First Love

SEVEN YEARS AGO I began an interesting writing project which somewhat chronicled my (religiously restrained) pursuits in love from the age of ten. Clearly it was a work of humour, some chapters were girls names, another chapter entitled 'It wasn't Pinnochio's nose that grew...' which documented adolescent sexual frustrations expressed via boyhood campfire conversations about girls. I continued writing up to the age of seventeen and eventually abandoned the project after deciding that the years that followed were shaping into a long winded tragedy with dwindling amounts of humour. 

Love changes with age. Some relationships seem like vague recollections in dreams or nightmares, some like lives in parallel universes. The past can be stranger than fiction when you look at the journey. Maybe it is a sign of success if you can look back on things that way?

I wanted to write something meaningful for Valentine's day but I thought it would be more important to laugh.

An excerpt from an earlier chapter in my abandoned project. My first love ;

CASSIE

Cassie was my first ever girlfriend.  I was 11 and at Intermediate School.  I had liked her for a while and she liked me also.  She had blonde hair, blue eyes, and her nose was a little bit pointy but that was alright, she was still pretty.  One day in the playground her friend Kelly asked me out on behalf of Cassie and I paused to think about it before replying with ‘yes’.  (I paused because I did not want to seem over eager).  Cassie was waiting across the other side of the playground.  As soon as I said ‘yes', Kelly ran over to Cassie to inform her of my answer.  I watched in the distance as she did this.  They both looked ecstatic and held hands, nodded their heads, and jumped up and down in excitement. 

Having a girlfriend was a new thing for me and I wasn’t sure what it entailed.  I figured we’d hang out, hold hands and stuff, and maybe kiss but french kissing a girl kind of grossed me out. 
In the classroom Cassie asked if I wanted to move my desk into her group.  My teacher Mr Thomson let us sit in whatever desk arrangements we liked.  I agreed but said that I wanted my friends Matthew and Andrew to come with me.  Cassie and Kelly consulted each other about this arrangement and they accepted.
So there we were. Me, Cassie, Kelly, Matthew and Andrew, all sitting in a group.  It was a different group dynamic sitting with girls. We would get in more trouble because the girls would talk when Mr Thomson was talking, and they would draw in our workbooks.  One day Matthew told me that it was pissing him off and Andrew agreed so they moved out. I felt quite abandoned.

I told my parents that I had a girlfriend.  I don’t know why I did this.  Maybe it was because I was proud I had got one.  I did not know it would cause such commotion.  Mum was outraged and said I was far too young to have one, and that it was bad news.  She feared that a girl would just be trouble and she wanted me to break it off.  I, of course was outraged by this and said that it was not fair and it was my life and that it wasn’t that bad.  I was quite angry.  Mum looked at dad for support.  I don’t think dad liked the idea of me having a girlfriend either but he didn’t say much.  He could tell that I was angry with mum for her reaction.  In the end  I heard dad say to Mum, “He’s only 11, don’t worry”.  I then heard Mum say “But this will just be the start, he’s too young…”

Cassie would call me on the telephone.  I learnt that girls like talking.  They like talking a lot. We would talk for up to an hour.  Sometimes Cassie would ring me for no reason, it was just something to do.  She would ring up and say ‘Hi’ and then ask me what I was doing. 

“Watching T.V” I would say. 

“Same” she would reply. 

“Cool” I would say. 

“Cool" she would say.  “What are you watching?” 

“The Simpsons” I replied. 

“Same.  Do you think Clarence from school looks like Milhouse?” 

“Um… yeah kind of.” I said.

She laughed.  “Four eyes (Clarence) is such a geek.”

Basically Cassie would ring me up and we would occupy the phone and talk about nothing.  It was disrupting my homework.  Mum would look at me as if to remind me of this fact when I was on the phone and it made me feel bad.  I would try to get off the phone by telling Cassie that I had to go.  “No you don’t” Cassie would say and she would insist on us talking.  I would give in.  I am pathetic and weak.

I started having to get my homework done early so it was done before Cassie would ring to make mum happy.

