nearly every day these days is spent by the water, feeling.

--

I can feel that when I am a flat piece of cardboard, that when my edges are smooth, that when am struck that the sound I make is like a dampened bell, a beautiful resonant object that someone is grasping, clutching, tightly, a series of thunks, that I am not here, not feeling the things that I am feeling.

for a moment I have known what it is to be truly be present and open, to be co-present and here with others, to open my heart ot the world, to myself, to other people in relation, and to have it be opened back. openess is magical. I feel like I was hurt recently in my openness. the anger towards me suturing my openess closed, and I fear that I have been hurt, painted, disappointed, hurt.

I realize i am angry. I am angry and disappointed and hurt.

I think I owe, I deserve more than this.

sigh.

there are the days and then there are deeper days, I feel like, somehow, the possibility of opening deeper days.

a whisper: it's always in you; it's always been in you; you can just let yourself be who you are. the magic of it is that we're always here.

so what does it mean to be here?

I am hurt. I am not willing to accept this reality. I am fearing. I can't accept it. what if someone said, "dan, it will be like this for the next year?" I would hold resignation, acceptance. my stance would change. I would no longer try fervently. I would leave the door open, send an invitation, and go about my business.

maybe we are where we are. maybe I can just accept where we are. my unwilling to accept this outcome is the generator of images that strike me, that hold me to where we are, that keep me beholden. and what is at stake when I keep this? when I hodl onto these stories of hurt? by holding onto stories of hurt, I am also holding onto stories of joy and meaning. not wanting to lose those.

the passage of time being what it is, it dissipates both joy and sadness. it washes those away. to separate and cleave our lives apart is to be truly sad, and hurt about this whole endeavor.

sigh.

what was I holding? holding onto these stories. not wanting to let them go. not wanting the past to be in the past. holding it, bringing it towards the present.

==

it is how it is it has been how it has been I am who I am you are who you are they are who they are

the present reailty of things is as present as they could be. they are ever persent. and they are what they are. and they will continue. the images and fictions I create are the cleaving of reality into another, the the model, the fiction, the fantasy, the form.

but we are also here, as we are. we are just here, present. look, and see. the stuff that is around us, is around us. open your eyes and accept the present, and aceptance looks like... leeting it down to rest, to sitting it down to be, to coming to terms. look at our lives in the film of history. the narrative arc of our lives.

==

something about this writing feels like it is surfing on the thoughts. it is thought itself as it is. can I step back? do I want to?

==

what does it mean to be present? I ask myself this a great deal recently, and know that I ask it in irony, because the moments that I am present I cease to be asking this question, the moments that I am not, the question comes to mind. it is a disappearing act, an indicator, a perfect representation.

presentness, however. sometimes I find myself wanting to snap my fingers, stomp my feet, look a friend in the eye. are we here? are you here? are we meeting in the plaza of our places? am I present, not thinking about the past or future, but just here; my mind's eye just synchronizing and being wherever I happen to be?

the moments in which I've found presentness feel incredibly sharp, vivid, open. a few weeks ago I wrote: "I feel like I can taste the sky in my mouth". I think that's still true, can still be true, is always true. when are we just here? when am I just, just, here?

the older I get I see how my self is created out of these patterns, and fears, and desires, and images. unsaid and unacknowledged fears flinging me into orbit, the strength of a rubber band that wishes to return to a place, a coiled spring holding energy. what happens when we take the spring out of its place, and let it be? it finds its shape. we are the shape we are?

what is satisfying and comforting about this is that I can see, and tell, that I am following in the footsteps of many people have been developing this practice. this is a well-tread road, in many ways, a road that might exist but that each person has to navigate, regardless, like falling in love, or breaking up, what having children must be. zippering into the experiences of humanity, for the first time, for the millionth time. presentness.

well. here we are. we are here, just doing what we are doing. it's all going to happen the way it does. this is not a call for nihilism, nor it is a request for anxiety-driven forcefulness that will bend the future to our utmost will. it is a simple articulation of how things are, pouring water on a table. it does what it does. we are who we are. when I am in the world I am interacting with a series of conclusions that I might foresee but I might not. we encounter them as we see fit. we are always improvising, improvising, improvising, improvising.