Starting a blog.  Any of you guys know where to start? I def don’t. That’s why I’m starting here. ⊗ Get ready for a convoluted mess.

I’ll wing it as usual and just say, ‘yes’. There’s a time for everything, and I feel that this particular time is drawing me in to share some (possibly) relevant thoughts here and there.

So, I think what I’ve decided on this first post is that I’m just going to share a photo, and then in turn, share my thoughts on that there photo, alright? A nice little exercise I like to call: look, a picture: a simple journey into a picture.

Here the picture is…

Lately, I’ve had a weird aesthetic obsession with space travel, or just the 60’s…not sure which, honestly.

This is Ed White, known as the first American to jump out into space and successfully float around out there in lifeless, vacuum-ous blackness. Looking back at the relatively recent history of the space race and the era that it built, this photo captures one of those moments that certainly makes me feel a bit more profoundly about how I view life, being that it simply fills me with excitement, a significant bit of fear, as well as a good little splash of pure wondrous awe.

Knowing who I am, I keep trying to imagine the paralyzing anxiety one must possess in this moment. Already packed tightly into a capsule built by my capable, but human peers. Floating within a void into which only a few people had ventured at this point in 1965. Then, somehow I’ve got to get my anxious shivering self to step out and grab a tight hold of some siq (\m/) new experience that hardly anyone has, or ever will have experienced.

You must have got some sense of pioneer that’s astoundingly paralyzing, overcoming something that doesn’t totally have to be overcome for life to go on, yet choosing to advance forward and propel the hope for that greater something remaining out there…you know, because we want there to be. “This can’t be all there is, can it?”

Looking past the vibrance of his facial expression, you can feel in his demeanor the tense lack of assured safety that he’s got in his confidence-free cargopants-thick space suit, yet somehow you can still believe he feels the weight of the calm in a quiet, blissful peace; arms fall splayed out just slightly and infant-like.

It’s a little jarring how very rare a moment like this is in life…there’s no control, but there’s also no anxiety of loss. Acceptance of some sort of order within the chaos.

Thinking maybe too hard into it, but the thought resonates deeply within myself. Deep down that’s what we seem to all want in the end, right? Just to be able to let go, and let it all go in abandon. Leave the stress of tomorrow in the dust. Disconnect from the seemingly unending fatigue of life. Lay it all bare to leave only the necessities, leaning sweetly back into the arms of something you don’t quite understand, yet which is truly glorious. So tough, though.

Faith is not my strong suit, and that’s probably due to the perceived ‘success I’ve built on my own’. Have I let my pride become too valuable? Why can’t I admit to myself that I’ve always been lost?

What happens when I’m not talking about losing myself to a new frontier like space. Or the great piny outdoors. Or maybe finding some youthful abandoned chillspot to snag some dope, likable instys in the process. Smh. There has to be something bigger than that, right?

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“It has to be huge, this is new, must be for real glorious. It’s out there, it’s gotta be.”

I want to cut this apart. I’ll be transparent here with my fears, my friends. In my experience with life as a thing, possibly the most crippling fear I possess involves fully letting go of those precious attachments that preoccupy the uninpired, lathargic, apathetic, self-deprecating part of myself…fears that I might step so far out of bounds that I lose all that I ever had, along with everything I once took for granted. It feels dramatic, but I say that in hopes you’ll understand.

It’s a dreadful spectacle…to consider watching all that I ever accomplished in my own mind just die for nothing’s sake. My dreams, my sense of purpose, my pursuit of love, my passions for change…a chilling narrative: the things that made me who I am were all safe within the walls of my pride, and I took a risk, blew it, and lost it all. That’s the fear.

It’s petty and sad to have such a fear, I just have to tell myself. I recall there’s always been a hope, even when all seemed lost. From behind squinted eyes, I can see a glimpse of salvation, even with the gust of sand painfully caked onto my eyes. It’s hard to see past the irritation of my current state, but in my mind I know I just need to keep pressing forward…toward the stream I never considered until this new agony befell me.

The question I ask though, and will continue to ask forever is ‘what will I then seek when there is no ‘next’?’ What is next when you feel there’s nothing else to see? Fear prevents what’s to come, or rather makes us blind to see the good in what’s next.  What peace to behold?

I find myself being told to move confidently with each step, due to the fact that my path has been made eternally clear in the Word I believe. It’s a slow process. Daily it seems, I have to convince myself of the persuasion that there forever and always will be something new and frightening ’til Kingdom comes.

Emphatically, there is something to glean in every moment, but it’s all about the perspective one chooses to take within that moment. Gotta swallow that weird convoluted cowardly pride that keeps my terrified heart from treading on, and believe like I’ve been shown that there’s something new to see, even in the failure…knowing that I will be lovingly made new every time I fall, even at my last.

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Told you it’d be convoluted.  Thanks for the revelations, space man.