2002-02-12


Thoughts upon having reached the point of no return...

I wasn't aware of it then, but by the time I arrived back home from my first semester at college, I had already made the decision to never truly return. When one is fortunate enough to come upon a fruitful period of money and time, they should seize the moment and educate themselves thru travel & exploration, for there seldom comes the kind of opportunity where there exists such a wellspring of knowledge not offered in any curriculum...
- So thought I, in June 1991. That summer, I continued to play the role of serious student and enrolled in summer classes at Yale, but when I moved into the little red cape with the sunny loft down by the sea, and set up shop with Charlie - and we watched our revenue snowball, thoughts of my schooling drifted further and further away. When I told my parents that I wasn't returning for classes in the fall, their jaws dropped. That day must still haunt them, for up until that day I was known to them as their son, the happy & dedicated scholar on the straightest course toward success - their son with the assured future, who they would never have to worry about. Suddenly became a stranger to them, lured away by Sirens singing of arts and abstract adventure - calling to my restless spirit - leading me out along the fringes, and into the open shapes cast with the subtle hues created where boundries intersect. Observations, experiments, randomness, connection, connections, reality, truth. All that jazz. Roaring. Homework would have to wait. Taking time off was an easy decision for me, just 19 years old, I knew I had plenty of time to first see the world and then finish school - so off I went. One year later I am back on campus, but reassimilation into the intensive astrophysics program proved impossible. I snored through Gen. Ed. courses. What was to be my junior year starts instead working at breakfast joint where I am to become Omelette Master and Kitchen God. Night time study involves playing jazz & blooze in band at local watering holes and crowded parties. It was around this time that the specter of my lost education began to spook me. I'd dream vivid scenes where I am still in highschool, unable to progress, unable to find my classes or my books. Missing the bus. My friends were all graduating, left & right, moving away, getting married. My parents had thrown up their hands, bewildered and sad. Everyone was let down. The haunting wore on me and I would do my very best to avoid the topic.
Always, I would tell myself that I would go back...
...s o m e d a y.

I shall not speak, I shall not think of anything
But through my soul will surge all love's infinity;
Far, far away I'll go a gypsy wandering
Content in nature as in a woman's company.

-Arthur Rimbaud

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