the journey: unedited rambling of the heart – please read

I looked back on the music and words and scenes that have unfolded before me in the years of my life and very few things have the power to stick out in a lasting and meaningful way.  I see memories of my childhood, friends that have come and gone, classes I’ve blown thrown and all the other mundane details that can be thought of. Art, literature and music touch me in a way almost nothing else is capable of and I experienced that tonight. My eyes flooded and tears flowed while pain built up in my chest realizing something had come to end. I had known this fact for months, it occurred back in September, but it just hit me tonight thanks to the internet and a simple documentary. The creative work of one man whose life was cut unfairly short moved me to feel this way. The power of his lyrics, and his melodies, the relatability of his characters and the realness and emotions they made me feel, coupled with one of the most beautiful stories of love, redemption and living your life to its fullest I’ve ever heard made me break down.

It’s clear to those who know me or no anything of the world that this is the power of RENT. It closed and had its final performance on Broadway in September. It seems like a long time ago but it is still fresh in my mind. It was the end of an era and the end of  Jonathan Larson’s dream. It never truly ended though, it lives on in the hearts of all of us out there who were touched by this production. It changed my life. It saved my life… I wouldn’t be here today if it wasn’t for RENT.

My life had hit a bad patch. I hated who and what I was and nothing could pull me from the depths of my depression. I was so good at playing the role of happy straight Bobby living in Sunshineland were nothing ever went wrong and there was only goodness. Deep down inside me though the darkness swelled slowly eating away on my heart, my body, my soul. I felt empty inside as if nothing could ever make me feel good or happy. Nothing could fill that gap. I decided I need something new and different to experience in my life. I turned to music.. but not the hand me down shit I was being fed from my brother for years. I needed something that was all my own, free from my family and societal pressures and norms. That music showed up in the form of musical theatre cast recordings. I searched for days and weeks to find that one song, that one singer, that one piece of work that could pull me up even just a little into the light. Here enters Seasons of Love. Not my favorite song by any means now but at the time an inspirational piece of beauty. Hope was somehow rekindled within me. I hogged the computer and searched endlessly to find all the songs of the original cast recording and fell in love with the music and the lyrics. They empowered me and showed me that I need to quit wallowing in self-pity and life my day is if it was my last. There’s no day but today. No moment but now.

I can’t say what happened from that moment. I became obsessed. Searching out other pieces of musical theatre that touched me in someway. Parade by Jason Robert Brown. Aida by Elton John and Tim Rice. Wicked. In the Heights. Jekyll & Hyde by Frank Wildhorn. The list is endless and I could name things off for hours and speak to you in senseless facts about who played this, what this character was saying with this line, etc. I came back to the world with a passion. Something to keep me going through the hard times. A love I wanted to share with the world… and with just one person.

Though this show has closed and been closed for months now its impact on my life is immeasurable. It started my craze for creativity and exploring the mind and the heart through song and storytelling. I am who I am today because of RENT and musical theatre. Thank you Jonathan Larson for saving my life and shaping who I am today.

daily creative writing #1

The hot air from the sewers clashed with the frigid temperatures above making steam billow up from the manhole cover. Taxis and buses drive by battling their way through the traffic and construction laden streets of New York City as the cold concrete radiated out into the air and sent a chill down Jen’s spine. Se sat perched on the corner stoop of the goliath Saint Matthew’s Church. Large wooden arched doors stood bare and silent behind her covering her in shadow. She looked out across the skyline remembering a time when it looked quite a bit different only a few years ago. It looked bare and empty against the cloudy winter sky matching how she felt inside, at least since the death of her father. The cold within her seemed to radiate out just like the concrete beneath her. Like the chill that spread up her spine people seemed to recoil from her, trying to avoid the chill of her presence. Only one person stuck by her and pushed past all the negative walls that surrounded her.

“Jenny come home please. mom’s cooled downed and I’m all alone.”

The words snapped her back into reality as a young boy of about twelve stood before her. He had a striking resemblance to her from hair color, facial structure all the way down to the green ring of color around their pupils.

“Alright buddy let’s go home then.”

Jen slowly pushed herself up, a little stiff from the hard concrete, and took one last look around. she looked down at her brother as he wrapped his arms snugly around her waist.

“I love you Jenny.” he said with a shy smile as he squeezed her tighter. “I never wanna lose you so please stop running.”

Jen fell to her knees and wrapped her own arms around him pulling them close together.

“You don’t have to worry. I’ll always be there for you Mark. Always.”

A single tear slowly fell down her face as she looked into her brother’s eye.

the journey: daily creative writing

Hello everyone out there. It’s been awhile since the blog got any attention and it is time once again to fix that problem. I’ve begun classes again after an awful previous semester and a very unrelaxing, work filled break stuck up at school alone. Depressing right..? Regardless of that, the only class I am looking forward to is my creative writing course which is actually the inspiration for this latest announcement and post.

In the coming days I would like to add the “daily creative writing” segment in the wonderful world that is chaotic, unconnected thoughts. The segment will follow myself and bookwhisper (hopefully) as we write unedited and raw for ten minutes each day. I will post the final piece on here each day with no further tweaking or editing allowed that can be read, critiqued, commented on, etc by the loyal readers out there. Hopefully we can both use the positive comments to improve on our writing and continue providing quality pieces to you as often as we are able. In the future I hope to add more writers and avid bloggers into the mix to form a collaborative writing community that will propel this blog to the next level. Maybe a lofty goal but we will see what can come off this in the future.

Anyways that is all for now but I will be back in the near future no worries.

the journey: passing sorrow

Passing sorrow

Slowly fading into the light

 

Feeling and warmth return

Like the sun shining brightly above me

 

I stumble around

Trying to find my center

 

One step at a time

As if walking for the first time

 

Looking around I see faces,

Nameless happy bright faces

 

I reach for them

Seeing friends and family

 

Each wrapping their warmth around me

Muttering “everything will be okay”

 

I absorb it, store it inside me

Letting it warm my soul

 

The light returns and I’m not afraid

Not sad anymore

 

The sorrow has passed..

the journey: a moment’s reprieve

The dust settles around me, leaving a faint cloud in the air. Looking around myself I see the nameless brethren that fought gallantly by my side for justice. Our enemies aren’t typical. We aren’t fighting terrorist abroad or a war against “weapons of mass destruction” or attempting to spread democracy. We aren’t even fighting people or creatures or things. We battle against ideas, concepts, beliefs. Hate and discrimination are our enemies. They hound us at every corner striking when we least expect it. Prejudice bears down on us each second of everyday. There is no escape. No hope for victory.

Then a beacon is lit and the light shines bright around us. One defender, one institution brings us hope for a better world. Slowly the light spreads out around the land, trying to sway the minds of the haters and the enemy. We relish in this moment of reprieve knowing that it will not last. The fighting will begin again and we will be back in the thick of things fighting for our beliefs. Fighting for our well being. Fighting for our lives.

The battle rages again and I hold on to that false hope of a better world for us all. I gladly give my life in service to the cause even knowing that nothing may ever come of it. Day after day fighting just to be myself.

the journey: frenzy

So it’s been awhile since I have written anything on the blog but I guess I should have expected that coming back to school. It always happens like this and I hate that it does. Things become to hectic, to frenzied and then I lose touch with certain things. The summer blogging has always been something I love to do these past few summers and I really wanna keep it going during the school year but it’s just so difficult these days. Here’s my pledge tp everyone: I’m gonna try to devote some time every Tuesday and Thursday while I’m in the library to write a lil something on the blog for you all to read.

Being in the library is another story in its own right but I wont get into the gory details of that today. I really wanted to sit down today and type up this poem or.. thing that I wrote the first week up at school and really liked how it turned out. I’m working on the format of it and trying to bring everything together because I want it to be as polished as I can make it before I show you all.

On another side note, I’ve been continuing to work on Dramedy these past few days and have been writing up random scenes here and there. The future of the project is uncertain but at this point in time it could either become the web series that I want it to me, or a book/novel because both of these ideas have great potential. I was working on it some in the library one Tuesday and as the scene was progressing I kept seeing the project as a book where each chapter is a different characters story or their perspective on what’s going on. I think it would give the book a different voice each time but will be still connected to the “main” voice and keeping the plot progressing.