It was hard work having a girlfriend.  They were quite needy and demanding.  Sometimes I wondered why I bothered but at the same time Cassie gave me a buzz.  I couldn’t describe it, it was like a flutter of the heart or adrenaline or something, the feeling that there was someone special in your life that shared a special part of you that no one else could.  This is what led me to sew ‘Ken Cassie Ken Cassie Ken Cassie’ all over the pencil case I was making in my clothing and textiles class at school.  It seemed like the in thing to do.  My friend Elliot had a girlfriend Joanna.  They had been together about the same time as me and Cassie.  On their respective pencil cases they wrote ‘Elliot and Joanna 4 eva’.  I showed Cassie my pencil case.  I think she was quite flattered.  I scored brownie points.  We held hands on the way back from class that day.

There were a lot of phone calls, drawing in each others exercise books, and some hand holding but me and Cassie had still not kissed.  I think Elliot and Joanna were in the same boat.  One overcast lunch time Kelly, Cassie’s friend decided that we should go over to the far side of the field where it was secluded and play dare.  Kelly dragged me and Cassie and also Elliot and Joanna.  I started to get that buzz – my heart began to flutter.  When we got there Kelly said that Cassie and I needed to kiss and so did Elliot and Joanna.  We all looked hesitant and embarrassed by being put on the spot like that.  There was a period of silence but then Kelly said “come on, who’s going to kiss first?”.  This made it a competition and I sensed shame for the couple that lost.  I looked at Elliot and Joanna who were sheepishly looking each other in the eyes, to me it was a sign that they were both developing traction in the whole procedure.  This made me look at Cassie.  I felt nervous and uncomfortable and so did Elliot.  We looked at each other and then at our girlfriends and as Elliot leant in to kiss Joanna, so I did to Cassie.  One quick peck on the lips.  It was over in a flash.

The love that Cassie and I shared began to grow old in the days that ensued.  Perhaps it was my fear of the big sloppy.  I watched older boys do it to their girlfriends at the bus stop.  I admired them.  I was just chicken.  One day in the playground Kelly came up to me and stated “You’re dumped.  From Cassie” and then ran away.  Our love had ended pretty much exactly the way it began - via personal message service informing me of my plight. This was my first experience of heart ache. I was dumped for another boy, Michael, who looked like a monkey.

On A Bad Day

When I was about ten years old I remember seeing a teenager in Wellington wearing a black shirt with the print "TOTAL FUCKING DARKNESS." I was riding in the back seat of a taxi that day with my dad and my aunt and uncle and as we stopped at a set of lights the teenager crossed the road the taxi driver shook his head while reading the contents of the teenager's shirt aloud. He laughed sardonically and as he did so I remember my adult compatriots taking notice and sharing rather sardonic chuckles themselves. What would that kid know about TOTAL FUCKING DARKNESS?

Was it a slow download speed on Napster? Was it the vexatious Wellington wind? Was it being short a bus fare by a few cents? Was it the lack of attention paid to him by a female cashier at Burger King?

Maybe it was all those things. Maybe it was more. I guess it doesn't matter when it comes to TOTAL FUCKING DARKNESS because perception is subjective. It's psychological. It's irrational. But the feeling may be very real.

On a bad day I'm experiencing TOTAL FUCKING DARKNESS.

I'm doomed on such days. There is no hope, no light. There is no promise. And although I pretty much never swear and even seldom do it in my head I resort to profanity and it seems the only apt adjective to describe anything because it is all fucked. FUCKED. Fucking fucked.

FUCKED.

I'm feeling so low on these days which is strange for me as I like to think I'm the sort of person that leaves their front door each day in search of hope.

I feel like I've been abandoned. Although I have lots of friends and family it doesn't mean anything. I am alone even if I am not. I am abandoned even if I am surrounded. People are talking but no one is listening. Suggestions are sugar coated but they hold no pertinence. Even I know that I am being an idiot for the way I am feeling but I can't help it. I have already tried to feel otherwise. Ive already told myself that I am being irrational. But none of this matters because the feeling is so real. I am utterly empty. There is a huge void inside. I'm drowning in a sea of people. I'm falling apart in a public space. I'm silently crying out for help, for anything, something. Something that holds it all together. Something that makes sense. Something that tells me that there is purpose, a plan, meaning. That hope and love are real, not just experiences. That they have a source and it is absolute and unconditional. That love is. That love wants. That love will find me.

