Hope

Hope is the one idea implied in every beginning.

Not success or failure, accomplishment, or discovery. Without hope, we wouldn't even bother to start. Not even responsibility is greater. If I set out to do anything just because I have to, I am only doing it in hopes of avoiding the consequences of not doing it.

Those murky waters of the corporate world are waters that drown, that cover disquiet. These are not waters that quench or cleanse. I've found myself a bit deeper into these waters lately.

When I am home I wonder what the purpose of some of these mass tactics are. Negative reinforcement, an atmosphere of fear, a lack of literal conversation free of implied failure, misunderstanding honesty as casual disregard.

Are these reflections of lives or statements of purpose, these curses breathed as breaths, these dismissals of respect as weakness? How did I get here?

I awoke yesterday in the the quiet sunrise of a California summer, maybe 5 years ago. I awoke in the light mummy bag I used when I slept in the alley behind Modernica Furniture back in Hollywood those years ago. I awoke relaxed and happy to be alive, all purpose and positivity, my head resting on my shoes, my notebook and the novel I was reading tight against my ribs within the bag.

I was happier then.

Now I have a beautiful wife who would give anything for me, a child on the way, a wonderful home surrounded by the people I love. I live a couple of blocks from everything I desire, I no longer own a car, my books and guitars filling my quiet time like never before, Steve Earle gently playing on the record player.

And I am not the man that I should be.

I figured out all of this very early. My first dreams were solitary and strong. By the time I had reached adolescence, my friends had chosen colleges and cars, careers and religions and wives.

I had this dream. I wanted one day: I wanted to buy a small amount of land somewhere remote. I wanted to build a small home; just a room, really. I could work a part time job to pay for food, beans, rice, vegetables, coffee. And that's it. A guitar, some books, a bicycle maybe. There was no telephone, no people. Just solitude and the magical feeling of waking at dawn and knowing that you are the only person who exists.

Somewhere this dream changed, came apart. Some for the better. A life without my wife would hardly be called life. Our child soon to come is impossible, a hope too great to comprehend. I didn't even know New York City existed then, eight million Turks and Greeks and Mexicans and Morroccans and Jews all miraculously frying things and putting them in flatbreads.

But the things that I inately understood were communicated through my experience in this dream. I understood that I could not live bound. I understood that I could not live with dishonesty or excess. I understood that the greatest strength lies in a straight line, and that my freedom is the song of my soul. But most of all, I understood that I am only my own strength.

Before I awoke in this sun, I was sleepless. I paced within my mind, unable to tie together the very simple notions that I had lived for for so long. I was afraid, not an easy or familiar feeling. I was lonely for the man I am.

Somehow, I'd slipped from hopeful to something less, something inadequate, something unfortunate. But I'm not doing this again.

Jakob started writing a story about a small girl with a hammer, slowing tearing down the walls of a city. Kevin once said that a wall that lay upon his path would have to be torn down. Mikey always runs; but it is not what he pursues, nor what pursues him, but the run itself. Zohar recreates our lives every three days, forever willing us toward uncertainty; this is the only direction for hope.

I gave up this dream a few years back. But now...Mikey, Zo, Jakob, Kevin...all of my friends really, have created the walls of a small home that are so much stronger than the walls that I could build myself.

And those murky waters? They are shallow, and they are burned up by this sun. I am stronger than this.