asks my left.

In friendships, in family and in most occurrences with intimate relationships, the boundary between myself and those that matter has dissolved. The drawbridge is down, the crocodiles in their moat have been fed and the knights in the castle are on lunch break, swords in a pile, leaning against the wall on the far side of the mess hall. Whatever walks across that drawbridge becomes my problem, and not only a problem, a big problem.

I still have a ways to go. I still have a ways to go to understanding people, people’s natures, my own vulnerability.

My castle is strong, my fortress is sturdy. After all this time, I will say it feels cold, it feels hard, devoid of any softness. The battles that I have invited in have torn the place to ribbons overtime. The knights I have lost within my own hallways have dripped off the walls, ponding in places only dust should gather.

Its about time this INFJ cleans up. Buries the bodies, scrubs the floors, mans the towers with lookouts and readies the swords in sheath. Always, this castles drawbridge will remain down, for those who have the depth of personality and bravery to walk inches away from snapping crocodilian jaws. Those who value me. Those who are willing to put their value on the line to understand me and the sacrifice of mine.

A queen will come by one cold afternoon requiring respite, walking within, encapsulated. She will envision my hallways filled with her art, kitchen filled with her favorite ingredients, wardrobe filled with her clothing. She will sit down to share a cup of tea, transfixed with the view, transfixed with the land it overlooks. We will share.

Sharing starts with a cup of tea.

 

 

A sun soaked Saturday morning

On bed, eyes shut.

Warmth delivering tingles to my face and arms.

Clear white light shining through closed eyelids.

 

Open the window.

The birds outside sing for me, communicating.

Their chirps and tweets offer a complimentary twist to the already soothing melody heard from the lounge.

Ada from The National, ‘What a song, what a sound!’

 

I think of you.

I think of you next to me.

You are at work.

The significance of a haircut

As a natural neon colored advertising sign, one of those flashing in a sea of neon lights, up in the reaches overlooking metropolitan Japanese and South Korean streets, your hair advertises, compels, encourages or repels. My hair has always served my life with opportunity and complexity you see, a lavish bush I would call it. The type of hairstyle that would have come accompanied with a strategically placed comb, lost in endless curls, and puffed up in humid 1970’s sun.

As a young child between the ages of ten and sixteen, this fro was used as a perfect distraction, an opportunity to steal from my parents of all people. On a fortnightly basis my mum would hear the same sentence again and again leaving my lips, ‘can i get twenty dollars, I need a trim’. Lest she didn’t hear the scissors snipping in her own bathroom while I had cut my own locks, pocketing and spending the ‘dirty cash’ on essentials all sixteen year old’s need: chocolate milk, petrol, condoms and alcohol. Around this stage of my life, the relationship between my hair and the person who lay behind the hair begun.

Simply, hair allows you to express yourself without others consent. It gives others the opportunity to judge, it encourages judgement. With long hair, I received countless compliments. Some ladies I found out quickly are drawn to curls like a bird to its nest. Young students of mine climbed up my limbs as if they were a trees branches, to simply touch this nest, if only once. To identify yourself and allow others to identify you with wacky skull fur however requires courage and self-expression. Plenty of people will chuckle, smirk or whisper insults. These folk are the individuals that make us stronger, I thank them for their closed mindedness, I thank them for handing over an abundance of feathers to put into my courage and self-expression hat.

Now as a twenty seven year old, this relationship between myself and my hair has matured, it has matured with me, it has matured me. I recently got a haircut. Cut the sides short, while still holding onto those curls on the top that I could never let go of. I am older, I am getting older I now know. This haircut has shown me that much. My hair is getting grey, wow, grey. I am accepting my age, my life, my slow loss of youth, constantly reminded by this recently evolved feature I have acquired.

I like it, truly, I enjoy and feel fortunate to have graying hair. I keep smiling. To simply identify myself with this masculine, maturing symbol of awesomeness. To give others the opportunity to identify me with this masculine, maturing symbol of awesomeness.

I will keep smiling as my hair keeps graying.

Juggling a fast paced life

My dad has always told me ‘leave work at work, never bring all of that back home with you’. It is one of those things he still cannot accomplish himself.

In this age of fast paced benchmark driven labour world, the literal pinch to maintain a healthy relationship with yourself is becoming harder, more painful and never ceasing. We are holding onto everything so tightly in our lives, allowing ourselves, our relationship with our own mind and bodies to slip out of our own palms, slowly to pour out from the top.

Society makes people. People are made to juggle shit. People juggle shit. When the focus says ‘bye-bye’ and the concentration required to juggle is lost, we end up shit everywhere. The term is ‘the shit has hit the fan’. In one of these moments, it is precisely used to mean ‘the shit you have thrown up, you have dropped, squished or simply forgot about, it has landed everywhere, all over you, look at the shit in your hair.’

We are not jugglers, regardless even jugglers themselves know when to take a break, a technical time out. Some things we juggle are heavy, some may be light, but one thing is certain there are too many objects thrown up at different heights, we can’t predict which one we are to prepare ourselves for next.

The art of living a healthy lifestyle, well the understanding I am learning to slowly employ in my own is just that, an art. Letting go: to put down the shit we either no longer have to juggle, no longer have the energy to juggle at the time, or simply should not juggle. Work often falls into that second category, manipulative relationships the third category. Put all the heavy chainsaws and bowling balls down, those lighter watermelons, cellphones, pencils and mint flavored M&M’s, put them down too.

We have to make time for ourselves, we have to consciously let these go. Don’t break them, just sit them down, to be picked up again conveniently, but only when we have to.

We have to find the breathing room within ourselves, the strength to juggle our personal things effectively, first and foremost.

How can we expect to bring happiness and newness into our lives without creating space for them first? Ditch the clutter.

In memory of my nephew Kobe

Staining Kobe into my skin.

Showing him the world that could have been.

His eyes transfixed. Glued on the world and growing older by the day.

He will never fade. This is his place to stay.

 

In remembrance, happy new years little man, you are in our hearts, on my flesh.

Being A Dad

Being in my twenty-somethings and having friends falling pregnant, I often wonder. When I become a father, what will being a father entail. This is my attempt to define my imaginings:

 

The time had come, I am a dad. From the first time I saw the porcelain sheen of her forehead, never would I forget. Never would I lose touch with that moment. A man keeps the memories that inherently make him a man, close to his chest. Some would say in his blood. I say in me.

In that moment something bizarre happens. For the first time in any man’s life, whoever it may be. Stuart Green the smiley, charismatic next door neighbor. Martin Luther King and Adolf Hitler. The plumber that you hired, once you realized the blocked sink really was not going to fix itself and might have been a fraction too far outside your skill set to combat. See all of these men, at this exact moment in their existence were greeted, introducing their child, their newborn bundle of joy into this world. We are adults, we knew and damned well expected that our lives would change. But in what ways and by how much?