The end of an era

Today a woman fell asleep at the wheel of her car and drove through a red light, slamming into my car as I was driving across the intersection. I saw her silver SUV out of my window a half second before she hit, and I knew with absolute clarity what was about to happen. She hit me on the passenger side of my car near the back, which is probably the best place to get hit by a car, not that getting hit by a car is ever something you desire to have happen. The force of the impact crumpled the rear quarter of my car and spun me around so that I was pointing exactly towards where I had come from.

I walked away with no injuries. I'm so incredibly sad to lose the car. I visited the wrecking yard today to clear out the rest of my belongings. There wasn't much there, a few photographs in the glove box, an ice scraper, and a beach umbrella in the back.

This was my first car. And the beach umbrella was once shared with someone important. And I also remember using the ice scraper on a frigid February afternoon to extract my car from the frozen slush of a college parking lot. And the photograph is creased in the middle, but I look happy in it and I can still feel her in my arms when I wake up in the middle of the night. And she was the first person I wanted to call when I opened my door and stepped onto the smoking, rubber-stenched pavement and I couldn't hear anything.

Here are two photographs I took for the insurance denizens:

Tall trees

Still heartbroken, I bought a paintball gun. This seemed like an appropriately masculine response to the situation. I am fortunate enough to have friends who have the same ideas that I have. This is a rare thing. I brought my paintball gun to them and they brought their paintball guns as well. And together we hiked into the woods and explored. We traced the path of a trail, an abandoned relic of the infinite days of early puberty. When I returned, I had a conversation with another friend. She told me about words in other languages which do not directly translate to English. One of those words seemed especially relevant. Waldeinsamkeit is a German word describing the cathartic sensation of being in the woods and being thoughtful. There seems to be a delight and a purity to exploration and I want to seek it out and be comfortable finding it in myself.

Here's a photograph I took of the hills of Connecticut.

Two aces

My heart was broken and I started cleaning my room. My cleaning strategy relies heavily on sorted piles. I wish it didn't, but its all I know. In one pile was camping equipment. On the top of this pile sat a confident backpack. I retrieved camping items from around my room and shoved them into this backpack. The backpack didn't seem to mind. In the top pocket there was a rigid presence. I unzippered the zipper and peeked inside. A deck of cards. When I opened the deck, two aces toppled from the top. I paused to remember. Two aces for a magic trick long forgotten. Two aces sitting on the top of a deck inside of a forgotten backpack, now repurposed. I stared at the cards and reflected on my life and choices and paths cut short. I could have been a magician. With enough time and training, anyone could be a magician, I suppose. This realization is slow and non-intuitive. I placed the deck of cards back into the top pocket of the backpack and rezippered the zipper.

Here is a picture of chickens that I took recently:

Mass centralization

For the first time in several years, arguably since before I left for college, all of my stuff, my material possessions, are located in one place. Moving from New York was stressful but ultimately positive and cathartic, and I am going to enjoy the process of consolidating and minimizing my life. My next step: get my motorcycle insured and registered at the DMV! I've got some trips to take...

Here is a photo that I took of a restaurant on Cape Cod:

The silent song

I went to the doctor today. The doctor was new to me, but he had obviously been doing his job for a long time because his office was very humble. He had a good bedside manner and I was relieved when he told me that I was in good health. I told him: "Thanks for the external validation," and he laughed.

Here's a picture of a cool tree from two streets over. I suspect it has been in this town longer than the doctor.

Move along

Today was a productive day. I woke up and cleaned my room and some other parts of the house, and then headed outside where I braved scorching heat and humidity to paint the gas tank on my motorcycle. This is my second attempt at painting this, and I hope it goes better than the first. The key to a good paint job is good surface preparation, latex or neoprene gloves (to prevent oil on your hands from touching the surface), several light coats, and a light sanding between coats. I decided to paint the gas tank a dark metallic blue, which is fitting because blue is usually the color of Suzuki racing bikes. Everyone can dream!

I also got a chance to hang out with my friend Sean who I haven't seen in several months. We went to the beach and flew kites and skipped stones, although I only have photographic proof of the first activity. I'm stilling lugging my new camera around everywhere I go, and I have made an impression on most of the people who have seen it. Life certainly looks different through the viewfinder! I'm ordering chemicals this week so that I can begin to develop photos on my own. This will save money (definitely) and put me in control of the whole process (potentially).

I'm also going to include some photos of my weekend on the lake with a few friends. The boat is a "testament to American excess", but it was really fun to ride in and I wasn't paying for the fuel which was an extra bonus.

I can't take my eyes off of you

One of the things that I miss, well perhaps miss is the wrong word (yes, it definitely is), more like intrigued at the appearance or in this case disappearance of, is music. I use to listen to so much music. Maybe its a generational thing. Or perhaps its just growing up. I've moved through too many computers, and my Windows Music Player library became a smaller iTunes library became a smaller playlist on my mp3 player became a smaller playlist on my smartphone became listening to Pandora became listening to the occasional music video on YouTube.

I'm not too sure what happened. I've moved music from something I "own" to something I "use". At the same time, I've increased the amount of music that I play and create myself. All of this together doesn't sound like a bad thing at all, but I still feel like there is something missing and when I listen to my old songs I am hit by a wave of nostalgia.

In other news, I have decided to take some time this summer to learn more about photography. I was inspired to pick up a cheap film SLR camera from Amazon and experiment with taking pictures using manual controls. My first three rolls of film turned out pretty well. Which sounds self-serving. Suffice it to say that I was impressed with the results I was able to achieve with relatively modest equipment. And by modest, I mean a $20 camera with some cheap Fuji film. Getting someone to develop it was the hard part, but Walgreens has proved to be a time machine of sorts. I'm also looking into buying the chemicals and equipment to develop film on my own which save a lot of money (90%) as well as provide an intriguing level of control and creativity over the whole process. Plus, its fun to learn something new. Here's some of the photos I took over the last week: