paradise
the shit day i had i think led to me thinking about all this. as i was leaving work, utterly drained from all the shit I had to put up with, the first gust of wind, as every gust of wind in the evening does, brought up some memories. Like random smells, stiff gusts of wind normally in the afternoon or evening, spur memories of a specific place at various times. let me explain:
when i was growing up, every summer for a week in august my family would go to a family camp in the sierra along fallen leaf lake. some of my best childhood memories come from these single weeks every year. inevitably every evening before or and after dinner i would hang out with my friends, and there were so many awesome evenings that were windy and just cool enough for a jacket, that when my body finds itself in that set of weather and time conditions it make me remember. i have this image of the huge pine trees swaying in the wind, and the pinks and oranges of sunset with the long shadows of evening in my head. i can almost hear laughter on the edges of the wind, or one of my camp friends shouting something. I start feeling all warm and fuzzy inside, i long for the ice cold of the lake, the blistering sun and dust of the trails, the scrapped knees and bruises, shit meals that tasted fantastic because of how hungry and tired i was, all that stuff. i long for my friends, especially the group i had around the time i was sixteen. we'd stay up to all hours of the night, drive the kids camp counselors nuts, swim, go boating, throw each other in the lake, throw ice from the ice machine at each other and so on. that one week in my life was probably one of the highlights of my still short life. i smile when i think of it, when the wind blows in the trees at evening, and at the same a deep aches happens because i can never go back to that week. i remember we went on an overnight hike to a small lake way up in the mountains. we got to the lake and camped out there. i was awake for some reason (we were sleeping on stone and one of my friends was snoring!) at some horribly late hour i didn't even know at the time, and i got up to wander a bit. it was a full/almost full moon and completely clear and there was no one else around. the moon cast these blue pools of light on the rock, a color i can still see in my head, but know i will never be able to reproduce. i just remember the sheer awe of it all. it was awesome, in the original sense of the word, with the fear mixed in as i thought about how small i was there out on the top of a mountain in the moonlight. and then i heard a snuffling noise and realized there might be a bear, so i quickly went from awed to 'oh shit get back to group,' but there was still that moment. the beauty and simplicity of it all could represent all of that one week in summer. it could represent just about every week i was at that camp during my life. even the week i had strep throat, the week i stepped on a nail, the week i had a two inch splinter in my foot that someone had to pull out with fishing pliers, the week i nearly threw up while hiking out of campsite on an overnight, the week i scrapped open the side of my leg playing capture the flag... all of it was so simple and beautiful.
so i have decided that during those weeks of camp i found a shred of paradise. i can think of other examples too that have nothing to do with that camp, like a mate of mine and i stuck at his parent's vacation home in the snow on memorial day weekend, where one day we got utterly drunk watching movies, and then on another got so bored we drove all the way around lake tahoe, randomly with music blaring because we could. or stomping around a forest, slightly lost on a trail, telling stories about the blue gnomes that go around removing the trail signage. there is sitting watching stupid tv with some of my friends while make stupid nerdy jokes and comments. there's sitting on the couch with a friend getting utter pissed just because, and chatting about everything. all of these moments and some more i can't think of right now are little shreds of paradise. they are moments that would come to mind, should someone ask me to describe what i thought paradise was. if i got to pick a few weeks of my life to live over constantly those moments would be in there.
sometimes one doesn't even know that one has found a shred of paradise until afterwards. but i've noticed one thing about almost every little shred of paradise that i can think of at the moment is that nearly all of them involve other people. whether it is my twin sister, my family, one friend, several friends, there are always other people. so who ever said 'hell is other people' seriously should have modified it to say, 'hell is people other than my friends,' because seriously i can't seem to find shreds of paradise w/o other people being involved. so sorry for the sappiness, but sometimes life is sappy.
when i was growing up, every summer for a week in august my family would go to a family camp in the sierra along fallen leaf lake. some of my best childhood memories come from these single weeks every year. inevitably every evening before or and after dinner i would hang out with my friends, and there were so many awesome evenings that were windy and just cool enough for a jacket, that when my body finds itself in that set of weather and time conditions it make me remember. i have this image of the huge pine trees swaying in the wind, and the pinks and oranges of sunset with the long shadows of evening in my head. i can almost hear laughter on the edges of the wind, or one of my camp friends shouting something. I start feeling all warm and fuzzy inside, i long for the ice cold of the lake, the blistering sun and dust of the trails, the scrapped knees and bruises, shit meals that tasted fantastic because of how hungry and tired i was, all that stuff. i long for my friends, especially the group i had around the time i was sixteen. we'd stay up to all hours of the night, drive the kids camp counselors nuts, swim, go boating, throw each other in the lake, throw ice from the ice machine at each other and so on. that one week in my life was probably one of the highlights of my still short life. i smile when i think of it, when the wind blows in the trees at evening, and at the same a deep aches happens because i can never go back to that week. i remember we went on an overnight hike to a small lake way up in the mountains. we got to the lake and camped out there. i was awake for some reason (we were sleeping on stone and one of my friends was snoring!) at some horribly late hour i didn't even know at the time, and i got up to wander a bit. it was a full/almost full moon and completely clear and there was no one else around. the moon cast these blue pools of light on the rock, a color i can still see in my head, but know i will never be able to reproduce. i just remember the sheer awe of it all. it was awesome, in the original sense of the word, with the fear mixed in as i thought about how small i was there out on the top of a mountain in the moonlight. and then i heard a snuffling noise and realized there might be a bear, so i quickly went from awed to 'oh shit get back to group,' but there was still that moment. the beauty and simplicity of it all could represent all of that one week in summer. it could represent just about every week i was at that camp during my life. even the week i had strep throat, the week i stepped on a nail, the week i had a two inch splinter in my foot that someone had to pull out with fishing pliers, the week i nearly threw up while hiking out of campsite on an overnight, the week i scrapped open the side of my leg playing capture the flag... all of it was so simple and beautiful.
so i have decided that during those weeks of camp i found a shred of paradise. i can think of other examples too that have nothing to do with that camp, like a mate of mine and i stuck at his parent's vacation home in the snow on memorial day weekend, where one day we got utterly drunk watching movies, and then on another got so bored we drove all the way around lake tahoe, randomly with music blaring because we could. or stomping around a forest, slightly lost on a trail, telling stories about the blue gnomes that go around removing the trail signage. there is sitting watching stupid tv with some of my friends while make stupid nerdy jokes and comments. there's sitting on the couch with a friend getting utter pissed just because, and chatting about everything. all of these moments and some more i can't think of right now are little shreds of paradise. they are moments that would come to mind, should someone ask me to describe what i thought paradise was. if i got to pick a few weeks of my life to live over constantly those moments would be in there.
sometimes one doesn't even know that one has found a shred of paradise until afterwards. but i've noticed one thing about almost every little shred of paradise that i can think of at the moment is that nearly all of them involve other people. whether it is my twin sister, my family, one friend, several friends, there are always other people. so who ever said 'hell is other people' seriously should have modified it to say, 'hell is people other than my friends,' because seriously i can't seem to find shreds of paradise w/o other people being involved. so sorry for the sappiness, but sometimes life is sappy.