But aside from a few extra hours of sleep, I'm just not feelin'... Right. Like I'm a rowboat tethered with a long rope to the dock at reality. I still feel somewhat attached to the world, but I'm just kinda drifting around. I go to work each day and can put in a solid 10hrs of productivity. When it comes to personal time, nothing feels right. Draw, read, game, walk, whatever. I'm just kinda watching it all waltz by in front of me. What's up with that?
I watched Insomnia and Donnie Darko this weekend, and I'm pretty sure that didn't help at all. Both great films, but they themselves have certain elements of surrealism that I find to have a rather intense effect on my brain. My mind feels like putty. Easily warped and shaped, but has problems keeping its own form for a while.
Following a prompting from El Franko, I went for a drive. I went... North, and a lil' bit west, and more north again. I followed some quiet highways right down the middle of some farmland. I could go for five or six minutes without passing another single soul on the road. It was nice - I had a grin on my face the whole time. I didn't look at the clock at all. Well, I did, but what I saw had zero bearing on anything. It's 2:45. So what? So I kept going. I just drove. And shot some pics along the way. Most of which were overexposed. I was hoping to get my new (used) camera by now, but no such luck.
But it was incredible - I'd stop and get out to do some shooting. A fencepost or field that caught me attention. It kinda sucks - when you're doing 100km/h you don't really have the opportunity to stop suddenly for that dirt road that looked promising. Anyways, I'd stop and get out. You can see for miles and miles, and the best part is that the only sound is the wind through the grass. Maybe some crickets. Even as I'm sitting here typing there's the constant tide of vehicles surging down the road and jets taking off at the airport. There's always unnatural ambient noise in the city. Always. But it's not the case in the middle of nowhere. It was rather refreshing.
Of course, the problem with doing something so unusual when you're already feeling a bit absent-minded tends to exacerbate the issue. I'll be in bed in two to three hours, and then my weekend will be over. Where did it go? Did I ever even have it in the first place?
Maybe I'm too busy waiting. I'm not thinking about today or yesterday or even tomorrow. It's gotta be school in the fall. I work to save for it, I've spent the better part of the last month figuring out laptops for it. I've spent the entirety of the last three months worrying about it.
The funny thing is that the overdrive mode I put myself into for school still has a bit of a hold on me. I have lists of movies to watch and books to read. I get through them as fast as I can. I get some enjoyment out of them along the way, but I'm always concerned with getting them done. Bang, bang, bang. I just recently unlocked all the weapons in Bad Company 2. Great! So I pick up Team Fortress 2 for the first time in a long time, and over the course of a week I earn all of the unlocks for the Soldier, Demo, and Engineer. The Wrangler for the Engineer was the last item. I got a lucky kill when netted me two achievements and the unlock. I kid you not, I play for all of 5 more minutes (now with my new toy) before I close the program. I sit there and stare at my installed games, and hop between two or three before calling it quits for the night. It occurs to me a day or two later that I'm treating my games as work. Play and work towards x goals, and once I'm done, that's it. Close the program, move on. How bizarre and unsettling. Mostly unsettling.
So here I am writing another post. Then I gotta call home, then make a lunch for tomorrow. Always one more thing to do. Bang, bang, bang. But I still feel like that boat. Drifting out until the line snaps tight. Float up close and bump into the dock. Never really quite knowing what's going on or having power over it.
-Cril
Philip Glass - Morning Passages
1 comment:
Taking nice long drives has got to be one of the purest, sheer pleasures of life. And one thing Western Canada has is lots of places to drive (all of which are quiet and beautiful in one way or another). And it's usually no problem driving slow enough so that you can catch those little dirt roads, each one has something unique down them.
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