enter into an empty room after confusing actions which resulted in false predictions. i'm unbalanced and effortless, feeding off of my own nothingness (misery enjoys solitude too) and pulling teeth out of my brain to stay focused because theres quite a bit on the calender. black metal, sunday, stravinsky all said hello to me this morning. they keep teasing me, as i expect more but end up satisfied with the product each offers. functioning in two worlds, bouncing back and forth like call and response, is rather difficult. so i packed my bag, grabbed some work and drove down there. opting for moments rather than blueprints, the early half of the week proved to me that spontaneity has a lot to offer our culture, and my life. (i wish i took life a little more seriously today) chimes in the back rafters of my mind, no defense presents itself because no defense is needed. acceptance just walked by and didn't care to stop but i'm pretty sure she'll be back around by this afternoon. my oh my i feel like a psychologists, keeping tabs on everyone dancing through the cerebral. they all walked in unexpected, i entertained and analyzed each. they signed my guestbook while we listened to herbie hancock:
adrien
vincent gallo
j dub
howie mandel
donnie
the forms
jonathan mcglone

i am so out of touch with reality, its oppressive.

surveying the land (my how the topography shifts like life):

in recent entries, a particular blog has been on point. i'd like to draw your attention to unfavorable topography, which seems to be championing the existential beings we are. a certain writer on that page, mark pierce, a brilliant mind, seems to be caught in the same snares that many college aged students go through, but his words have pounded in my head as i associate with his contradicting emotions of discomfort and revelling in despair that has resulted from mind aerobics. i wish to elaborate.

a friend of mine was spending the weekend here, visiting friends and dancing, discussing religion and politics with conviction and wisdom. he shared with me his decision to never try and say anything profound ever again. this decision of his was based of the frequent path he would travel down while trying to be profound. the path only led him to despair. this does not mean that humans are incapable to being profound. the act of attempting to be profound, or in our case now, figuring out the messes in our minds, the over emphasis takes away from the true meaning of what our experience is. constant contemplation on thoughts so grand and exquisite often lead us to realizing how incapable we are of containing these profound thoughts and the complexity of human breath. for example, look at many of the existential writers throughout history: dostoevsky, kierkegaard, camus, sartre, nietzsche all drove themselves insane (literally) trying to figure out the human self and the humans purpose in life. constant hours poured over candle light, ink jars and feather pens contemplating lifes purpose led most to conclude the utter unimportance of life. i'm not conveying that we're all bound to go insane and conclude there is no purpose to life, i am merely using these examples as a caution to every mind that attempts to be profound.

relating all the words above to mark pierce--mark has come off as a profound mind and i think he has not recognized it. while he lays confused in his conscious and unconcious, feeling as if he isn't doing anything at all, he is relating thoughts to us all which we can associate with and further contemplate. christopher sauchak, another brilliant mind (my how syracuse breeds them--i wish i could say its the air or the hills of syracuse which create these minds, but i believe it must be that blues joint, the dino bbq which adds much flavor to their minds), touched on this a bit, patting the back of mark.

marks words have led me to conclude that profound words most commonly result from the act of trying not to be profound, from sitting back and living through actions, reflections of experiences while eating pulled pork sandwiches, playing music in a band, fingering through discs at soundgarden or surrounding yourself with humans that understand that life is a little bit more than a narrow, straight path we journey upon. life is a cycle, and by simply living it with confidence the profound thoughts and understanding will come. be patient my friends, we aren't designed to know everything or make sense of life, we're designed to live with our memories, moments and dinosaurs.

*the simplest questions are the most profound. where were you born? where is your home? where are you going? what are you doing? think about these once in a while, and watch your answers change.

still in love in the midwest (an audio adventure!/where are your headphones when you need them?):

the drops of water in misplaced
puddles dance
curving their misfortune into tiny
little bodies

skywalk these molecular compositions
in spite
surround self by unpredictable wave of sounds that
hit close to home

rememory of my place
landscape scatters off an artists tool
of muse
directing attention to higher
backwards sounds
in backyards where feet are lifted
in tempo in dustrial dilutions
contrary to what gives breath
still magnifying

when radios buzz emitting
familiar scents
often imagine myself next to the
mystery of bandname hierarchy
with head bobs and mercenary marchings

lethal. intoxicating. deep breath. give up? wake up.

sliding down
a silver wave of electron
mixed media warm
microwaves empty glasses
green forests we pass through
too quickly
and the night sky, (did you see those shooting stars?)

