Season of Ash

Endless overcast. Length of tracks. There is no sound here, only whispers.
It's a kind of death. It's a void. The walls do not echo here. There is no point in conversation.
I think of it as a winter a rare few endure. It's exhausting and daunting.
Monochromatic landscapes. Lackluster.
It's a season of it's own. It does exist.
Ashen corridors.

Death of Comfort.

It isn't so insane.
Human nature is a beast. It devours the last shreds of dignity you cling on to. Natural selection is the greater good. The will to survive is the strongest of all traits. It's a wonder anyone feels love.
It's a wonder anyone feels pain after the hoops we jump through daily.
But humanity continues to surprise me.
I somehow still surprise myself. I never thought I would find myself thinking so far ahead and judging everything around me by the standards I've come to create. But I don't feel apologetic for it.
I look forward to those moments when people surprise me with kindness. And forget it within minutes.
I am an American, and I hold grudges. I am human, and I am apathetic towards the death of others.

Aggression drives me onward. The drive to destroy what has been placed into young and ignorant minds. To break this generational mold of cowards whom can't use their fists or mouth.

I won't ever feel bad for being angry.
I won't give up my opinions for anyone or anything.
I will never be content, I will never settle.

I've waged war on everything you've become accustomed to.
You will be unsettled.

The Kill

Sick.
Sick in the head over the physical pain that is endured from emotional weight.
So many god damn years. You call me young, I was anything but.
This shell will never break, hands I'll never take.
If there was a way, I wouldn't have the will.
And when I have nothing left there will only be a single purpose.
The kill.

Memories in music

     Lately, I've been on a kick of the music I grew up listening to. Such as: Godflesh, Drive Like Jehu, Laughing Hyenas, Mule, The Jesus Lizard, Curve.
     It reminds me of when my family lived in Kansas. Breezy spring days with the windows open and the attic fan going. On a good day, when no one was home but my father and me, you could have caught him moshing in the living room with me. Circle-pitting around the coffee table. Him having this grit-teeth, eyebrows parallel, crazed smile that I would soon inherit.
     I remember specifically that one day he had put on Neurosis' Enemy of the Sun. I only remember this one rational thought of hearing the music when I was a kid. I thought, "Wow, these songs are really long. I wonder if I'll like this when I grow up."
     The things that stick with us through the years are so odd. I remember coming from the grocery store with my parents and my sister, once. We pulled in the driveway, and for some reason, I wanted to carry the two gallons of milk. I remember taking them up in my hands. Then a large blank spot. And then dad was taking them from me to put them in the refrigerator. I asked him, "How did I get here?"
      He looked very puzzled. "Huh?" was his reply, I'm sure.
"I don't remember walking inside!"
      He told me I was probably too concentrated on carrying to milk to remember anything else around me. Which makes sense, as I was probably no more than five or six years old. And if you've ever seen a child trying to do something physically or mentally taxing, then you've seen that utter concentration in their eyes. Nothing else matters at that point.
      I also remember moving the coffee table while watching our recorded VHS of Nirvana playing live on MTV to make a stage. I stood on it, no one else in the room, singing "RAKE MEEEE!" having no knowledge of the word rape. Must've been around the same age. But, I also remember stopping because...well I don't recall why I stopped. I felt weird. There was just an odd vibe there sometimes. Even before my sister passed away.
     Music and memories took on such a different meaning. I remember my first personal feeling towards a song, like it was yesterday. I remember the pit in my chest that opened up, the chills down my spine, the closing of my eyes. The feeling that encompasses me when a song hits all the right notes inside.
     My father and I were watching the video for The Perfect Drug from Nine Inch Nails. (I must've been about eight or nine years old.)
     It was after my sister had died. I don't know what it was; The lyrics, the amazing music itself, the imagery of the little girl, the piano at the end. But it tore me the fuck apart. Dad and I didn't say anything about it. I was choked up either way, I couldn't speak with a brick in my throat.
     I still felt very insecure in my ways of showing my sadness, I didn't know how to go about talking in depth about something so personal.
    The song feels so familiar to me. The pissed off, driving rhythm at the beginning. You could kill anything, anyone in your way. The anger overflows into insanity, the drum and bass-like portion to which, in the video, he is preparing and consuming absinthe. And then everything subsides and self-pity comes washing over to tell you, "you're just a bitter, sore, and lonely fuck." Showing to you, your faults, your reasons, and your self-made barriers.
    It hit me like a half-ton pickup in the chest. It still does.

    I remember coming home early from a friends house the same year she passed. Walking up the front steps I heard Timelessness/Resurrection from Fear Factory, playing. Which was a sure shot sign that when I walked in, he would be somewhere in the house crying. He was in his chair, didn't even care to wipe his eyes, he just stuck his arms out to me. I would hug him until he let go, then rub his head.

    He was pretty good friends with Burt and Dino from Fear Factory. And as luck should have it, they came through Kansas that summer to Lawerence. After smoking up the band before the show, he asked them if they would play those two songs in memory of Ali, my sister. They were more than happy to do it for him. And they did, and my Father, my glorious fucking father, sang on stage and stage-dived his ass off.

   I love those kinds of stories. I love that it still happens. I love that music has such an effect on people, even if it sucks.

Music, in a sense, is our memory. It stirs up the silt in the water of our heads. It brings back those feelings that can only be felt in a present-tense once. It's timeless.





-Years after seeing that NIN video for the first time. Last year, I believe, my dad asked me, "does that song make you think of her too?"

AA

Hello,

My name is Marshall, and I'm an addict.

