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[swansonlikestowrite]

What a Waste

God! I feel like a fucking waste! (that’s a positive intro) This is the first thing I have written for enjoyment in months, I’m not even writing it for enjoyment I’m writing this because I feel like I must. This is supposed to be my job! Everything feels futile, the world is ending, we’re gonna burn to death, or get shot, or get cancer and die a slow painful death (if we’re lucky). All I have is a creative outlet but I’m not even content enough in any of my creative outlets to pursue them. I’m not content in them because the world is fucking ending. Nothing matters and yet, because of this, EVERYTHING matters. I feel like I’m too late to create and live off of it but oh my god I don’t know if I could live with myself if I didn’t. It feels like my entire life leans on luck, something which I don’t seem to have much of. I think of every decision I make over and over and over again, I seem to be a different person with different dreams every single day, nothing is consistent, I’m running away from myself, and I don’t even know why. I’m escaping my own fears but that’s what’s making me scared. I’m scared of being scared but almost everything scares me. Don’t take that the wrong way, I’m not weak. I can handle my shit, I just don’t want to. I’m lazy and uncreative, but I want to be energized and creative. I’m fighting against my inhibitions every day. I’m built to tear myself down it seems. Nothing works, nothing sticks but I’m trying so hard to make them stick. I feel so mediocre, I want to set myself up for “greatness” or whatever the fuck, but I make choices that make me comfortable and I’m way too comfortable in mediocrity. I have a list of sentences and phrases in my phone called “words that sound good together”, I’ve been making this list for about a year and a half now… I haven’t used it once. Not to make a single song, not to write a single essay, not to implement in a single drawing. I feel like I’m constantly playing catch up with everyone around me who just ooze creativity and artistic skill on accident. They do things because they feel called to, I do things because I feel obligated (just like this essay). I guess what I’m trying to say is, the weight of the world is crushing me but the weight of my expectations is crushing me more.

[swansonlikestowrite]

Human Emotion

Human emotion is such a wonderful gift but also an indescribable curse. I personally take pride in my acceptance of emotion, letting my emotions guide me is important to me. But this all falls apart when I do not have a label for them. Lately, I have felt so full of feeling, my chest is absolutely bursting at the seams with happiness, sadness, joy, wonder, anger, shock, surprise, embarrassment, frustration, nervousness and anxiety. All of these things all together expressing themselves at all times. I feel more in tune with the world and with what is going on around me... but I don’t necessarily want to be. The phrase “ignorance is bliss” rules my life, I wish one night I could fall asleep without wondering where we go when we die, or to make it through a single day without caring for someone who wont care for me back. What a wonderful gift it is to feel! I am so thankful that I am having this problem! I’m emotional but I’m not a wreck, I just need to harbor them somewhere... to get them out of my chest and out into the world. I want to give the world a hug, I want to dance with someone when there’s no music playing, I want a punching bag, I want a canvas, I want to write something that will touch someone, I want control.

[swansonlikestowrite]

The Divine Feminine

The idea of femininity carries with it an intense strength. The term “divine feminine” is a perfect descriptor. Femininity and the power it holds IS divine, it is something that commands respect and appreciation. We would not be here without the pain and love and labor of our mothers and their mothers before them. Femininity is not something to be disregarded and shaken off, it is important and beautiful. I don’t claim to hold all the knowledge of femininity, but what I do know is that I am surrounded by powerful, strong, resilient, driven, and amazing women in my life and the shit they put up with is intense. Life is a fucking battlefield and the roadblocks that are put in place by the patriarchy to hinder women is enough to make anyone give up, and yet I have had the pleasure of knowing MANY women who venture forth anyways. As a man I do not feel well equipped to be writing about the experiences of women so what I will say is how much I respect them for putting up with what they put up with. Femininity is powerful, it creates a power balance, it allows us to become attached beyond the surface level. Femininity is the cornerstone for things such as art and beauty and love, Femininity to me is an intense emotional connection. The term “divine feminine” implies strength, it implies beauty, it implies grace, but not at an achievable scale. To be divine is to be otherworldly, it is to be godly. Things that harbor femininity such as art, as previously mentioned, is one of the truest expressions of the holy and the unknown. Divine Femininity in the form of beauty and grace is like a hand reaching towards the heavens for even the opportunity for a god to brush against it. Divine Femininity as displayed in art is an attempt to feel as the gods felt when they created our world, to reach an emotion within us that cannot be described with words. Femininity is an overarching expression. Femininity is napping amongst the clouds. Femininity is a kiss shared between two lovers at the perfect moment. Femininity is the strength to break barriers. Femininity is divine. 

[swansonlikestowrite]

Flight

Something about flights makes me emotional. To be transported to another place so far from regularity, so fast, is a shock to the brain and body. The ability for humans to fly through the air should not be possible, it is an attack against everything we should be able to do. As the wheels leave the ground I feel a sense of uncomfortable comfort, I have absolutely no control for the next hour which is deeply horrifying but is also an incredible comfort. There is a lack of control, I dont get to choose what happens with my life, I am in the hands of the pilot, I dont need to thing about survival. All of my flights as of late have been marked with intense emotion, first with immense joy and next with immense sadness and loss. An airplane is just a mode of travel, but it makes me feel more than most things do. I see planes flying through the air and I see rows of people flying through the sky towards a destination I dont know. Everyone has something to do, but for me... I’m just happy to be on the plane.