midwestern america
paved our way and thanks
to products
and commerce trade goods
thank you man (misery enjoys company)

don't let it get you down
for
we all want to wear red belts
and dance across stage
strum an aqua guitar and bite our bottom lip
to be innocene yet refined
to be wanted and paid in full (i'm counting up)

discover for yourself that what moves around you, will always move around you.
its all just waiting for you to move towards it
and fuck it all up (for good this time).

four walls joined to create a square--a box
within the box souls sit: couches, armchairs, kitchen chairs
coffee table
conversation
exit box
expanse
irrational tears induced racoon eyes
i am happy?
or am i just planning the next film next frame next sequence?
actions! (louder)

an open display of proficiency:

mine, o thou Lord of life, send my roots rain.

yes god, i'm warm now:

cast me out into this catastrophic bleached aire (this is how i feel)
neverending beginning at the roots of equality and matches (angels watch with popcorn bowls)
dreamlike dances in cold draft rooms pitchers hanging walls and sliding wet stairwells (i am here)
exhale the weeks work inhale new fresh plentiful changing views on constants (tomorrow)
dangle me over this bridge backed by borrowed moonlight (my eyes are full too)
where to now? its as if we've tackled the great beast within us all.
releasing tamed broken and humbled like breath of our own ghosts (dance here)
shadowing the shaky past lines drawn by hands that lose feeling after hours of telepathy (don't let me down)
from here i'll write her name my name the name in skies diamond filled (the tank is empty)
blinking reactions are slowly being held in the bosom of mothers (one day)
come on down from your cloud, isn't it warmer outside the lines of amusement? (rhythm equals perspectives)
where to now? its as if you shot woody harrleson.

inspirato (new! the moral tale):

there was an opening for didactic charity, which saw a new mode for influencing my writing, by the medium of good little novelets.
hitherto these had been chiefly of a feminine character. but i guess there are volumes upon volumes in existence to be found (its funny how i see reality in morality), in which a young lady might see the mirror held up to nature for her warning and her edification; presenting, on the one side, the scapegrace of her own establishment, which cheats on teachers, steals her companions' pocket money, and gets into all kinds of disgrace, until she is finally either reformed by an angelic half-boarder, or dismissed to her friends or (maybe you can help me remember) marries a drunken dancing-master (what an awful example); and, on the other hand, the pattern school girl, who just passes through a furnace of unjust suspicions and jealousies, never does wrong, wins all the prizes, always knows where to find her gloves, is crowned by her schoolfellows at the last half-yearly ball with a laurel-wreath as the "reward of virtue," and withdraws from the scene gracefully, amidst a tumult of applause, into the bosom of grown-up society, to make, we should conceive (though we are bound to say the story never gives a hint of it), a highly-accomplished and rather disagreeable wife.
realism is a bloody, angry bitch.

deep within in me is the urge to write, and then publish it, but i can't.

old friends have a funny way of reminding me what i used to be like two years ago.
its safe to say that a lot has happened since i left beck and warren.
some of these faces i dont even seem to recognize anymore (i wonder if they recognize me).
wrapped in linens and striped shirts and doubt across a room filled with fillers.
gravity acts (newton smiles from above) pulling me there to whispher words of changes.
into the rooms of adulthood and our youth, a seedy mixture that takes time to figure out.
don't forget to call and don't forget to write (i hope things are for the better).

idiot wind.
daydream of the way things sometimes are
sometimes aren't
but now movement forward (i'm looking back-iknowishouldn't)

theres blood on the saddle
blood on the moon
blood on my hands
and blood on my t-shirt
blood on a letter lost and found
blood on the door to our souls
blood on shelves books buttons destiny blood

its a wonder i can still breathe at points like
these
lioness has decided to win
calling from across water

coax me to swim
to dive in and begin another
vicious visceral cycle my
stomach will twist and reject the poison

keep moving your teeth cause
instead of words that imprison
words of freedom and sorrow only stick
rather than my blood on your paws

its hard. its saddening. the sky makes me shiver. the weather makes me miss. a simple cigarette keeps your hand in my view. your scent sticks to my clothes. and image is still there. the blood is still there. water doesnt work. neither do the birds. or oklahoma. the dawn the run the slide the metal the taste the crow the package the tune the math the sea the wire the feast the rage the sorrow the hair the touch the smoke the signal the writing the sun the chapter the epilogue the flight the terminal the illness the page the turning the heart the age the lips the smallness the year the captain the antiques the father the explosion the rising the air the capitol the rings the keys the nails the festival the fall the break the tie the lever the implosion the cave the out the jack the movement the bar the grass the gasoline the feet the cracks the face the curve the effort the loss the disease the bruise the outdoors the expanse the lilies the passage the clock the taming the release the peace the settlement the conversation the happiness the film the breath the shore the embrace the town the travel the dimness the room the floor the reflection the attention the lines the deeds the debt the review the dress the back the turning the distance will continue the end.

