Chronicles of a HeadCase.

He was dying, I knew he was growing weak and I knew for weeks that it wouldn’t be long… though there wasn’t much I could do. As time drew closer till that short last breath and final whimper, all he could do was wait around as he faded away. Each breath shorter than the last… I’m glad he passed peacefully. Brainy’s gone now… he’s been a good friend for more than 10 years and it feels a little quiet around here since Monday. Its an appropriate and calm silence to mourn the loss of a friend and also part of the family. Burying him myself was a good closure; if you love your pet(s), I recommend burying them yourself when they pass away. I watched Brainy grow up, hung out with him at night while he was still a pup when he was shivering from the cold, taught him some neat tricks, spent many hours playing with him, punished him when he was naughty, etc. There was that one day when I came back from jogging, opened the automatic gate, accidentally dropped the remote and the gate closed on Brainy’s head as he was running excitedly to come greet me. He went into shock for about 2 days… and ever since that he never grew up and had always stayed puppy size (don’t try this at home). Well, I know that he got sick and almost died twice while I was away in the states and now after a year that I’ve been back, he finally let go. I guess he was waiting to see me first, glad I got to say goodbye.

Rest in peace Brainy.

Just away from your boulevard, where I decided to stay in shelter from this lucid elusive gleam. Sometimes I get so tired from endings, I shudder away from beginnings… with sore legs as crutches for a worned out mind and a still warm beating heart. Maybe something is amiss, maybe I am worried and longing for a change in my mind… a new point of view. Its been a while since I woke up to a new day with new eyes and a breathe of fresh air. It reminds me how emptiness can empty you out pretty fast, so we often try to fill her up with an ocean of hope… in hopes we don’t sink so quickly. And of course, we can only cup a handful of water as we are soaked in this sea of distilled dreams, and its only just sinking in. Silly me, I’m still floating in a limbo amidst the many more and the many few, drenched and soaked, still on my way home, hoping to make it out alive. I know I will, I know I can… the sun will never go down on me if i keep heading west, or should I turn around to catch the next sunrise? hehe. choices in perspective dictates our choices in life. What we think we see, is ultimately, more powerful than what any of us see. What do I think I see? I think its another 100 leagues to the next horizon, and I can’t wait to get there. Would you like to take a walk with me?

I wasn’t thinking of tomorrow till you turned the world over, and now perhaps it is more than just another prayer. I was without a care and too numb to want to spin another tale till a web was spun beneath mine. I held away any excitement, but the contagiousness of yours made a struggle of this usual demeanor with the temptation of a cure for this anesthetic state of being and then another gentle tease. So now I wait to catch a glimpse of that red silhouette dancing and acting out the role of love… this time I will know it is you. lol. Although, I can’t help but wonder how much more you can captivate.

Dedicated to a "Leng Lui"

These idle and lightly touched moments contend for a little more time to be spent… just a little while longer. Some playful mischief in the eyes of a beholder may just be heaven sent and something to hold on to, something to steal. For when you have finally been swallowed whole into their world, the hunter may become the prey… ensnare the light of a star in you and you may be blinded forever. There is also the thrill in the thin hanging thread of blind anticipation with just enough to keep your breathe holding; in a game of hide and seek, just how long will you wait before fear caves in over your fleetingly anxious glee of excitement? Do you hide in the shadows waiting to be discovered or do you think that when you remain concealed… you are the victor? You know you can’t hide forever, it will only be a matter of time before you finally come out of hiding and find that nobody is looking for you anymore.

So wear it on your sleeve, let it be taken and trampled upon once or twice. Eventually it will find its rightful place in the world. Hmm, although… if everyone is seeking and nobody hiding, there won’t be a game to play anymore… or is everyone still in hiding?

As a follow up to the Ship of Case blog entry, i would like to sum up just where i was going with it… there were a lot of good responses but the ultimate conclusion of the exercise was to identify that identity had nothing to do with parts. If you had answered that the parts were important as your identity… then you should know that every couple of years every bit of your body has been completely changed to new parts. So if who you are doesn’t reside in the body… maybe the brain?

Throughout history there has always been the notion of an observer within us… the one in the driver’s seat of our existence, but trying to identify where this observer/driver (soul/mind/spirit) resides has always been a mystery.

