If only I could scream, just a little bit louder.

I’m living alive, so a lie is in order. 

I’m tossing your worth in the form of a quarter. 

My future will lie in the hands of reporters.

Altered quite favorably by the thoughts of supporters.

I’m living a lot, so much less is a blessing.

Perhaps I’m alive for these thoughts I’m assessing.

In the words of my poetry, for all I’m expressing.

Why is it the internet can be so depressing? 

I’m living for love, so it’s life that I fall for.

I had no idea life could be such a tough chore.

And I had no clue that in searching for much more,

I would discover myself all alone and so dirt poor.

But it’s silly to see what is when it isn’t.

From within my mind brand new thoughts have arisen.

All these labels have taken my mind to a prison.

But what seems to rule this world is just fiction.

Or unjust is probably a better description;

As I look to escape old depictions restrictions. 

The Social Scourge that is Facebook.

I hate Facebook's partial replies, blatant indifference, lonely cynicism, and 'net glow' popularity contests... especially considering it all seems to carry itself into the real world. 
People need to spend more time hanging out with one another, and/ or spend more time hanging out alone... I mean, really alone. None of this shit where they tune everyone and everything out in favor of the lonely void of Facebook, Twitter, and the internet, in which they partake in the addictive and contagious habit of 'distant socializing.'


I believe, of no real fault or intention of its own, that Facebook is causing a deterioration of my generations social fabric. It has led to a decrease in genuineness and real social connections... perhaps because people spend too much time in the socially limbo state that is fragmented social networking. Instead of concentrating their needs and wants for social connectivity into the times they actually spend with real people in real life, they disperse large doses of that social energy into meaningless exchanges via Facebook, so when it does come down to spending time with real people, the connection in many (but not all) cases is noticeably less than it would have been prior to the age of the internet.      


It also causes people to have this subconscious habit of keeping people at arms-length, purposely reducing the amount of time they actually spend legitimately hanging out with people due to there being no need to catch-up with anyone in person, or even over the phone, because Facebook and Twitter keep you constantly up-to-date with everything you want or need to know about a friend, or a "friend" (quote, unquote).
Due to this constant updating, and a lack of reinforcement in the legitimate social connection you did (or would) have with this person otherwise, were you catching up via getting together... or, at least, over the phone... it causes an obvious social rift to develop between the two of you, in which obviously awkward moments can arise when the two of you come face-to-face in public, and know you know each other on a superficial level, but since there is no real social bridge between the two of you anymore, you simply gaze at each other for a moment, potentially nod, and move on. 
There's no need for conversation. The two of you already know what's going on in each others lives.


This leads to you feeling as if no one really gives a shit about you, your situation, or what you've actually been up too, causing you to give less of a shit about anyone else, their situation, of what they've actually been up too, undermining, quite obviously, many socially-related human requirements such as empathy and true interconnection.   


If no one can honestly tell... we're killing ourselves in doing this.
So cut-back on your use of Facebook and other social networking sites... go out and actually let yourself live without giving yourself the back-up plan of returning home to socialize at a distance. Don't bottle-up your needs and wants as a human being simply because you're too lazy to truly meet them. 


Please.
For the sake of us all, end your addiction to the internet.


I need to get on doing the same thing. 

My Bucket List: Part 5

40: Acquire a Canon Rebel T2I camera before I start traveling extensively.

41: Get a real job within the next month.

42: Have a one-night stand.

43: Try 'friends-with-benefits.'

44: Go skydiving.

45: Go scuba-diving.

46: Go climbing in the Tian Shan mountain range.

47: Explore Mongolia.

48: Explore the Gobi Desert.

49: Visit (and explore) Afghanistan.

"Intrigue" on CJMP, 90.1 FM

is the name, as well as station, of my own radio show that I start officially as of today at about 4 PM.

The show will deal with what I like to call 'off-the-radar' current events, as well as philosophy, existentialism, everyday life, local life in Powell River, art, music, and a legion of many other things- the theme will be very much open to change and transformation for any reason I (or potentially others) see fit.