I've been addicted to anger for twelve years now, and I think with the help of my friends and family, I'll be able to overcome it.

I become angry at simple things. As simple as: dropping things, getting hit by a millimeter sized pebble in the face, a car door handle not working correctly, anything that should be working but isn't. Anything that isn't working correctly. Candles that don't melt down properly. Body aches and pains, headaches especially. I get angry at the green light on my phone, when I get a voicemail, when I get a text. When the sun is in my face too long. When I can't speak what I'm thinking. When I stutter, make a fool of myself, try too hard, try too little, when I'm unmotivated. I get angry that I get angry.

I always thought I was more level-headed than my father, but I'm not.

At least he can deal with it. 

I only feel normal at shows. I only feel right in that elevated emotion environment of releasing stress. 

I feel like a mockery outside these places. A cosmic fucking joke. Like I have no place anywhere else.

Unsure of every step. A tight-wad. Then I relax, and I go with whatever my gut tells me. Feeling good at the time, only later to think back over and over and feel like I must've acted like a jackass.

I keep myself awake thinking of all the times I must've made a fool of myself.

I get pissed off at myself for having such a "small town" mentality. Getting so worked up and excited over new shit. 

Logically, I know that it's not likely as such. If it's me speaking from what comes off the top of my head then...that's me. And if someone doesn't like it, fuck 'em.

But sometimes, I get really fucking annoyed by myself.

Voice, words, text, personality, face in the mirror, fact that others know more about me than I do. My physical being is sore and worn out. My muscles keep fucking twitching. I have to piss like two times an hour. I can't sleep for over 5 hours straight....if that.
Myself "writing" this annoys me. So much that it's all I have just to not X out the page, but I feel I must get it out...somehow, somewhere, for some stupid fucking reason.

But my anger is what annoys me the most.

It used to be my advantage.

Now it's becoming my weakness in more areas.

Memories, lack-thereof

Catching myself going through old pictures. Florida and other eastern states. Being on beaches, sitting with people, always looking away and off into the distance.
It seems like, in all of these pictures, I have absolutely no interest in what's around me. Not to be an asshole, but it's kind of fitting for the company I was in. But that should've had no effect.
I don't remember once having gone down to the beach at night alone to walk around and think. I don't remember once taking a stroll by myself with my thoughts, actually. It really gets me down, honestly. I was too wrapped up in other happenings to take some time for myself.
Maybe it's a little stupid to feel this way about "thinking in other places". But, seems to be nice.
The photos were from my, then second, trip to Florida. My first trip was very thought filled. It was on different terms, different people (my parents) for very different reasons than "fun". I walked around the town alone when my dad was in the hospital. I walked and smoked with my mom, whom doesn't smoke and I was too young to be smoking. We talked alot. We had sleepless nights. We went to the beach to pass time. Went to aquariums and other places that I don't remember thanks to the stress. I remember alot of sponges, that's about it.
I remember a black man from Lawrence Kansas in the hospital with my dad. He gave me some advice to live by:
"Ever fuck?"
me "Yeah."
"Lemme tell ya, boy."
I smile and look away with unease, but curiosity.
"Ain't nothin' in the world like fuckin' on a full stomach. Getchu some chicken, some mashed p'tatoes, and fuck."

He brought some well-deserved comic relief to the situation. He was a very nice man, I hope he's doing well.
My father was in and out of a dream-like anesthetic state, it was terrifying, I thought he would be that way forever.
It tore my world apart. I wanted to walk into the ocean and not return. I wanted to crawl into bed with him and make my heart stop. Crawl into bed with my father like I used to as a child when I was scared, now terrified for him, the strongest man in the world.

The next summer, I went to a different part of Flordia, with different people, for different reasons, and all these photos were taken. I really hope I was thinking of something worthwhile when I was looking off into nothingness.

I remember standing on the edge of a cove with my dad, feeling the wind off the ocean and watching the storms miles away. Lightning striking the surface of the ocean and causing nothing. The tide wrapping around some wooden poles in the shallows, wondering to myself if I could walk across the cove on them.
I don't like the ocean. I dislike the feeling in my stomach when it's dark with waves crashing, a storm in the distance, and wind breathing brine in my face.
If it's true what I hear about memory, then seeing the ocean will never be a nice thing to me. And I'm okay with that, because I have Table Rock lake for a body of water with great memories.

Looking back on all the inbetween moments where an underlying terror was alive, I wonder if I ever knew that they would be worthless in the grand scheme. I remember the doctor almost turning my father away before his treatment because his case was a bit more severe than a simple Xanax love as many of the others had. A little bit worse than the Methadone alternative others had taken up.
Four 80mg oxycontins.
oxy IR's
Xanax to sleep
muscle relaxers
Daily.
I remember the shock my mother and I had when he told the doctor how he ingested them.
I remember the terror that my father was going to kill him if he turned him away.
I remember my dads determination and his tears when he hugged me before going to the room to get started on his treatment.
Will of an ox. But this was the one thing he, "couldn't stop on his own."


Years later. If anyone actually reads this and is interested. He is doing great. Persistent in being sober from addictive medications or ones he can't keep control of. Ibuprofen/naproxen is his pain pill of choice now.

False Heart

Sometimes I argue just to prove to you

That you're not at all what you chalk yourself up to be.

Maybe I want to beat you, stomp you out, leave you senseless

Just to show you that you're not as strong willed as you perceived.

But really, I'd rather spit on you and walk away.

And you'll realize someday that you're lower than any form of decay.