a trip to dover beach and what i heard (and saw):

the sea is raging
stepping away from my car
i was wrong and should of known
all along
listen! the grating roar of the pebbles
the ebb and flow of tide
followed by sounds of silence
the sea is now calm tonite (thank you reality)

sophocles was reminded of misery
matthew arnold of faith
into my mind the turbid flow brings silence
still no peace no beauty no desire
no intensity no connections no clubs
no hair cuts or latest fashions (or talks on a cell phone)
so let us be true and honest to one another of
the world which lays before us
like a land of dreams
because reality has calmed misery and hope and
dreams and desire etching before us a scene
i try to capture for you

and here we are now
overlooking the beach of activity
where life is held captive and veils hang over
your fantasy filled eyes (which fill nothing, may i remind you)
not even the ocean or the granduer of
the breath of life so various
so beautiful so new
can exist here but will combat
swept with confused alarms of struggle
where ignorant armies clash by day
and even more by night.

a clear spring sky and conscience or finally the time came when:

i read all our old emails tonite.
my eyes nervously scanned the screen and noted the words
quickly descending down an uneven staircase of distance
into an empty red void
similar to the edges of our scattered universe

when you responded with
phrases dripped in laughter and defense
i angrily wrote back to myself
that prayer was now hopeless and
reality is far from your dream-filled grasp

i told myself i would never write back.

whitened like a dove hanging in a summer sky
with the wings of a child and
new heights to climb
you made me do this
you don't deserve this explanation

good-bye.

astronomical observation no. five: a letter of concern.

dear universe:

i am nothing. thanks for pointing that out to me today. i know you probably cannot understand my language because it was created on this life bearing planet i live in on, called earth (have you heard of it?), but i wanted to write to you, letting you know that the life upon the planet earth is currently, and has been destroying itself ever since it came into existence. i know it doesn't really matter all that much because we are so small in comparison to the rest of you, but the life on this planet has been trying to tell me that we are the only living beings to have ever existed. they also told me that you are still expanding. anyways, if this is the case (that we are the only existing form of life) i find it interesting that because we cannot handle or grasp the fact that we are completely unique and separate from the rest of you, we opt to destroy ourselves. i did't know if you were aware of this, but i thought i would bring it to your attention.

sincerely,
jonathan mcglone

ps. i can't even believe i would think you would read this letter on my blog.

i received a package:

yesterday, after much delay, i received a package in the mail from mark james. it was the mix disc that he told me he would happily put together for me. so i listened to it. and i remembered before i left that quiet home in redford, mark had asked me to give him five adjectives to describe how i wanted the mix to sound. myself, being an english major but shabby on the grammar, couldn't give him five adjectives, and opted to give him five words. the fluidity of the music, the warmth, the changes in sound, etc, all of it made sense. the timing was perfect. it eased the tension in the air, gave me something to talk about and be content in. as i reached the end of the disc, i found myself unable to stop listening to tracks thirteen, fourteen and fifteen. i repeated them over and over. the songs also happened to be by the same band, fireworks!. maybe you've heard of them, maybe you haven't. the band also happens to be a collaboration of the sheer musical brilliance of mark james and brian g. once i embedded their tracks into my head, and allowed their relevancy to my situation astound me further, i finished listening to the rest of the mix. the package was much appreciated.

definition of:

concentrate. here it comes the ocean tide is hauling me over and i begin the ride. i complicated it and made the ill fated wish that if she comes to this crossroad i wouldn't worry about her anymore. see, it just isn't that easy. i wrote down even more words but these words had a different feeling to them that reminded me of how i felt when i was attached. but the letter was lost and it couldn't be sent i tried to make sense of the situation. i realized that what was to be was meant. it was for myself and carried me across the ocean and back, allowing my sails to be hoisted, this time the vessel won't crack and travel and movement and transport and and and and and on. forward. progress. development. renaissance. construction. continue. run. fast. faster.

fireworks! (sometimes its easy to forget her, sometimes its easy to remember):

i've tried to be patient. as i have watched from different distances, both up close and from a far, i still shutter. the earth is frozen over. i heard his heart was too. it cracked this week and his recovery is what i'm waiting for. but i realized that he will never return to the way things were before, because the way things were, were wrong. but i feel detached, distant and poorly equipped, i can't understand.
he just walked in as i typed those words and said, "it ended." word just in: i'm proud of my best friend. i will be there for you, it won't be easy for me, but i'm in it with you. i know what it feels like to be shat upon. it just takes a long time to wash yourself fully clean.

