The life and times of people you know.

Here's a little bit of what I've been writing. It's still kind of a rough draft.

.... Life being so unpredictable most of the time leads most of us to believe that purpose is elusive in our short unenchanted minute here on earth. However consider that if life in itself is not an end but rather a means to an end, or different yet means to a means of a never ending end, the unpredictability is the “carrot on a string dangling in front of us” luring us on toward the ending, or the non-ending ending, and the purpose. Depending entirely on your view of life I suppose. And so the experiences of life, good or bad, and the daily struggle to survive these are what make up life and the world as we know it....

.... Being born is just about the most unmemorable yet utterly significant event that happens to us. More so unmemorable for us than for our parents I’m sure. My own mother tells the tale of her being in Kaiser Hospital in Vallejo, California with me in her womb refusing to budge an inch. My father, who had already been through this ordeal with my older sister, was nonchalantly at the barber shop getting a haircut. Half way through the haircut the nurse calls the barber shop telling the barber that “If my father wanted to see this baby being born he had better get down to the delivery room.” My father after hearing the news, having only half a haircut, made it to the hospital just in time to see the beginning of my journey into the world....

.... My grandparents lived right across the street from the beach and when I was little my parents tell me that I would just look out the window and watch the ocean swells roll in. Pointing out boats and seagulls to whoever would listen. I would play on the beach pretending to be a pirate, a sailor in merchant marine, or a castaway stranded on the “deserted beach.” I have vivid memories of learning to surf when I was young. My father had rented my younger brother and me longboards and wetsuits then set us free in chilly northern California Ocean. We splashed around for a couple days trying to figure the whole “catching the wave” thing out and then it happened to me first then my brother. I caught my first wave. From that moment on I couldn’t shake the feeling of being propelled atop the water pushed by the powerful hand of the pacific. Times meaning and significance seemed to melt away into the abyss which I was suspended above atop my fiberglass board. My teenage years were spent pursuing the adrenaline addiction of the ride and rebelling against my parents, society, and whoever or whatever other means of outside control of my self indulgent surfing fix....

Azusa

At the bottom of everything you'll see we were dead from the start. Drowning our conscience in the deep blue lies we told. Leaving the door to sleep cracked open for our beautiful disgrace. We'll shake our heads and drink the day. Or taste the barrel of the gun to drain joy cold in our heads. The innocent condemn the sinners and the guilty will forgive the saint. Here at the top of hell we found in paradise we laugh and sing already done. So very happy to find we were upside down. So please hide our pride and shine this little light all alone against the sunshine on Azusa.