I haven't posted on this site in almost TWO YEARS? Looking back at old posts, I feel like I wrote them when I was a kid.
I guess I kind of gave up on this for a while because school. And because I thought, oh, I want to write songs now, that's the cool way to communicate your thoughts, that's the way culture gets its poetry today, I wanna be a part of that, yada yada...I still do. I'm still trying to write songs. I've written a few that I think are pretty good. But I feel like I haven't been nurturing my writing abilities a ton and I think part of that is that I've ignored the extended form. Plus there are some things I'll never find a way to say in a song, as much as I have the vague ambition of turning every thought that strikes me as unique into a song...
So, going off of that, I thought maybe I'd just spill some things that have come to my mind recently that seemed interesting, and that may eventually turn into a song. Or may not.
Isn't it odd how much stuff you own that you never use, or that you only use once a year? I don't mean the kind of stuff that's comprised of all those Christmas presents you asked for so eagerly, but then you got and never played with. I mean stuff like a camera tripod, a volleyball, a two-way tv cable splitter, those random office supplies you have so preparedly made sure to stock in your desk drawer...I've found it interesting as I've moved here and there as a college student the number of things I "need" by some vague notion of "good-to-have" or "wouldn't-want-to-be-without-if-the-situation-came-up-where-I-needed-it"...I also noticed that this problem compounds when you actually own a home because you aren't forced to slim down from moving so much...and at that point you kind of think of yourself as an estate, like, shoot, if this is a real household, it's gotta have a full stock of oven mitts and a fondue machine for every fifth year the family Christmas party is at our place and everything...
I kind of mock this mentality but I know I already kind of fall into it from time to time. It's almost like I imagine a neighbor knocking on my door, like people did in the old days, and asking me if I have this or that item because their item has either been depleted in supply or has ceased to be functional, and I dread being the guy who can't help out the dear neighbor because I don't have a USB-to-whatever converter but I KNOW I have a USB-to-whatever converter back at my parents' house.
It's just kind of funny in general to think about things every household has but that rarely get used...all the old wagons and tarps and wrench sets sitting in garages across the country.
I think as a society we could be more efficient if we had groups with whom we shared these kinds of objects rather than owning them...that way when we end up in a bind and needed some particular tool we didn't have, we would be covered because groups like that could afford to be more exhaustive with what tools they owned and lent out to its members. And of course, people who needed their own tools on a regular basis could simply have their own their tools just like before.
But then...where would the nostalgia be for the time my bike lock decided it was done unlocking if I didn't still have the bolt cutter I had to buy to remedy the situation?