Regarding close friends, I am willing to take music suggestions, but the deal is that if you really want me to show it on air, you have to provide me with a download link, whether it's to the album, or an individual audio file.
I also need to have a general appreciation for it- that means I will not put most country on, nor will I showcase much metal, especially not 'screamo' music.
Although I wouldn't mind showcasing certain songs from bands such as Rise Against, or interesting metal instrumentals.

Anyways, in many ways, my radio show will be much like my blog, and will deal with much of the same things, just beyond the real of readable text.

If any of you out there would like to listen to my show, tune in tonight at about 4 PM using the following link: http://blog.cjmp.ca/listen/

Hope to hear you listened in :)
Have a great day, blue planet!

There is such thing as an overarching beauty to all of this.

I'm not quite sure what to write about.

I've had a million ideas on what to write about in the past few days, and I could narrow it down to 2 or 3, and publish them each as separate articles... but I think I'll indulge, this time around, in what I like to call a 'scatter-brain' article, despite the fact that I'm not suffering from any serious case of scatter-brain myself.

So, hmm... where to start?

Well, for one, aside from the second part of my Literature exam and my History exam sometime this week, I have officially graduated from high-school.
Am I scared?

Much less so than I expected to be, and considerably less than I was about a week ago, despite nothing really progressing in any promising direction.
So far, I'm absolutely broke, and have been spending the last 5 months looking for a job with no success.
I'm not that worried about it... I will most definitely find a job soon enough, especially considering I have no school to work around.
I will miss school though... seeing all of my friends each day, giving my learned two-cents regarding some ideology or historical occurrence in History class, and lazing around in Literature trying to catch the girl I (until recently) thought to like me peaking at me from across the room.

And she did peak at me, regardless of how that ended. I'm just happy we're still good friends.

I also discovered the most incredible band yesterday morning... never before have I been so taken by a bands first-impression on me. Although a lot of their stuff can be quite melancholy, it's melancholy in the most beautiful way possible.
Not only is their music capable of being romantic... it's capable of including romance, philosophy, existentialism, history, and mystery into a single song at a time, whilst retaining this absolutely hypnotic sound that keeps you hooked. If you'd like to see what I think of as one of the best examples of their absolute genius and beauty... check out the current 'Song of the Week' at the top of the page.

Lately, I've been feeling what I've gauged to be some sort of 'necessary' aloneness.
I know it's temporary, and part of it is created by the wide array of philosophies I have been introducing myself too.
I've discovered many philosophies are quite ungrateful of what everything actually is... philosophies that see the body as a cage and things like that. Although it's interesting food for thought... isn't it incredible enough that we, as human beings, came upon our current consciousness due to pure happenstance? And why is it that there's such a pressure from society to take such cynical and sarcastic approaches to life?
I find the pressure of society as a whole always trying to inform me of what I'm missing, as opposed to appreciating where I am and what I've got.

But fuck society.
Society is a silly goose-egg, to be goofy and frank.
Those bullshit Vancouver riots over the Canucks losing the Stanley Cup...
How absolutely self-absorbed and petty can you get? Fuck... I wish I had been there to trip an anarchist or something, or break some wild sports-fans nose before he could push a Boston Bruins fan off a freeway to his death.
Nobody deserves to die over a worthless hockey game.

Part of me is craving a romantic encounter, preferably long-term... but either a single passionate night, or a long-term commitment. I don't really feel like indulging in anything in-between.
But at the same time, I'm going to hold myself back. If a chance honestly presents itself... perhaps I will take it. But just after graduation is certainly not a time I would like to be committed.
I wouldn't mind some freedom and leeway from serious commitment for awhile, but at the same time... something of a romantic nature would be nice.

