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writelikeness (a tumblelog)

// alexander.j.ige // wordpress // bandcamp // follow on facebook //

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-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Thanks for reading.

This love will never be convenient.

Bad Person

I’m tempted to write a full-blown essay (thesis) that argues that I’m a bad person. I’d define my terms and everything: what it means to be a bad person, why a person is bad, how he can be bad (he: girls can’t be bad, I’d argue—separately), and demonstrate how to describe a person and then describe myself and provide enough evidence so that you’d at least consider that I’m a bad person. 

I’d really just want people to know that they can like me, fine, but they should know that I really do bad things sometimes. And yeah, I want love and grace and all—but you should really know what it is your loving, and giving me the benefit of the doubt (“Oh yeah, I love that guy; he’s actually not that bad”) is actually the opposite what I’d want. 

I’d argue that it’s not like I have good intentions and make mistakes, or that I miscalculate and err, or that I am in a bad mood and lose control, or that I lie to myself or am lied to, or that I have good ends and bad means. I just straightforwardly and intentionally and willfully do something bad. 

It’s not like right now: I don’t do bad things or say I do bad things so that I can have attention or test your unconditional love or feign humility or anything like that. And it’s not to make you feel less honest about yourself or about how bad you might be. I don’t know. 

There wouldn’t have to be a reason either. It’s not like we have a good reason for why something is good—maybe ‘cuz someone wanted it? But I do things that I don’t want to do. And other people didn’t want it either. So yeah. It just kind of is. And maybe I’m not a bad person, but get the terms define and gather enough evidence: it wouldn’t be a bad essay. 

"I’m sick of not having the courage to be an absolute nobody."
J.D. Salinger, Franny and Zooey

Lets face it

shitmystudentswrite:

So lets face it, at one time we have all been in love and swept off our feet across the mall area.

Mediums of literary expression of feelings (from highest passion to lowest)

  1. Poem
  2. Lyrical (Musical)
  3. Speech
  4. Short story
  5. Long story
  6. Essay 

I’m not exactly sure what this list is supposed to mean—and I definitely don’t know how to concisely title it—but it has something to do with what you can get away with in certain mediums. Poems and songs can be merely depressing if they want to be, and they should be immediately heart-wrenching  because they’re so short; it’s hard to get away with a full story that is all explicit in a short work. If it’s depressing, the hope is subtle and implicit—but it should still be there. And essay should always be hopeful; it’s stream-of-conscious that requires the fortitude of finding a good conclusion that ties the essay together and makes a full circle. Same with stories, generally, but they can have happy and sad endings. But there’s both rhyme and reason—poems have more rhyme; essays have more reason—but both have the responsibility of telling the truth of both finitude and infinitude. The stuff in the middle is the hard stuff to write: speeches and short stories. Makes sense, I think. 

"Of course my classroom is not a therapist’s office and I am not a therapist. The safe space they choose to talk through those fears, desires, and uncertainties probably won’t be in class, in front of me and their fellow students. What I want them to take from my class is a vocabulary with which to initiate the conversations so many people find impossible to start. For better or worse, we live in a world seemingly permeated by the pornographic. In such a culture, there are few more valuable skills than the capacity to talk with candor and insight about what turns us on, gets us off, shapes and shames us."
Hugo Schwyzer in The Atlantic

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And there’s nothing wrong with my lifestyle no matter how many times I tell myself to “Breathe in, breathe in—hold it, hold it. Now, let it out.” […][—And this is how the cool boyfriend sits in the passenger seat of his girlfriend’s car. He’s looking at me. I wish the light would turn green and set me free. Teach my rolling veins: “Where there’s a will, there is a way.” Just cut me open and let me drain. // I’ll move to Florida. I’ll buy a brand new pick-up truck, and I’ll tint all the windows including the driver’s side. Now you can’t see me, so you can’t touch me when I sit at the red light and watch your boyfriend wonder if I’m inside / if I can get inside.]

