Prologue…I started writing in my early teenage years. Looking back I can see that I was desperately trying to figure out this thing we call life and how this very confused little boy fit into it. I recently turned 40 and a lot has changed in my life and in the world around me. I suppose that the biggest change is that I am no longer a confused little boy trying to figure out “life".............instead I am a confused young man trying to figure out “life”. What is really important in life, what should I hold onto and what do I need to let go of? What motivates me and what destroys me. So many random thoughts and experiences…how do they all connect? Somewhere inside of me, are my answers to those questions and many more; so I write whenever I can. The writings that I have included in here are all special in some way or another, they have made their way from the thousands of crumpled papers and incomplete ideas to this small collection of still more incomplete ideas. These writings are also the ones that are “safe for public consumption.” I feel that if I sit down to write something knowing that it is going to be published or read by other people…then I will begin to compromise my thoughts. That I will not write what I am truly trying to express for fear that it will be misunderstood, taken offensively or somehow used against me somewhere down the road. It is amazing how insecure you can suddenly feel after sharing your thoughts on an intimate level… Or maybe it’s just the simple fact that if I am writing to please you, I cannot hope to cleanse myself. Some of the writings have dates and some do not. Some took several years to finally complete and others were written in minutes. Some have extended thoughts – explanations, notes and/or questions that were added after the writing was completed. Many of the writings are about personal feelings and/or situations and others are just thoughts that I wanted to explore, reactions to a movie or song, explanations… As I put together this collection of writings I struggled with how to organize them. By subject, type, importance… in the end I decided to just organize them alphabetically and include a small summary where appropriate. I am not sure who will eventually read these, if anybody, I just hope that if you are reading these, you enjoy them and perhaps even identify with something every now and then. In a way that creates a bond between us, perhaps that is goal… Joe
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