A vibrant crowd of at least 30,000 youth shout, “Taylor gang, Taylor gang, Taylor gang!” An interesting fact is the crowd incorporated not only youth, but older people too. I was there, watching in awe, as many gathered together chanting away at songs, voices in unison that knew every word, hiding the lower voices that were just learning and recognizing an optimistic few, craving new exploration.
At times, I believe that we are in this new world, one where judgments are quick to suffice and thus quicker to let go, enduring criticism for their negativity in the same breath from others around. One where medication takes a liberal approach and it becomes known as meditation. The founding of a small root word implicates more meaning than a long and incomprehensible, puzzling explanation, trying to display itself on a flat plane near the horizon, with righteous tone. In effect, I think, ponder, muse, a concise partiality of the whole in that moment, like a sickening fly trapped in heat, at room temperature, without inches of air for miles.
I cannot, and refuse to, continuously run into the mirror when I already see who stands there waiting to raise their arm when I do, or waiting to blink when I do, saving the time in between to make another motion elsewhere. This I must accept, because in that moment I was engaged, to the fact I stated earlier, that enjoyment has no age and youth is not something I’d want to come back to for myself.
I’m young in my writing process, without definitions or borders, yet somehow, those definitions and borders or restrictions even, make the reading more stimulating. Complicated wouldn’t necessarily be the word I’d use because maybe it doesn’t have to be. Experience, now, revels with defeat, frolicking in turmoil and yet, still alive, in its utmost fashion.
I understand youth as the crease of a loan statement perusing my conscious with dire stares. I visualize the perforation ripping itself a part beyond the folded edge. I’ll stick the shredded envelope pieces back in the mail later, once I’ve contemplated my next decision; and remind myself that the best story is the singular one.
We give ourselves away much too often and, rather than finding oneself through words and opinions of those words, we use now as the creation of self. The creation sought after is to be one of the great pioneers of a generation. Can that be researched, can it be studied with careful eyes? What is the question that we constantly peck at, until we finally say that this specific time period, is all we have? Can we do more than reign? That one thing that never seems to lose is imagination, because that thing which is further must be explored. Not for attainment, not for control, but simply discovery.
The beauty of struggle and the will to overcome, I share a quote from Nietzsche, stating, “The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself.” As a writer, I sometimes find myself at odds or crossroads, if you will. And there is no destination, but blue sky, lonely clouds hovering their shadows, above green grass listening to white noise encounter deaf, black ears. A calm, picturesque landscape holds everything in place, as we were one voice.
We were, an aligning stream batting against the shoreline of the stage, moving back and forth in ripples up the bank, like airwaves under the surface communicating their direction. Without writing, my voice only creates these ripples, not waves, because it does not communicate, lessening the stimulation of a voice deemed useless. A price on the wording of words come not from the artist, but the audience; I witness the integrity of that audience changing daily. Our voice drew in waves of irregular form and stature alike, our voice drew near to the end, energy removing fragments of time throughout my time there. This is a blessing, to be a part, a part of an era that doesn’t conform, the millennia represent that status quo and to witness the direction from any of those periods, our progressive behavior is opulent.
Most writers, painters and philosophers may believe they figured it out, channeling the tide and being comfortable without having to succumb to societal elements, but even their perception of themselves is only developed under one singular truth as well. Millennia represent the making of a generation and for once in history, when those individual causes are fought on one accord, beauty becomes more visible and the will to continue expands past that singular vision of life. It only adds more meaning and a much more extensive definition to barely see waves in the distance, foreshadowing possible events to come. But it’s always a hunch and even hunches include less data from scientific support than a poet’s vision of the near future, as if Nietzsche actually had the answer to life himself.
For me, I dislike -- and like -- the craft of writing. I love to hate its way with words as if it actually existed. I try eliminating the words "about" and "very," considering them useless to my voice, instead of resonating them with a useless voice. My learning of new words that stride alongside my word bank becomes a discipline, and the need for perfection insinuates madness to no degree. Youth begets perfection, but somehow we make it worthwhile to perfect our passions because our youth today seek that which makes them happy first, which in turn makes them comfortable with a resolve that comes later.
Writing is also infidelity, in which editing a draft becomes a reevaluation of life at given points in time. The content actually matters more than what the title suggests and the journey to authenticity and optimism comes from an original version of self. Not adapted, nor acquired or complete to anyone else’s standard, just a true form of self at the beginning stages of identity. Who do I want? What do I want? A writer’s dilemma. At the end of the day, I could do nothing, but be there. I showed up and became a witness myself to others in the same group, enjoy repeating the phrase in unison, that we are young, wild and free. Otherwise, the point to going back is that one never left anything behind for someone else to hold onto.