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Texts from my Samsung Trance

  • justin: BEAAAAAASSSST!!!!!! [Fri May 21, 11:35am] [2010]
  • j song: Prom 2010 with the ige siblings! <3 im glad i called you! Sorry i made you go through so much to get to universal! I owe you! :D [Sun Jun 6, 1:30am] [2010]
  • justin: Hey borski yeah this has been a trippy week i have two papers due in a couple weeks ones an 8 page essay on the apostle john and stuff so im getting attacked by school. i got a lot better at going backwards i can do like a circle and a half haha.. i was trying to do a keo spin .you can look up what that is. and it was pissing me off the i couldnt do it... i never thought id get mad for not being able to d a trick but i happened today. i threw by bike across the yard i felt like a dad a.. hahaha not really. i had some crazy deja vu today it was cool. michelle is comng to broomball tonight to that will be beast. forsome reason i wanted to skate recently so i might try and pick that up again we'll see the. i watched bones last night it was awesome and i heard the office was pretty funny. ahh bones was sooo beast haha they had some random korean thing in it which had nothing to do with anything just a shout out to the koreans haha. oh i might go to italy durng spring break f dad lets me. i wanna see you in october thatds gonna be beast ok late [Fri Sep 24, 8:41pm] [2010]
  • j song: I JUST WISH WE COULD BE STAYING UP TOGETHER AT THE SCHOOL PARKING LOT SITTING AT OUR HOLE-Y TABLE BEING DELIRIOUS, TALKATIVE, AND TIRED TOGETHER WHILE CUDDLING. ILL SHUT UP NOW. BYE. [Sat Aug 27, 3:50AM] [2011]
  • luke anderson: Dude, just finished reading your paper. Wow. The way you articulate your feelings is incredible. I'm so glad I know you. You're awesome, seriously. [Wed Nov 9, 2:02pm] [2011]
  • liz ferguson: I hate love [Tue May 1, 9:23pm] [2012]
  • ryan w.: I MISS YOU LIKE NO OTHER!!! [Thu May 3, 7:54pm] [2011]
  • paloma altman: i love your letter [Thu May 3, 8:44pm] [2012]
  • paloma altman: you're really awesome Alex, I hope you know how much I value you. [Thu May 3, 8:46pm] [2012]
  • paloma altman: I can't help but read your letter over and over Now it's 4:10. [Sat May 5, 4:10am] [2012]
  • liz ferguson: You are super cool [Fri May 11, 10:38pm] [2012]
  • sarah park: i was thinking about you today and how badly i wished i could be a better friend as soon as we said goodbye, so when i got home i read a charlie browny christmas. twice. it's weird how honest can embarrass me and even make uncomfortable, the last paragraph particularly the first time i read it, but i think that's why i sincerely appreciate your writing. it's never predictable or corny and it's you, it's your voice and your love in between well-thought-out words. i don't tell you this enough but everything you say and write resonates with me in a way no one else can do and i'm crazy lucky to have an amazing friend like you. i love you alex. :) [Mon May 21, 11:58] [2012]
  • nathan deardorff: Im listening to I Can Make A Mess Like Nobody's Business. I just realized it was the weekend before thanksgiving that you showed them to me. Its crazy how our friendship has grown, and still is. I love you man, and am so thankful for you. Youve kept me going this year. [Tue Nov 20, 12:26am] [2012]
  • liz ferguson: Night Alex. Ur great and your issues pale in comparison to the beauty of your humanity [Sun Dec 30, 8:14pm] [2012]
  • leah rabe: Matt is not a douche. [Thu Jan 31, 2:55pm] [2013]
  • mom: Do it. If she says no or not right now try again in 3 days. [Sun Mar 24, 11:36pm] [2013]
  • liz ferguson: Hey. Iwanna love God more than anything. I wanna lov ehim with my heart soul and mind. Help me with that [Wed Apr 3, 8:51am] [2013]
  • paloma altman: Alex. I miss you. Hope you're doing well. I think of you often. [Fri May 4, 2:14am] [2013]
  • abigail salvatore: You're great. Good night. :) [Wed May 15, 11:12 pm] [2013]

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I miss Liz. 

I miss Liz.