Category Archives: Note to Self

Note to Self (231) Talk To Me

. Note to Self . , ,

I missed you. Hearing your voice, laughing at stupid jokes, this is what I need right now. I haven’t found many who could keep me entertained. The ones who do get my full attention are hard to find. It doesn’t take much, just enough to get the ball rolling. Maybe what I see as an easy way to catch my eye is something much harder than it seems.

I don’t need role play. I don’t need superficiality. Money can’t buy what I long to find in this lifetime. Words and only words will light the spark that will keep my fire burning forever. Are you up to the challenge?

Driving a Ferrari takes a lot of skills. Patience, dedication, just the right amount of love and care to make me drive for miles onward. Yes, I just compared myself to a car. I could compare myself to a beautiful piece of music, a brilliant book, or the most delicious chocolate cake you’ve ever tasted.

The spark needs to be there, otherwise I’m in idle mode. Words flow, intrigue me, make me want to know more about you. If your words don’t work their magic, I’m as good as a rusty pile of steel in a junkyard.

Under the expert hands of an artist, the steel comes to life. Becomes beautiful, eerie, and touches my heart. Open my mind with your words and let’s embark on the journey. A talk – a great talk – is really all I need.

Note to Self (230) Les Miserables

. Note to Self, Writing . , , , ,

Oh boy, I haven’t cried watching a movie in so long. This was truly the most amazing piece of art I’ve seen in quite a long time. I grew up reading and studying the work of Victor Hugo – truly the most amazing author who will remain at the top of my list forever – and I forged my writing according to his style. To me, he is the master and I’m only the apprentice. The words of love, dedication, passion, raw life painted under his brush with so much finess and detail, resonate strong within me.

There’s nothing more I’d love to convey in my own art. So much to learn, so much to admire, I’m in awe. Watching the movie brought me back to the time of my youth, when I was only speaking and writing in French. The country where I was born has now become a distant memory, tainted with awful politics and a lot of other stuff that pisses me off beyond belief. But when I think of my childhood, and history lessons, how people fought and died for freedom, I feel joy. Nothing can be taken for granted. The way my country of origin has turned into cannot replace the proud I built reading the work of brilliant authors and poets who made this country the gem it truly is. Under the dirt, the hate, the lost values and wasted time, my country is beautiful.

I learned to love again through my love of words. I hope from the bottom of my heart the work of Victor Hugo will never be forgotten, because it’s pure heaven.

Thank you for this gift.

 

Note to Self (229) Impatience

. Note to Self, Writing . , , , ,

Define yourself. Tell me in a few words who you are. Not the image you project into the outside world, but your inner self, the real you you only dare to reveal to the very few who happen to catch your interest for longer than a mere few seconds. It doesn’t take much to know who to trust. We have friends who last a reason, a season or a lifetime. But the ones who feed off your soul and manage to keep you on your toes, these ones last forever.

Stare at the stars and watch the milky way fade away into the darkness of the universe. What do you see? As the breeze brushes the skin of your face, your heartbeat increases and you take a deep breath. You belong here. You’ve always known you felt more than everyone else around you, but could never really explain how and why until this very moment. Silence isn’t uncomfortable anymore. You listen to the sounds around you and understand what they mean. Your mind races away, a million thoughts a second, wanting to catch the beauty of the black sky before sunset. You speak. Whatever you say, I follow. It doesn’t have to be smart or complex, yet I find a mesmerizing intelligence in all your statements.

A smile. Closing your eyes, you see beyond yourself and embrace every breathing second you’re awake. The journey to your mind has barely started and I already find myself getting lost – gladly – into the maze that are your thoughts.

When will I ever be able to finally get it all to myself, like the selfish and impatient addict I was born to be? I must wait. Appreciate the calm before the storm. Baby steps, before I can run and unlatch you from your ground. I long to unravel all the mysteries that made you who you are, but the few words you gave me as an introduction will suffice for now.

One can never think too much. Your mind holds a treasure that will never die.

Note to Self (228) God

. Note to Self . , , , , , , ,

I’d like to believe there’s something bigger than us out there, and we’re not the simple product of luck. I still am a control freak, and don’t really feel like I can rely on God to solve all my problems. Much of my willpower helped me become the writer and the individual I am today. Was it God’s choice for me to be this way? Inherently, I’m a combination of a billions genes my mother and father gave me when they conveived me. Their own path and fate was sealed by the genetics given to them by their parents, and so on. Was it God’s will to guide my dad out of France and make him meet my mom in Germany? Was it God’s will to have them fall in love and get married, and have me? Or was it just luck? Plain coincidence?

When I pray to God, I pray to the ultimate perfect intelligence who knows everything about anything. Is it Jesus? Is it his father? Do I believe in all the prayers and principles I learned while in Catholic school? I call myself a Christian but truly, what am I?

I believe in the natural order of things. If God is in charge of this order, then why do we have so much chaos? So many wars? So much hatred? Human beings are imperfect, always struggling for power and control. We think we’re the best, the only ones, but are we truly worth the effort we put into fighting all the time?

God is love. Yet when I look around, I only see humans interacting with each other, based on the values they grew up with, and either embraced or rejected, and formed new ones based on the environment they live in. Where’s God when the market crashes? Where’s God when children get kidnapped and murdered for no reason? Where’s God when poor people die on the street from hunger, and rich assholes drown under piles of cocaine? Where’s God when all you have is an addiction you can’t win against, but only attempt to tame?

So much injustice. So much unfairness. God is balance. Where’s the balance here? If we were created to God’s image, why can’t we be better with each other? I refuse to believe blindly. I refuse to accept facts that can’t be proven. My faith has always been in myself, because this is the only truth I know. The only one I can rely on. God never showed me the light. God never spoke in my ear and told me what to do. How can I relinquish control over to a being who remains indifferent to mankind’s demise?