Any thoughts or ideas on that idea..? For now I’m gonna go back upstairs away from the computers and continue working on it for a lil before class and test times soon. Hope everyone is having a productive semester and that things are going good. Enjoy and hope to talk to you again soon.

the journey: i made a video

Today I was bored and got a break in between all the packing and stuff, so I decided to make a random video of the land around my house and my dog  just to have some memories or something to kinda look at when I’m at school and be reminded of home if I need it. I put them all on my computer and I’m currently working on turning them all into random videos to upload on my youtube account and let people of the world see them. I finished one and put it up already and thought I would share it with everyone here to watch and then you can check out my channel and subscribe, comment do whatever. There will be more videos in the future and maybe soon enough there will be something dealing with Dramedy up there. Anyways enjoy and thanks for reading and watching.

the journey: too much

I’ve been realizing that I take on too much to ever be able to focus on one thing in my life. I have multiple projects going on, one blog to maintain, another that’s in the process of being established, learning to drive finally at 20, getting ready for junior year at school and so many other things on top of having just a regular life. It’s difficult to balance everything sometimes.

So in spite of all of that I’ve begun working on another project now that is gonna take center stage. Due to this the blog and some of my other projects may be put on hold or put on the back burner and not update as often for awhile. Once I get settled into this project I may have time to come back and update here and give you all the details, but we shall see what happens in the end.

For now I just wanted to throw this out there for you all and let you know I’m still alive even though I’m swamped in so many ways.

the journey: escaping reality

Ever since I was little, reading books and playing video games was one of my favorite ways to get away from everything and kind of escape reality for awhile. My games and books kept me so captivated that nothing else mattered but me and them. As I grew up I added music to my list of ways to get escape. While doing any of these activities, I can shut everything out around me and just get lost in a world all my own and of my own design. The music and books and games all tell me these wonderful stories that I become so immersed in and I pretend like I’m part of them. Sometimes I just watch and see it happen around me, other times I’m right in the think of the action.

Each world reacts differently and uniquely. Reading leads me to observe and watch as a tale unfolds before me full of love, drama and intrigue. Games put me in the action, fighting for my life against hordes of monsters and enemies armed with any weapon I can imagine or the powers of nature and the gods within me. Music has me doing the telling of story as the notes and lyrics flow and pulse through me and open my imagination wide. I become so far gone within my own thoughts and imagination, it’s hard to to pull myself away from it and return to reality. Sometimes I don’t want to return, I think everyone feels like that sometimes. The real world hurts, it causes us stress and just brings us down sometimes. We need something to take us away from our problems, if only for even a moment.

There’s so many ways to escape reality and each person has their own. Photography, family, movies, writing, just anything you can think of and love. From my escapes comes my best writing and my most philosophical thoughts. That’s why today’s journey is an escape from reality. I challenge everyone to shut out the things that are bothering them and spend just one day doing something that you love and tell me how you feel afterwards. Nothing may have really changed around you, but you have. This relief you get can make it so you have a new perspective on the things that were bothering you and then have a new attitude on dealing with them head on. It’ll help even if you don’t realize it, I can promise anyone that. So, will you accept my challenge..?

the journey: a cooking adventure

One of my nerdy little passions is watching the Food Network. I watch and stare in awe at the things some of them can do with food and make it seem so simple and oh so delicious. I sit there and learn as much as I can about new foods or different ways to cook things. Cooking is another of my secret passions, I take the food in my house and try to make something amazing out of it. There is a Bobby Wilk Original Recipe Cookbook out there that only one other person has seen or experienced the recipes within it.

So while going down this road of life I spent a day at a hmmm.. a “cooking camp” we’ll call it, as my first stop along the way. I took a recipe I found online and saw on the Food Network on how to make crepes which I’ve heard many times over are extremely challenging to make even though the recipe is so simple. With recipe in hand, I got my best cookware and utensils out and went to work experimenting and trying to make crepes. From that moment on the recipe and concept became all mine. I looked through my fridge trying to find anything I could put into a crepe and make into a nice desert breakfast course and found a big bag of apples. I took one out and cut it up and cooked them in some oil, cinnamon, nutmeg and sugar until they cooked up nicely as the filling of my crepe. I put them all together and drizzled some Hershey’s Chocolate syrup over them and topped it off with with a bit of whipped cream.

The final product was pretty amazing, at least I thought so. The apples were cooked just right to my liking and the crepes was something new to try out and experience for the first time. It was honestly nothing like I thought it would be, something was good and just unique about the texture and flavor of the crepes. It also inspired me to get back into experimenting and trying new things in the kitchen once again. Overall the pit stop was well worth it and a nice break from the road. I cleaned up the kitchen and got right back into the swing of things ready for whatever comes along next.

The final product: