Random Sky Shots

I once accompanied my sister-in-law on a business transaction aboard a cargo ship they were commissioned to do repairs on (She and her husband run a company that sells and repairs power generators and stuff).

They had me along because they needed my "communication skills", as the owner of the ship was a foreigner (Greek, I think) and both husband and wife were somewhat intimidated by the prospect of dealing with someone who speaks another language (we spoke in English, not Greek, in case you're wondering).

Anyway, we stayed onboard the cargo ship for about three days. It was not really a 'memorable experience' as one would define such but it afforded me some rare chances to take snapshots of the sky in that magical time when night succumbs to day.

Here are a few shots:

I have always been fascinated by the colors of the sky especially in the early mornings and late afternoons.

It's amazing how quickly its colors and hues can change right before your eyes without you noticing.

Take a look at these next three pictures. They were all taken from the same spot all within a 5-minute period.

Notice the moon glowing faintly on the first one?

And here are some shots from my own backyard one afternoon not very long ago.

And have you ever wondered how differently a single scene changes depending on the colors the sky paints it with at different parts of the day?

Not even Michaelangelo, Leonardo (and the rest of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles...LOL!) can do justice to the beauty of the sky's ever changing palette.

Aint God wonderful for giving us such a canvass adorned with his own masterpiece as a canopy over our heads?

Author's Note: Pictures were taken using a Motorola V3i phone.

Of Compiling Life Stories

From time to time, we come across something (or someone) that has a way of jolting us out of our self-imposed stupor and slapping us with ice-cold insight that never fails to shove our faces straight into this porridge filled bowl we call ‘our perfect lives’ and re-evaluate the way it tastes - first at the lips, then the tongue and later at our grissly insides before it gets slopped up into every single cell of our so-called life.

Life is a collection of pictures and videos and songs and files and what-nots stored, at times haphazardly, in what I have come to refer as man's 'bio-hard drive'.

These experiences are interwoven into a delicate fabric that make up our life stories. The more experiences, the more intricate the pattern.

Consciousness, after all is simply a continuing story - a tale we weave with every single thing we do - and we get to decide how it twists and turns and ends and continues like a river snaking it's way from the mountain where it's spawned, through forests and meadows, through deserts and marshes, until it finds its way to the sea.

I have always thought of myself as an early bloomer.

I was preparing dinner with my mother for my siblings at the same time that my peers were wading and playing in knee-deep mud puddles. I was helping out my father do home fixes at the same time that my peers were ranting about the kind of brakes their bikes should have. I was working in a minesite as a laborer shoveling rocks and mine goop at the same time that my peers were enjoying high school summer vacation. I was already initiated into the sinful indulgences of the flesh at the same time that my peers were giggling like schoolgirls about their first kisses. I was starting out a career in teaching at the same time that my peers were still unsure what to study in college. I could continue on but I’m sure you get the picture.

With these ‘advanced experiences’ I have always held my head over and above my age level (and sometimes those a bit older than myself) thinking, “I’ve seen more than you can possibly dream. You haven’t seen anything yet, buster.”, as I feigned interest in their own stories.

But recently, I simply realized an entirely new perspective in my life’s experiences that I’ve never ever seen before.

You see, I’ve long since stopped savoring my moments. Food is fuel so you just gobble it up. After all you don’t see cars lingering in the gas station ’savoring’ the fresh injection of diesel in their tanks. A beach in any part of the world is simply the same - salty water meeting sand and sometimes testing its resolve against rock cliffs.

I have stopped compiling my stories thinking I had enough.

But right after I came across an article, a rant or whatever (I can't remember) that talked about continuously writing your stories and looking at the world through the eyes of people who knew what living was all about, I realized how wrong I was in thinking I had enough.

Now I have a newly reborn desire to pile it up, absorb it all and to try to breathe it out in paper and ink so I could show it off like the spoils of conquest.

Simply put, if at this stage (I’m 33) and I already have stories that will make most people I know who are in their 40’s and even 50's look like kindergarten, what more if I was older?

I have always been told that you should pile up riches in places where moths and rust don't eat and destroy.

Well, let me now pile up my stories. Let me continue to revel in the beauty and enthusiasm of life. Let me bathe in its triumph and defeats. Let me marvel at the enormity of life's span and scope. And hopefully in the end, when I get to sit with my progeny gathered around my feet and staring at my wrinkled countenance, I would have a wealth of stories to tell them - of the dragons I slayed and of the maidens I danced with and kissed, of the tears I shed and the happiness that made me want more, of the music I've heard and the silences I treasured, of the memories that made me full and the experiences that colored me.

Summer has ended as I am writing this, but I feel like the sun’s beating at my shoulders and stinging my eyes as I feel sweat trickling down my back as the humid air fills my lungs and the salty and tangy scent of skin fills my head.

It’s summer all over again and this has got to be the best I’ve had ever.

On The Logic Of The Foolish

Foolish people never learn.

That is, what experience and life teaches them never really sticks. They remember it while the licks are still fresh, but as soon as the flesh cools down, the memory of the lesson supposed to be learned vanishes like morning mist towards the midday.

There is a reason why we say, "history repeats itself." 

The most common is that because it does. If you want to go academic, there are plenty of proof that this is true; the Dialectic, the Principle of Socio-Political Cyclical Movement, Psycho-Social Patterns etc. Even the Bible says, "That which hath been is now: and that which is to be hath already been".

Given this premise, it is then logical that we really should "learn from our mistakes", or "heed the wisdom of those who have gone before" or "remember the lessons of the past for reference to the future". Because if history repeats itself, it follows that the difficulties that come with it also repeats itself. In which case if you've encountered a particular problem in the past, you will encounter it again today or tomorrow and you're in trouble if you don't remember how you can solve it.

This truth applies not only to singular aspects of life but in multiple occurrences in a several alternate planes.

After all a man is not just a man. He is a son, a brother, a friend, a master, a husband, a lover, an enemy and the list goes on. And each of these alternate planes have its own history of decisions and indecisions. And all these realities are intertwined in a single complex fabric of experiences that encompass the entirety of a person's life memory.

It follows then that if a person sees a pattern that recurs several times in one of his life planes, it is understandable that he take measure to prevent any negative effects that this may bring about. If it persists, then he can continue trying to shield himself or he can simply change the way he looks at it. Maybe the pattern is an integral part of the fabric.

Most of the time, it is.

As such, there would be no sense fighting it as doing so would only disrupt the fabric and possibly even create a tear.

Don't miss the forest for the tree.

Shopping And Finding The One

This is the way I shop.

I go to the store (mall, shop, whatever). I pick-up the item I want. I take it to the cashier and I pay for it. As soon as the item is packed, I take it home.

Straight home.

I don't hang around the shops or the stores after buying something, lest I find something that looks better and/or costs less than what I have thus, ruining the entire "shopping experience".

Sometimes, I can't help but notice another item that looks better than what I just bought.

If this happens, I don't pay attention to it and I just ignore it.

After all, there would always be something that would seem to look better than what I have.

There's no point in looking for the best because the best is, at best, relative.

I was once asked, "How do you know when you've finally found the one?"

The answer is you won’t.

“There were bells on a hill, but I never heard them ringing. Oh, I never heard them at all, till there was you…” is only a song.

It is NOT true.

You'll never know when you've finally found the "one".

The only true thing you can count on is what you’re feeling for the other person – so you better be sure you’re not just helplessly infatuated.

"If that's the case then, how do you know when it's already the right time to tie the knot?"

I usually answer this with what I have come to call, the “Vegetable Scenario”.

Ask yourself, what if right after marrying the person you love, he/she gets in an accident that leaves him/her paralyzed and a vegetable for life. Would you be willing to take care of him day after day after day forever?

That includes cleaning him up when he soils himself, bathing him, making sure he's comfortable and everything - everyday - regardless whether your partner would do it for you had the situation been reversed.

Sounds cynical?

Maybe.

But then, that's what marriage is.

That's precisely the reason why you promise to love each other "for richer or for poorer, in sickness and in health, till death do you part".

If you can respond to this scenario with an honest "yes" with minimal hesitation, then, you're ready.

Otherwise, you're not.

It’s that simple.

"What if you did tie the knot, and then somewhere along the road you simply realized that you were not meant for each other and/or you met the person who’s truly meant for you?"

First of all, if you really believe in the myth of predestination, then, there's no doubt that you’ll meet the one "destined" for you and there's no point in discussing this further.

The mere fact that you are entertaining the possibility of making a mistake in making the decision already, in itself, denies the truth of predestination (which, in case you hadn't noticed, comes from the word destiny - an event or a course of events that will inevitably happen in the future. The operative word being "inevitable")

If you insist and say you simply realized that you were not meant for each other, then you (or your partner) might not have responded to the “Vegetable Scenario” honestly.

This is where my shopping practice comes in.

Once you've bought what you want, that is - chose to tie the knot with someone, don't linger on the store.

Go home and enjoy what you bought.

Always remember why you fell in love with her/him in the first place and relive it every day.

If you happen to "accidentally" see something that you think is better than the one you bought, ignore it.

The more you expose yourself to questions about the wisdom of your choice, the more confused you will be.

Most of the time, the things that we think make another thing (or someone else, for that matter) better than what we already have is just novelty.

You're just being blinded, distracted and sidetracked by an imagined flaw of that which you already have.

Besides, if you go for the new one, what assurance do you have that this entire cycle won’t happen again?

And if it did, what will you do then?

Drop what you have and pick up what's new?

How many times would you do it? Will you ever be content?

No matter what you do and no matter how careful you are, you really can't have a contingency plan for everything.

You can't prepare for everything.

You can't have the perfect criteria for all your choices, be it a shopping item or the person you'll spend your entire life with.

There's always something or someone better than that which we already have.

I say it again, there's no point in looking for the best because the best is, at best, relative.

The secret is to learn how to be content and to learn how to always go back to our original reasons for doing things.

Just be honest - most of all, to yourself and you'll see what contentment is.

Why demand perfection when you're not perfect yourself?

There will be times that your judgment will be tried, tested and put through the furnace, but never despair. As long as you’re honest with yourself and with everyone concerned, you have nothing to worry about.

After all, you wouldn't want to be the object of the same confused thoughts, right?

Just give your best and expect nothing in return.

That’s not being “martyr-like”.

It’s called living your life the best way you could.

An Un-Funny Joke

It's amazing how easily a facade of normalcy crumbles with the slightest touch or even just a whisper.

Sometimes we go through periods of difficulty and strife that leave us terrified and scarred and utterly confused and even unwilling to move on.

There can even be times when it seems everything is in a state of suspended animation as we stand face to face with situations so far removed from our own perception of reality. And as your entire being goes into shock, you hear a voice screaming, “Why is this happening to me?”

You will yourself to calm down. You convince yourself that this is all just a dream. You force yourself to wake up so you can break free from the nightmare’s brutish grip.

But even after you open your eyes, the truth just blatantly stares you in the face in all its utter monstrosity.

It is real.

It is happening.

It is happening TO YOU!

Such can prove traumatic for anyone. It wouldn't matter if you're a trooper extraordinaire or just an average Joe.

Circumstance has an uncanny way of finding the smallest chink in even the strongest armor.

Is anyone safe? Is anyone immune to the caprices of fickle fate?

We are often taught that when life throws you lemons, make lemonade, sell it for a quarter a glass and keep the proceeds in a piggy bank.

The more lemons, the more lemonade. The more lemonade, the more quarters. The more quarters, the richer you become. Bring it to a roll and soon enough you'll be a millionaire!

Hah! Lemons and millionaires! What a joke!

Yes, life and living it is the greatest adventure of all. But sometimes you simply find yourself way over your head and you wonder where in the world is the reset button.

If only it were that easy.

Change The World by Eric Clapton (covered by Drift)

This is what happens when the person in charge of percussions does not have a steady tempo...


...You'll sound like you're in a hurry to finish the song! :-)

Actually, I was personally in a hurry to finish the song because I haven't bathed yet (as you can probably tell by the way my hair looked and the way I was dressed)