[swansonlikestowrite]

Her

Breakups are hard (duh), everything that seemed so happy is gone in a flash. My best friend is gone, the memories we shared are lost to the ether. Little things we would relate over fizzle up and die and are ruined for me. She is within so many of my memories as I’ve grown, she was my person for two and a half years. We were a constant, a comfort to rely on when things weren't going right, someone to tell every secret. God knows if I see a cute mouse, a fuzzy cat, a beautiful pre-war home with ornate tiling with an aga in the kitchen, bunnies, airplanes (her dad loved airplanes), studio Ghibli movies, or punk music... I’ll erupt into tears. Every second of every day I spent attached to this person, and it all disappeared in a flash. Its been two and a half years, I was 15 when we met. Every little part of me has been influenced, at least a little bit, by her. I cant crack my knuckles without thinking of her, she would beg to crack them for me, and I would let her even though I didnt like the way it felt. I was committed, I was prepared, to be hers forever. I dont want to hit on anyone again, I dont want a crush, I dont want to share a kiss with someone else, I dont want to say I love you for the first time again, I just want... you. We looked at apartments together, we discussed baby names, I knew what type of wedding ring she wanted, we knew the song that would play during our first dance... and now... none of that matters. Years worth of laughs, and tears, and conversations of who we would become TOGETHER, are gone. Because she wasn't ready... but I was...

[swansonlikestowrite]

Tonight I ran, I didnt know where, I didnt know why. Nobody's eyes mattered, watching a crazed man run passed their floor to ceiling windows... I didnt care.

I ran until I reached the water, I let it touch me and I touched it back. Overwhelmed with emotion, I sat in the sand... hoping. Hoping for what? I didn't know. Was I hoping it would give me an answer? Call out to me telling me what I've been missing? Maybe I secretly wished the tides would rise and take me with them. I don't know what I wanted.

I took its knowledge and made it mine.

And then I ran home.

[swansonlikestowrite]

Analytics

I’m not a fan of a lot. I like Seth Rogen’s pottery, movies, and writing, I like nice shirts, I just got the perfect fleece at a thrift store not long ago and it has yet to come off my body, I like a song that makes me feel cooler than I am. What I am, is deeply analytical, mostly to a fault. I don’t ENJOY much, I tolerate some things and experience others but when I enjoy something thats how I know it MUST be good. I pick things apart, if someones desk has a can on it from 3 days ago I can only begin to imagine what type of person I’m dealing with. I ruin things for myself, that doesn’t make me angry or sad, it’s just the way I view the world. I find it fun to complain, to tear things down brick by brick is a past time I enjoy. Does this make me a bad person? Who’s to say. There are a select group of people whose opinion matters to me and thats my friends, family, and Seth Rogen, so if they’re fine with it then what really even matters.

[swansonlikestowrite]

Guest Room

How odd it must feel, to go back to your childhood home and sleep in the guest room

[swansonlikestowrite]

Dry Eyes

When theres pain there but nothing comes out, and you’re the only one at the funeral with dry eyes. You feel lonely.

[swansonlikestowrite]

Creative Waterfall

Brian Wilson was a creative waterfall. Andy Warhol was a creative waterfall. Ye is a creative waterfall. Prince was a creative waterfall. Keith Haring was a creative waterfall. Pharrell, O’Keeffe, Jackson, Van Eyck, Davinci, Raphael, are all creative waterfalls. Pouring with mind bending and genre breaking ideas. Where do these ideas come from? Thin air? Psychedelics? Desperation? Love? A life can be so bland but so magical aswell. Some people have an innate skill to dig deeper, to put all they are into their field, to break ground on a new idea with no fear. My creative waterfall is dried up. Rather, I dont think it ever existed. I float through life, I find it so hard to look deeper at mundane things I have seen all my life. Warhol may see a worm on the ground after a storm and invent a whole new medium from it, when I see a worm I remember when, as a kid, I would cut them in half to see them grow into two. I feel my brain doesn't work like a creative waterfall. It’s a well, I collect information and spit it out, but I never invent the information. I find it hard to envision myself as a great, kids want to be actors or rockstars, but my goal has always been comfortable mediocrity. My name doesn't feel like one people will be talking about, one that will be in history books. But I want so bad to be known, to impact, to breakthrough, to find the stream that leads to my creative waterfall.

[swansonlikestowrite]

The Dichotomy of Dreams

I so badly want a carefree life as an artist, living in humble Italian villa, dancing with my lover to music we put on the record player. Sadly, however, this dream is not exactly plausible without luck. For one, I am not an artist by any stretch of the imagination, I cant paint and I can barely play the guitar, I express myself here... through words. Second, I feel obligated to do more than hideaway. Is it my inherent only child spoiled-ness or my middle class upbringing? I’ll never know, all I can say is that I have a strong urge to become something. This idea is inherently selfish, but I YEARN to make a name for myself. This Carefree, Italian villa living, record player dancing, life is all but impossible for me to achieve, which sucks. But I can dream, dreaming is a two sided coin. It brings intense joy from believing in what could be, but also brings intense sadness with realizing it may just be a dream. That idea is displayed in this very paragraph, I have typed myself in circles around the dichotomy of a dream. I feel special and I feel the need to have others think I’m special (why the fuck would I be writing this if I didn't?) and hopefully that dream comes true.