I don't nor ever will own a shirt that says TOTAL FUCKING DARKNESS but I feel like I've worn it before. It was on a bad day. Possibly my worst day.

It was also in Wellington. I played indoor cricket without feeling. I drove home with no urgency or desire and then lay in bed wanting to be swallowed by it never to resurface. But the feelings would not go away. I felt tormented. I wanted it to stop. I wanted to bring it to an end.

It was a work night and at 1:30AM I decided to get in my car and drive up one of the hills overlooking Wellington city in the rain. I got out of the car and stepped out into the moonless wintery night. The clouds hung low and remember fumbling my way up an overgrown path. I love mountains because they give me clarity of vision. They put things in perspective for me but on this night I felt devoid of my natural senses. When I could see the specks of city lights below me through the fog I wondered what the point in all of it was. Who really made a difference to the world? I just saw it as one big hopeless fucked up mess. I had an idea that I wanted to scream when I reached the hilly outcrop but I couldn't even manage that. My breathing started to go and I got down on my knees failing to gain any form of composure. What was happening to me? I had no idea. "Oh fuck" I remember uttering to myself. I started freaking out. I was scared. All I felt was darkness and I was at the mercy of it, like it was going to consume me. Oh, God, Oh God, please help I remember voicing in my mind over and over again and eventually my breathing started to slow back to a normal rhythm and it calmed me. I felt as though I was covered in a veil of darkness but now I started to see a pin prick of light. It was faint, tiny, minute but it disturbed the darkness and I clung to it.

'This is what hell is' I was told that night. It is not fiery flames. It is darkness and separation. Devoid of hope.

You must know this. It is a reality for many people.

People need hope. They need love. They need truth.

Light starts in a dark place.

"The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it."

AFFINITY III

He looks at the screen hoping that enlightenment would come but once again there was no message. It frustrated him that things would have to be this way - this kind of one-way communication with his father. He wanted answers. He wanted to know everything, to know where he was going, what he was supposed to do, how everything would pan out. He wanted to be able to calculate all of the obstacles in his path and the difficulties he would face, that way he wouldn't feel as if he was always running blind, falling from one problem to the next, never understanding the purpose of it all despite this underlying desire for something he couldn't define.

He looks at the screen once again.

Still nothing.

In the absense of communication he would often spend time speculating about how he should go about things. He was doing this now as he walked around his apartment staring blankly through his thoughts. He would try to assume his father's rational point of view but always fell short. This was perhaps, that he was not the man his father was nor would ever be. His head was clouded, a jumble of interferring stimuli that tried to find solace in outlook, but the forces were always opposing and the result was a scaled down yearning propogating an unsteady forward step. He wanted more. He knew he was made for more.

Another glance at the screen is taken.

Again nothing.

He looks at his watch. The kids would be climbing now. Each one with a bag, up the tallest towers in the neighbourhood. They had turned into some kind of juvenile army over the years. One day he had been flying a kite as his father had instructed of him in the Eastern Bloc and the children had seen him and been amazed. They had never seen a kite before and were mezmerised by the way it hovered so effortlessly in the air, how it sailed around buildings. It was only made of two sticks, paper and string but could embrace freedom so simply.
He had gained a following that day and that was probably what his father had intended. Now there were hundreds of them. They came out of the urban jungle wide eyed and hungry. They sought something that previous generations had lost and though it dumbfounded him they were entertained by his projects. The projects became a replacement for being left to their own devices on the streets. It was like a cultural or drop centre. It was to become their new education.

He could see them now zig zagging up the emergency stair cases of adjacent buildings, each one carrying a loaded sack like a procession of ants in the night. The current project had been months in the making and he enjoyed the sentiment that it carried. They had spent the last three months collecting Tigris Corporation flyers and the children had graffitied them, each in their own way. Some with lipstick, some with horns, other with more defacing creative flair. On the back of each flyer was a message to the city, a stated concern, a hope, a prayer. They were written by people from all walks of life and demographics across the city. They had collected the messages from people on the street then transcribed them onto the backs of the graffitied flyers. The last step was to fold them into origame paper tigers.