I haven't kissed a girl in quite awhile. I've had a few chances to do so... but I just haven't, in an attempt to test my self-control.
Now that I am aware that I have pristine control over my own actions, I'm going to take control and take the dive next chance I get. I mean, why not? As far as I'm aware, I'll only live once. So every time is the right time to live it up.

Anyways, I'm going to shower, brush my teeth, and play some Modern Warfare 2 as I contemplate what to do with the rest of my day...
Have a great evening, blue planet.          

More than half of this was never real to begin with.

And at the end of the day,
There's always more to see
In your life, through your eyes,
And in your dreams, through your mind;

So don't worry.

The world is in no hurry,
And in the flurry of scurrying that is a city street,
Remember to stop sometimes and take a seat
On the bright yellow-line next to the speed-limit sign

Because those who work overtime,
Always seem to turn into balls of slime in the thrush of free-verse that is society;
And all the technicality as a result of liability issues is fine with me,
Providing they allow me to peak at the real reality to remind myself I'm free and more sightly than the tightly-knit and frightening father-figure CEO
Who can't go to sleep without affecting the lives of at least 1 million civilian bystanders,
Who forget to meander on the bright yellow-line next to the speed-limit sign from time to time.

Stop to make sure at least some of your words rhyme
When you write your hectic poetry through the overwhelming cries of 7 billion lives pushed into overdrive as a result of the 21st century.

Through all this I would like to pose a question:
Is it better to be happy than free?
Or greater to be free than happy?


And either way, if I'm working to hard,
I'll leave it to you to slap me back to reality,
Because honestly...

More than half of this was never real to begin with.

The Left Turn Ahead

Ok, so let me put this into a crystalline perspective:
It's the early morning hours of the day after Wet Grad. I've been sleeping, for the past 3 hours, on the top bed of a friend of mines camper.
With partial indifference, I observe all 3 of the people I was sleeping with waltz out of the camper at around 5:30 in the morning, and then nod-off again.

When I wake up, still in the same bed, the camper is moving.
Still slightly drunk and high (with the effects of both slowly wearing off, but combining with the hypnotic trance of sleep deprivation) I wake-up from a strange dream, and wonder if I'm still dreaming.
Content that my friends are probably driving the camper, I nod-off once again despite the campers erratic jumps as it lurches over pebbles, sand, and sharp rocks along the make-shift dirt road leading to our destination.

When I wake-up once again, I begin to wonder if the camper has simply rolled away with me inside. I picture the 2 friends of mine still standing at the campsite repeating the words 'oh shit, oh shit, oh shit!' over and over again as they hopelessly mull over what to do to remedy the situation.
This thought... understandably... alarms me, so I climb out from under the bouncing covers and drag myself over to the camper door, about to open it before I stop myself and say- dude, what the fuck. Don't be a fucking idiot. Leave the door alone.

I decide to do a bit of an experiment as to gauge whether the camper has drivers or not, and climb back up to the bed, and open the front curtains.
Up ahead, I see a generally sharp bend.
This is it.

If the camper keeps going straight, and cascades itself into the endless bush ahead, not only is it likely that my life could be over (and just after Grad... what sweet fucking irony that would have been), it's likely that, at this speed, I would come out with at least a couple serious injuries were I still present in the arena of existence.
But if it turns, on the other hand... I have absolutely nothing to worry about, and I can go back to sleep, content in the knowledge that the camper isn't lacking human operation.

The moments leading up to the bend feel like forever, as I subconsciously begin to come to terms with the fact that this may be the end.

At the last second-
The camper turns.
What luck that was.

At this point... I begin to laugh, and berate myself for my intoxicated naivety.
The entire experience was somewhat beautiful, however. It was like something I would read out of a book of existential short stories concerning life and death.

Sometimes, fucking with your brain is the best thing you can do for yourself.
As long as you do so in moderation.

Just remember-
There's probably a driver. So don't worry about it.    

My Bucket List: Part 4

31: Join (or start) a ska band.

32: Get down at least 500 entries on my Bucket List; fulfill each and every one of them.

33: Become a professional poetic freestyler.

