Death was just a simple glance across a dim lit room

And those eyes did it

Those three words did it

Those three words killed him

And I surrender to it all

Between you and me, I surrender to you

Forgive me for the sadness

And the bringing of you down

I just needed a lover and I needed a friend

And there you were

Running from forever like all the rest

Three simple words bled me dry

Three simple words bled us dry, bled us dry

I love you

(Heaven In Her Arms)

Listening to Like Herod in my old bed in my old room in my old house, swimming on the waves of sound and watching my memories run through my fingers as I raise my cupped hands above where my body becomes submerged. Watching a slight yet steady stream of my past flow out of my hands, returning to this sea made of two parts song to every one part of genuine nostalgia.
It's ending now, and the feedback dies away, slowly forming a collage with the real-life sounds around me. The creaking in the floorboards and walls isn’t the secrets leaking out like I used to think, it’s simple physics as the atoms they are made of expand en masse with the changing temperatures of day becoming night becoming midnight becoming a cold December morning.
There’s a bubbling too, the sound of hot water flooding cold pipes. If someone was here, someone who wasn’t me (I am deaf to the sounds that my heart makes, though maybe before I wanted to listen, I could have heard) could they hear the blood pumping around my veins? My blood is warm, my body is cold, and so I think it would make a sound, what with it working on the same principles.
I think the only way for someone to really find out would be for them to listen really close to my heart. They’d probably have to put their head on my chest, and be really, really quiet. Maybe even silent. And I’d have to be quiet too, silent even. And we’d both have to just lie there, still and silent, so this person could listen to my heart beating for them, until this person could tell me that my blood is pumping in my veins and making a sound, or that it is, and it isn't.
Either way, I'd be alive, and there would be someone who cares enough to listen to my heart lying next to me, so I would be happy.

If what went on inside your head affected what went on on the outside of it, I think I'd look like a Picasso.

It's not something I think I've really ever talked about here, (and I'm not talking about it here, I'm not talking about it anywhere) but ever since people in my life started dying, they haven't really stopped.

This is something which plays horrible games with me, more than what I guess is the granted mind-fuck of having a succession of friends past and present, as well as family, die. A thought has crept into my head and stayed there, black and acidic, that somehow I'm involved like some sort of conduit for whatever it is that people believe in; fate, providence or whatever intangible factor it is we blame when someone we love leaves us.

That last sentance makes me seem positively insane. I'm not; I fully recognise that in reality, it's just a savage mix of coincidence and the inherent tragedy of being human, but still, I'm me, and if you've been keeping score, that means I'm liable, if not likely, to wreck my own head.

The cancers, the suicides, the illnesses, the accidents and those who simply grew old: I am saying sorry. Both as a condolence, and an apology, for what I know I didn't do, but am irrationally terrified I did. Now please let me go.

This is definately one of my stranger posts; it's even earned an italic footnote from me, which I avoid at all costs. But I want to assure you all, I've not gone off the deep end. I've just had this recurring thought in my head for about a year now, and tonight for some reason I felt comfortable enough to try and exorcise it.

"So here's a message, to let you know I still exist"

At least, I think I do. It all got a bit blurry today, and so it depends on how you define existing. I think I'm existing... I'm not sure that I'm living though. I've talked about it here before, but theres still just a numbness in me where I know other people have heartbeats and feelings and dreams and all those things you're meant to have. I've been kidding you all that I'm fine, sometimes pretty badly, but it's been because I've had to kid myself that I'm fine.

Last night through to today I kind of broke down. The life I've been living caught up with me and I realised that for all I think I've learnt and become, this void is still there.

I'll try to be better in the new year. Theres not much of this one left, and what remains of if feels like a write off anyway.

Sorry everyone.

Music is my medicine.

Certain songs aren't neccessarily what we'd listen to every day, but when you hear them, maybe for the first time in ages, you're back somewhere, or with someone, or just generally reminded of something. In a bit of a change to the usual programming of personal trauma and near tragedy, I'm going to just list a few songs that do this to me-

Gangstarr- Full Clip- Ahh man, 'way back when', skating was the shit for me. And for all the memories such a lifestyle brings, nothing for me is as synonymous with the summers spent rolling around as this. Fucking supreme hip hop, confident and swaggering yet laid back, this song is skating to me. Plus it soundtracked Josh Kalis' part on the DC video, one of my favourite things to watch ever. Just, cool.
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=XYAsGH6P_QM

Jimmy Eat World- The whole album Bleed American. I bought this on the first time I really ever went out with a girl (just into town, typical early teenage mini-win, ha ha). I'm not sure if it was fate or irony or my subconscious or what, but this album subsequently served... no, serves as what it sounds like to be falling in love in your youth. I'm not old enough to be over what pressing play on this record brings, and I think that's ok.

Metallica- Sad But True- Never my favourite song of theirs, but significant because it's the first time I realised guitars didn't have to be in standard tuning. I don't imagine it's the first song I ever heard out of EADGBE, but its definately the first one I recall being unable to play properly as I was just starting to play guitar, until I went down to drop D. Not necessarily a great story, but hey, fuck you, it's just a little anecdote about me remembering the first time I detuned a guitar.


Sigur Rós- Popplagio, Saeglopur & Gobbeldigook- These ones are rooted in the live performances. Shared, importantly, with the most important people in my life present, either physically or in my mind, these are binding experiences for me, almost indescribable in their personal significance, which kind of defeats the purpose of this post so sorry I guess. I can say this though, I never want to forget the way I felt as the water fell or the air was filled with colours on those nights. Popplagio, by the way, is probably the most powerful song I have ever heard, live or on record.

I might do this again time to time, I liked it.

So it took 23 hours without sleep to make me see straight, but for the first time in about a week and a half, I feel driven to do something. Nothing specific, I suppose, just theres now motivation to be active whereas before there was none. This is good.
I'm not going to over react and say it was her that kicked me out of it, but I was lost in vices because I had nothing to work towards, and her words hit me as hard as i needed them to, despite her having nothing but the softest of intentions for me, and so now I'm back and I want to pretend the last week and a half never happened.
I was afraid I'd lost myself and afraid that because of this, I'd forgotten how to talk to her, but to my relief and joy, it's not difficult at all despite times and distances. She makes me laugh too, she makes me catch myself unawares, which not many people can do. Barriers down now, and masks aside, I've got to get back to being me again, and I'm looking forward to it for the first time since I got here.