He had a view of the whole city from his balcony. Tonight was a clear night with the haze wearing only thinly on the horizon. Every night he stood on his balcony he would ponder the city and all the unanswered questions in his head. He would look to an adjacent tower and always see a young woman that did the same. It gave him solace. He did not know who she was but watching her silhouette and the mystery of her form gave him an idea of some sort of innate connection.

The kids were on the rooftops now. They signalled to each other and proceeded to drop their loads until the blackness of the night sky was overcome by a swarm of tumbling tigers. People in buildings saw them and ran to their windows and caught them as they fluttered past. It was the first time he had seen so many people look out of their windows with interest, excitement, curiosity even.

A paper tiger lands on Miss Delaware's balcony and he watches as she picks it up, unfolds, and reads it. When she is done she immediately looks back in his direction and it is unmistakable that she is looking at him.

Whether she had read his specifically written message or not was irrelevant. Somehow though, he knows she has.

He looks back and checks the screen in his apartment.

Nothing.

It no longer bothers him. He will find her himself. It makes more sense this way.

Affinity

The thread of Miss Delaware:

In the moment, embracing the minutes and seconds, she looks down at her unblemished wrists. Out of the window and into the apartments they stare mesmerized by a cable fed kaleidoscope, they smoke away on balconies, consider love in barricaded bedrooms. She looks to a particular room on an adjacent tower. Today he is not there.

Her watch beeps. Rushing to mirror she adds colour and definition to her face. There is no need really, but today promised to be one of those days. It was a day to change all days that would come. It would make sense of the days that served as mere filler between such momentous occasions in life.

Swinging her handbag around her neck she exits her apartment and rides the grav-tube to street level.  She views the messages that her friends had recorded for her and sent that morning, little holograms that sprouted from her wrist.

“Can’t wait to hear about how handsome he is” they say.

“I’m so excited for you.”

“You go girl. Affinity to infinity!”

She hurries out the door and hails a cab.

“Tigris Corporation” she says.

The cab driver looks at her briefly through the rear view and nods.

“Affinity Division” she adds.

The mention of the Affinity Division causes the cab driver to double take. He looks at her with new eyes, intentions different. The very mention of the ‘a’ word was a catalyst for many emotions within people. It separated the haves from the have nots, it spoke of material wealth, hope, a ticket to a better existence - something out of reach for many people. 

She was a modest woman and did not mean to gloat. She already regretted the mention of Affinity to the man. She should have just mentioned “Tigris Corporation” and walked herself to the appropriate sector of the complex. 

She doesn’t want to make further case with the man but as she sits the holograms project out wildly in her face. Advertisements of holiday getaways on private islands, wedding dresses, sex parties and toothpaste. She was sick of all of the images and they were almost unavoidable, the world seemed to rotate around them.

“Can you switch them off please?” she says to the cab driver.

“But if off, your fare more. If on, your fare cheaper” he says.

“I don’t care” she says. “I want to live without being told how to live. I want a life that cannot be bought.”

The taxi driver laughs. “Yet you go for Affinity” he says. He flicks off the advertisement projection system angrily and rues lost commission and ambassador credits.

She notices a smudge on the driver’s wrist as he switches off the advertising system. She can tell that he was a user. It wasn’t the wrists however that gave it away. It was in his eyes, a slight and occasional vacancy. Her brother was the same. He had started at first recreationally, but now he was hooked. Rubbing out had become his only form of solace. The more he had, the more he needed. Soon he found more meaning in rubbing out than living life. There was little left. He went from one fix to another, the severity in coming down necessitating the next hit.

Along the western corridor traffic was slow. They slowed as they passed paramedics attending to a few collapsed pedestrians. One had collapsed at the bottom of an overpass escalator and his shirt had got stuck in the machine. The other had collapsed on the footpath outside a Mass Transit Shuttle stop. They were both young.

The cab driver shakes his head. “Aye-argh” he laments, his words sorrowful but also fearful and angry. “This is problem.” 

He flashes one arm around and gestures at the world outside the cab.

No one knew why more and more young people were falling dead seemingly without reason. Drug use was speculated but there was no direct correlation found. Some had a history of heavy drug use, others were mostly clean. Coroners reported that cause of death was by unexplained neurogenic failure to the heart. Their hearts had simply ceased to beat. 