34: Learn "To Build a Home" by the Cinematic Orchestra on piano.

35: Become somewhat famous for something or another.

36: Visit Wall Street (and New York City in the process).

37: Visit Israel and whats left of Palestine.

38: Visit a country that is embroiled in revolution; possibly take part in some way, shape, or form.

39: Find a job.

40: Make something I love to do work for me for the rest of my life.

Carpe Diem.

It means…
Make the most of this moment; don’t concern yourself with the future, or the past, or the outcome, or even the consequences because once that future comes to fruition… it becomes your present, and you must make the most of that present. Embrace it. Take every single strand of it and thread together the ‘now.’ Not the then, not the before, and not the after… the ‘now.’

Shatter the latter to the before and after, then take what’s left and sow it all together to create a perfected present that’s pleasant even to the likes of a peasant.

Just make doubly sure you’re presence is felt in this pretentious present,

Because you’re wanted and welcome, in this hypnotic heroic that is everything to you as well as a collective too.

Stage your very own private and personal coup;

Cus you’re due.

My Bucket List: Part 3

21: Have sex in a moving vehicle.

22: Win a slam poetry contest.

23: Live in Europe for a year or two.

24: Attend, and graduate from college.

25: Do extensive travelling with a romantic partner.

26: Explore Siberia.

27: Visit Stonehenge.

28: Get married (and/ or find a life partner/ soul mate... eventually).

29: Have children... eventually.

30: Buy my own computer.

My Bucket List: Part 2

11: Become a part of (or start) a generally successful band.

12: Get my own radio show.

13: Go on an epic road trip to some opposite end of North America with a group of close friends.

14: Climb Mount Everest.

15: Participate in an orgy.

16: Walk from one province to another.

17: Dance and sing on a city street in broad daylight, with hundreds of people walking by and watching me.

18: Busk.

19: Step foot in every country on Earth.

20: Publish some sort of biography.

My Bucket List: Part 1

I will be releasing ten posts which will, all-together, chronicle the first 100 things I have decided to put on my bucket list. Each post will contain 10 additions to the list, and there is a very good chance it will extend into the 3 to 500 range by the time the list is complete- whenever the hell that might be.

So lets get started.

1: Write at least one novel.

2: Visit the Palace of Versailles in France.

3: Release at least one music album.

4: Become a guitar 'virtuoso.'

5: Completely disappear from all of my current contacts- family, best friends, friends, acquaintances- for an entire year whilst living in a strange and new place.

6: Visit (and possibly live in) Denmark.

7: Go clubbing in New York City, Los Angeles, London, and Amsterdam.

8: Release an album of slam-poetry.

9: Get in shape.

10: Become 'enlightened,' in some way, shape, or form.  

On the Shores of the Sun

Exhaustion.
What a curse it is;
Awake yet better asleep,
And barely alive,
You just can't contribute to the great bee-hive of society;
And as we all know,
A working-class hero is something to be.
Yet the sound of a jet in the sky,
Or the silence of a fish in the sea,
Is no longer what seems of intrigue to me.

I'm lusting for an end to this linear life,
As delineated is a rare yet delicious spice;
Otherwise were in a great maze as a puppeteers mice;
And the differential unpredictability never fails to suffice,
Or entice.

So on the shores of the sun I question the rain;
As the sun is omnipotent and other weather insane,
And like a bird, space-ship, or a pilot and plane,
I use gravity as my balancing cane.

Or as the waves lick the shores of our earthly sands,
I walk alone on this beach and rest with a hand-stand,
As I see the clouds down below, and the ground up above;
With all of this strangeness,
I have fallen in love.

The flightier folk find solace in pain,
While I move around dancing in the rain;
And the long stories of life,
Or biography,
Perhaps understanding is always the key.

So question me in my fatigue and see what I say;
If you want the truth,
You can get it today;
I'm exhausted, and the truth is like the moons-ray;
It gives me an excuse to find a place in which to lay.