comfortable contradiction

i went for a walk today along the bow river pathway that shoulders memorial dr.
it was lovely, warm and the sun was just entering its last phase of setting.
all kinds of people were out, walking, running, slouched over, smiling, etc.

as i sauntered through the 10th street pedestrian underpass, i crossed the path of 2 young men. high. one of them was hugging a boom box to his hear to listen to the music that was pumping out of it as he danced/stumbled. the other turned to me and said joyously 'exercising?' ... i turned back and said 'that's right!'.

2 wayward, unkempt gentleman perhaps deep in a trance to numb something no one can fathom.

but as soon as i walk past them, and turn my gaze toward the river i am enchanted by how fast the water is moving, the different sounds of wooshing and wooring of the water. as well, the tall, sometime ominous well-lit towers that block out the stars.

it's this stark contradiction that is in part modern city life, in part a function of calgary's economy and in part just how beautiful and painful life is.

when i was 15 i started an online poetry blog profile with the username 'SweetPain'. it's weird reading it now, the poems i wrote and the screen name just sounds super s&m'ish but I digress. Maybe at 15, i was just as enchanted by the idea of contradiction as i am now.

i have always been trying to make out my own path and do my own thing. whether it be in a weird, unique or whatever where. i'm a walking contradiction. i am raised this way, so i should say these things but no...I don't want to do that or this. (if you know me i think you get what i am saying? maybe?)

but i think that's why i like most in others, what makes them so unlike what i would expect. because it helps me, understand how judgmental i am. it helps me understand how society has nurtured me so to think this way or that way or someone. it's taught me to love people, for all of that weird shit that they do.

i wouldn't say it makes me forgiving, i would say it makes me insanely curious and sometimes overly patient with someone. i think to myself - 'no! they have to be nice/they can't be an asshole'. and most of the time i am right. i end up finding those other-sides,  that most are too impatient to find. it has , and does drive me to madness. the times i am not right, i am sick over wondering what i could have said or done, or explained or given to just make them wanna be cool with me. this, i think i need to forgive myself for a little more for that.

what makes you a walking contradiction?

running

today i was so brain dead from my week, i sunned on a parking-lot embankment as the cars went buy waiting for my car to get serviced. a total of 5 hours of waiting, and my lovely little CC has been fixed and tire-changed.

sometimes i worry i am getting less patient, that my ability to forgive is lessening and that in general i am becoming less good. more jaded by humanity or something.

but, as most worries go, it is pretty unfounded. i've found a way to forgive someone who hurt me, to love more people and to try to start all over again, and again.

some days are harder than others to forget all the words in your head, and just breath, just be wherever you are. intention, is important, and i try to find out what my honest intention is with how i engage with people, or pursue goals in order to get a strong sense of why i need to do something, or talk to someone or even think so hard. then you just let it be.

when you can be just 'there' just so present, just so alive then you are like hey look - the sun is setting on another day in this city, it's warm, and everything glistens-good.

i'm still reading on the road, and it seems that Sal & Dean have lots of conversations about 'deciding everything' , having all-the-things decided and so sure yet only to fall to the peril of their own foolishness, addictions and ailments. Their combined 'madness' is entertaining, and you start to feel frustrated like the 'girls' are frustrated with them. i suppose we all have times in our lives where we are just running, bouncing and hurting without knowing where to land but we have some vague idea that a dream is going to find us.

right now i love valerie june, and hozier. two soulful singers who seem to give each note a certain personality and a certain shade of wonder.

this post is vague, and i didn't mean it to go anywhere. i don't feel like i am running from or to anything right now, like i used to. is this content?