She clutches her hand bag tightly as traffic returns to its normal pace. It was a straight run now and she was at once nervous and excited.

The Tigris corporation complex took up a large section of the downtown area with five sky scrapers arising from its base in the shape of a hand reaching out from the ground. Inside the Affinity Division she welcomed by a man in a tuxedo and a woman in a scarlet dress. They escort her to a private lounge where they pour her a glass of champagne. 

“This is for you on your special day” the woman says. She places the glass of champagne on the table beside where Miss Delaware is sat. 

They stand together with loose embrace and smile down at Miss Delaware on the couch.

“As you know Miss Delaware, we already have your details on our database.” 

Miss Delaware looks around for the voice that is speaking to her. The voice comes from behind her. She turns her head and notices another man in a suit, but this man seeming more official. He has just come through the door. He keeps speaking as he walks, his words as if known by verbatim.

“We know your activities, hobbies, likes, dislikes, humour, religious beliefs, moral outlook. We know your favourite books, foods, music and drinks. We know your friends, relatives and the people you avoid. We know your sleep patterns, your sexual preferences and appetite. We can even assess your propensity to change given common variables in life such as stress, time restraints, societal fads, movements and political climates. Our system is the most comprehensive on the planet. Just about everyone is linked to our social network. We have over six billion subscribers worldwide and five million alone in this city.”

He sits on the couch directly opposite her and looks into her eyes.

“Affinity awaits you. We will find your match. All I need first is the payment.”

She hands him her card. Fifteen years of hard work and saving since the age of eighteen. The payment is processed and he puts the computers into action and starts the trawl.

The man tells her to sit back and relax but she is mesmerized by the colours and flashes of faces upon the screens. She can’t help but think about all the people that she had never met in life because she had worked so hard. All of the people that she would never meet in life because that was the way of life in modern times. The faces flash up on the screen for only a split second each but in a strange way, she was knowing them all, everything about them, analyzed and critiqued, computed and permutated, vicariously through a system of machines. She sits there for hours. Face after face. Frame by frame.

Regarding Statements of Intent & Disclaimers

It's the New Year, again. Out with the pen and all the resolutions. We will better ourselves this year: shed pounds, get smarter, be braver, become more financially viable, learn Salsa, speak Japanese, experiment with fruit and cheese combinations. My resolve has been half-assed in previous years. I've made statements of intent, nodded, and soon ignored them. Self betterment has always been eclipsed by more meaningful tasks: vacant stares, television, pondering life on other planets, scrutinizing existence of parallel universes, living vicariously through facebook, not getting out of bed... the list goes on. The truth is, I must hate myself. I mean I must really hate myself. I could be so much more in so many different ways but I am not. I stop myself from doing so. My intentions are the antithesis of my being. I am wasted time, wasted space, when I could be brilliant. Or could I?

Lately I've been thinking what everyone else has thought at some stage in their life. What if everyone pursued their dreams?

There are doctors that want to be writers, writers that want to be comedians, comedians that want to be golfers, golfers that want to be farmers, farmers that want to be dancers, dancers that want to be famous, famous people that want to live in outer space in communion with Xenu.

I wonder how many people are actually pursuing their dreams. How many people are happy with their lot in life? And who actually said that our life should be confined to a 'lot'.

What would happen if we did things that we were passionate about and really pursued them? What would happen if a farmer quit milking cows and started attending a dance academy. What if he took a financial gamble, suffered peer scrutiny, faced all the nay sayers, friendly concerns and domestic disapproval, and took all the challenges head-on. What if he succeeded? What if he failed?

I don't know such answers.

Perhaps the bigger question I am asking is;

What if someone follows their dream and fails?

Would they be bitter? Would they wish they did things normally, safely, securely, relatively dispassionately until the day they died? Would they have regrets? Would they consider their lives a tragedy?

This blog is about following your dreams. It is about facing your fears, your doubt, your critics. It's about being a better person. It's about creating a better society. Belonging to a better world. 

It's also an experiment.

What if we could do more than just dream?

I am. You are. We could be.

So why don't we?

This years resolution: Do more than just dream.