I sometimes feel this earth was better off without mankind to destroy it all. Animals don’t believe in any God. They spawn, kill for food and territory, and die. Their life is simple. No society imposing rules that don’t make any sense, no corrupt officials abusing their power.

I believe in God, but really at this point, God is just a word. I believe in love, compassion, dedication, honor, trust. I believe in positive outcomes. I believe in second chances. I believe in redemption. God will not give me what I need unless I fend for myself. God never took care of me. My parents did. It’s weird. I was an atheist as a kid, and then became a believer again.

I thought I knew, yet God seems so foreign to me right now.

Note to Self (227) Dream

. Note to Self .

Stuck between fantasy and reality, in a blur of sensations, emotions come and go like waves crashing onto the shore. I don’t know why my mind keeps drifting away, never at rest, always seeking the final relief that will give my life its true purpose.

The truth seems infinite. Impossible to grasp in the blink of an eye, it disappears and stays hidden. How can I finally shut down and let go of the past? Memories flood my brain, choking me to death. One breath feels too much at the moment. I sink deeper, willing to surrender.

But that moment never comes. And I wander awake in the land of my dreams, until I’m too exhausted to stand.

Life gives me strange gifts. Some of them feel soft to the touch, and others look attractive to the mind. But how much can I trust the feelings that overwhelm me? I may never know, as the truth slips away insidiously through my fingers like grains of sand.

I can’t think, can’t remember. All I see will vanish as soon as I wake up. Prisoner of the dream, I break free when dawn lifts the veil of darkness around me.

My eyes sting. My mouth utters a growl and I bury my head into my pillow. The dream was so beautiful, I didn’t want it to end. But it ended nonetheless because the truth escaped me once again.

So I linger. Wait for my light to shine. And the dream, my dream, wraps me in a cocoon of bliss as my eyes close and my mind unravels to the wildest corners of my subconscious.

Note to Self (225) Kiki Breaks Free

. Kiki Reynolds, Note to Self . ,

Kiki wakes up every morning thinking she could do something better with her life, like being creative, and entertaining crowds, but instead, Kiki’s stuck in a world she despises. If she could she’d leave right now and get in her car, drive for hours, listening to music, and forgetting all about her worries, her bills to pay, and the life of dread she wakes up in every day. Kiki just wants peace. She wants love. Human connections that make her life richer and fuller.

Maybe she can plead insanity when it comes to dealing with her life. Everyting’s too much. Too stressful. Too hard. She can’t keep up with it all. She just wants to retire on an island and write. Because words mean the world to her. Because words allow her to escape, and break free from the routine. Words are her passport out of the doom.

It isn’t dark where Kiki leaves. It’s just not bright enough. Not cheerful enough. Kiki seeks bliss. A break. A nice long break.

As she takes a drag from her e-cigarette, she remembers what it was like to be a little girl with too many dreams. Hiking through fields and climbing on top of her hill, at the top of her world, and staring at the horizon, wanting to take over the universe by storm. Kiki likes to feel powerful, and as she contemplates the realm of possibilities beyond skyscrapers, she sees meadows, and cows, and no civilization nearby. Just her, queen of her imagination. No crown or tiara, no princess dress. Just rubber boots, an ill-fitting summer dress and a straw hat.

Kiki listens to the silence and takes a deep breath. At the end of the day, she’ll be herself again. Not angry, not sad.

It’s just another shitty morning at the office, and she’ll make it through, because she’s a tough cookie.

Note to Self (224) Struggle

. Note to Self . , , ,

Quietly back home, I listen to the silence of my apartment. The fridge is humming in the kitchen. The small feng shui fountain drips quietly by the bathroom. I’m sitting here in my pajamas, writing away my thoughts, so that they would leave me alone. My mind enters a blur I know all too well. The darkness within lurks and waits, wanting to take me over, like it did so many times in the past. The monster, my monster, lives inside my brain. I can’t get rid of it. Hearing others share about their struggle helps me often, but sometimes, it makes everything worse.

I remember the times where it was me against the world. My bottle of Black Label safely tucked beside me like a child, I nursed my addiction with love and patience. The memories would go away with the drunken fog. I wouldn’t be bothered by them for a few hours, and finally I would breathe. But did I ever really breathe? Did I ever feel like myself for all these years I drank?

My monster – the insane spider – wants to return and rule my world. But I won’t let her. I can’t. The past is too painful to experience again. Memories of how I treated my ex-husband, and friends, co-workers, acquaintances, flow back and scare me. Will I ever be able to be in a normal relationship with anyone? Will I ever be able to love? I feel full of love and compassion, yet the spider tells me I’m a selfish bastard. There’s so much I want to give the world, but I hate playing victim. A lot of pain molded me into the individual I am today. Everyone goes through pain. I’m not unique. I’m not special.

Pause. I listen to the humming of the fridge and when the humming stops, I listen to my cat breathing. This animal shows me unconditional love. Unconditional trust. My cat wouldn’t love me as much if I wasn’t able to love her. My life is great. There’s nothing I should complain about. But here, in the silence of my apartment, I feel something’s missing. A voice to tell me I’m safe, a voice to reassure me I’m doing the right thing. My struggle is normal. Every few days, I feel that way.

I must stay strong. I have many people around who support me and care about me. My poodle, my guardian angel, my sober friends, my family. I’m safe. I’m loved. The spider needs to shut up for just a little bit. Go to sleep. Dream about your stories and how you can create anything you want with your powerful imagination. Tomorrow is a new day.

I’ll be fine.