"I often converse with inanimate objects and sometimes cannot stand being me. But, the water is cool and the breeze is too, and I like this spot by the river's edge. So, Hello River, and, Hello Island, I see you over there, by your lonesome – not significant enough to split the river in two, but substantial enough to jut about the water's surface. I don't know why I described you, as if somehow defining your parameters actually means anything. Well, I guess it does. Defining things gives me a sense of control over them. I am telling you, Island, that you are 'this' and not 'that.' And, because you are 'this,' you're mine. Do you understand?
I think everyone (everyone being a general term for people that actually think about this stuff) eventually has a problem with the idea of 'significance.' It's just a different way of asking if anything one does is actually important, which is – of course – a very bland extension of the 'why are we here?' question. Actually I think all questions, regardless of subject or origin, are just a manifestation of that question. I won't, but I am pretty confident that I could show that any question asked ends up just being a version of 'why we're here.' Again, I won't, but I so totally could. Just realize when you are asking some teenager behind the counter at whatever fast food store, for a straw, you're really asking why you're here.
I'm sitting here talking to you about things that should be important – that are important – but I'm having a hard time getting past my apathy. I do the majority of my life utterly terrified, but I hide it. And I don't mean – 'I'm nervous about my fifth grade Christmas recital terror' – I mean fucking 'realizing your about to be in a car wreck and can't do anything but think about how frightening this is and how much this will hurt,' terror. But then, I ball it up and save it for after I'm done doing whatever scares the shit out of me. I don't know how I rationalize the fear away, but it all ends up coming back anyway. I wonder; is this how everyone lives? I can't imagine that my 'human experience' is all that unique or different from everyone else's. We're all just creatures of impulse – some of us are just better at ignoring the impulses. Either way, Island, I'm pretty sure the next big storm, this summer, will wash you completely away. T.S. Elliot showed us fear in a handful of dust, but I bet that storm will do the same to you with a bucket full of rain drops.
I generally feel awkward around people and I feel, strangely… guilty, about that. But, God, everyone keeps brushing up against me, so now I'm feeling angry. Please stop, but they don't, and every one of them, unknowingly, takes a little bit of me, like the water slowly eroding your tiny shores. All metaphors are tired. Attempts, again, to define – visualize. I did it again – in my complaint about metaphors being another attempt to define things, I defined metaphors… I just did it again. I could own the world… the whole fucking universe, if I could find the right metaphors and I know I can find the meaning of everything through any question. I think in long soliloquies to inanimate objects, sometimes animals, because I don't think telling a person makes sense. I don't think I want a response. We're all so beige anyway."
But, for a moment there I just got confused. My perception changed, and instead of seeing the river slide past the constant, immovable land I saw the earth flow past the constant, immovable river.