Well the follow up excercise is about the brain, and if perhaps our mind/soul/spirit/observer reside within the construct of our gray matter. Lets say you are a millionaire who is hospitalized and you may be stuck in that hospital bed for an indefinite amount of time. For argument sake, lets pretend that this is in the future with technology beyond our imaginations. So, instead of being vegi-fied in bed, your family spends millions to have your brain wirelessly connected to a remotely controlled body. What this means is that while your body and your brain residing within it, is stuck in bed, you are experiencing life through this android body (capable of mobility and all the six senses). Where are you? in bed or roaming the streets in the remote control body? (Think about your answer before reading on…)

Ok so many of you may say that you are in the hospital bed, because that is where your brain is, which is the essense of you and storing all your memories and whatever else. Okay, So if thats what you say or feel. Lets split up the brain, left and right lobe of the brain are placed at the two ends of the city and still remotely hooked up to your remote body…. so, where are you now? Please discuss.

Do you count yourself among them? the countless tales to tell and dream forth about. Look at you… isn’t that what makes you special? Forgive me for being mean but its just another way of letting you know you are still alive. Though it must take much more to move the warmth that had been smothered off your chest from all the years of vermin and leeches of the world. I realize the shock that such a fabled soul to be released into the wilderness of reality would be quite traumatic, but how does one live without breathing and if you breathe than you must exhale… if you exhale then you must taste the air in which you live and it is the same air that all of us breathe. So don’t pretend that you are larger than this life at any point of your life… come back down to earth before you fall so hard that you become grounded to the dirt. Where the vermin will walk all over you, and leeches suck out whats left of your rooted carcass. In other words, only you can save yourself when it counts… there won’t always be someone coming to help rescue you from your whim. Think about it, don’t let anyone feed it to you.

Is this attached to a memory? The skies are strange when you feel like a stranger in your own city… no emotions associated with any places, maybe some faces. But I only seem to find nostalgia in tunes from the past these days, i’m not sure why, but maybe the real thing doesn’t quite cut it anymore. The buffer zone of comfort seem to grow as time goes by… soon i’ll be buried deep in representations and mirrors. Add a little smoke and some fireworks for display, and i’ll have a stage of my own. With audiences of no ages coming to see, the tragedy of comedies. lol. Or is it the comedy of my tragedies? Yup, that sounds about right. Although the audience may just be what the tragedy is… is there anyone out there? seriously… is there?

I’m not listening, yet hanging by a thread for all or nothing… over and over again. Sure, it doesn’t matter because it doesn’t mean a thing, but i’m still looking for a better way, another way to change maybe. I realize I haven’t much to lose since I really have nothing at all, lol. You start with nothing, you go with nothing. There isn’t any use though, guess i’ll still be trying to grab a hold of that meddlesome ghost… closer to that light at the end of that tunnel yet still running in place. Such a delicate pace that left us unavailable eventhough we all get along with something to say. I hope to find a little exception that would implore me to worry… wrap myself with a couple of lies and stay at home with my concerns. It doesn’t bother me to say it anymore… i guess i might have to live without that something in between, tear down the theatre to reveal an empty stage and some broken lines. No major differences anymore, just the same old passing through of life. We don’t know what we got till its gone, so i wonder what we could lose?

Heres a fun philosophy excercise. As some of you may or may not know the classic "Ship of Theseus" replacement paradox scenario. Here is my version of it and how it may address identity issues.

Lets say, there is an island, lets call it the La isla HeadCase "HeadCase Island". So, in this island, there reigned a pretty demented King, we’ll call him King Case. So, under the rule of King Case, people were very happy in general. Every weekend, he gave away free alcohol to his loyal drunk subjects. Eventhough poverty stricken and starving, the peasants had a helluva time drinking and partying their asses off. So when King Case passed away peacefully in a drunken rage. The people missed him dearly and built a ship in his name. We’ll call it, the Ship of Case. The good people would take the ship out every year and drink themselves blind in memory of their beloved alco-king.

Over the years, the Ship of Case suffered wear and tear (you know how drunks are) and parts were replaced… plank by plank, sails, etc. All the used parts were dumped on a beach not to far off from where the Ship of Case was kept at the pier.

One fine day, some young kid comes along and finds all these ship parts on the beach (waste disposal isn’t exactly a priority to a nation of alcoholics). So this kid found that there were enough used parts to make a ship. So after weeks of hard work, he built a ship which looks exactly like the Ship of Case that is parked at the pier. So here it is, which is the Ship of Case?

The ship by the beach built by that kid with all the original parts? or the ship by the pier that had been completely replaced with new parts?

Think about this, and then think about how it applies to us.

With careful grace, the silhouette drifts across an ocean of cries. Clearly this partial shadow emits uncompromising brilliance that seems to us that we are the only ones who appear to notice. Now I’m left in disarray and a handful of silent reveries. Another victim to all the responses, I can only turn away from the moment and collect my thoughts before I lose myself in them. Do what I do best to lose that aggravating gravity and its accelerating encumbrance… yes white discussions and idle talk, anything to get my mind off the haunting possibility of a beginning and its pretty consequences. Would be nice to feel alive again…