"three times one minus one:"

2 ritalin .5 hours with eyes shut and 10 hours of pounding on the keys:

i made music last night. differing from my usual outlet of making music via six strings and a hollow body, i used the alphabet this time. my rhythm wasn't completely together but i was pleased with the finished product. i used to be a perfectionist back in the day, but i've seemed to be a little more open to error in the past couple years, i enjoy seeing the faults in what i create. it reminds me that i have a long way to go and that i'll always have a long way to go.

dear donnie and chris:

speaking of having a long way to go...i remember thinking this when we roamed the streets of plymouth canton and other areas of metro detroit. today, each of us have reached new heights. i look forward to exiting the atmosphere with both of you one day and drifting into space (who will go first? or will we all leave at the same time?). now that we are settled, it seems that each of us have found our niche to some extent or another, the fact that we envy each other's thoughts and writings and creativity speaks loudly in my ear at the moment. in high school, i always had the feeling that we depended on each other to truthfully express what was contained in each of our skulls. we each had different techniques and ways of going about communicating and we feuled, reassured and critiqued each other (i still envied), as well as explored creativity together. since we departed to go on and exist on separate parts of the continental united states, we were given the opportunity to find a way to develop our skill of trade on our own. i look back two years and think of how we each were incubating our ideas, unaware of when they would hatch. i look back and i feel so young. brasco, chainsaw (there were plenty others), dub. dodos, sauce, jonathan. we still have more miles to cover, but the pressure is definately decreasing (atmospheric--meaning that we're rising). i'm not boasting, i'm celebrating, i'm reflecting on how little and how seperate our ideas were when we gathered at salt truck's on boring weekend nights. but somehow, through technology, we're back co-existing and creating, feeding off of each other and feeding one another in such different ways its beautiful. i hope this cycle continues, we'll be vicious in 2010. keep moving in your ever changing realm, i will too.

fondly
jwm

dear caitlin james:

your last blog (re: "the boys" emo journals) made me laugh. for two reasons, your ability to be quick with wit and your ability to generalize. i recognize your statement, "no offense," but i still took offense, especially after an entry of mine exactly a day ago. i'd like to direct you to that particular entry of mine, titled "why blogging is not indie (to me)." on april, 1, 2003. hopefully my attempt for a defense of why these blogs are not "emo journals" will strike a chord with you, move your spirit, and you will renounce your claims against me, my thinness, my shaved head, my lack of muscles, my cuteness (you dont have to renounce that statement) and my extensive crying, and moreover, my "emoness". you are not the only that reads your blog. i have frequented your site (i'm straightedge.) ever since jules announced your creation of a blog. she also told me over the telephone that you are by far the funniest james. i have to agree, for the same two reasons as above (and some of your other entries as well). there are certain responsibilites that come with technology, abusing those responsibilites by defaming human beings is an obvious abuse of this amazing technological tool. i don't mean to deter your use of your personal blog, i mean to encourage and guide you by helping you become more aware. in the future, i hope you will take full responsibility and awareness that there are others who read your writings. if you don't want people to read your writing or you wish to defame human beings, please use a pen and paper rather than the internet.

sincerely,
jonathan w. mcglone

on tuesday, april 2, 2003, caitlin james wrote:
"i think i am the only one who reads this, so that is cool. but jules gave me links to 'the boys' emo journals. and that is exactly what they are. emo. (no offense)...and then i read john mcglone's and it's like 'why am i so thin and emo? i shaved my head to emphasize my muscles...and i started taking weight gainer, but i can't help it! i am so cute! sob.'"

whats the value in proving the existence of god:

years have gone by since the first scientist sat down in his laboratory with an idea in his head and an objective scope trying to prove something. it seems that science and its methods were created out of a want and desire to obtain knowledge. humans, born out of ignorance and placed somewhere, anywhere on the planet were left to figure things out for themselves. science naturally developed out of this longing to know and understand. but where did the idea of god come from? i don't have the answer to this question, rather i am intriguied by it. rene decartes, in his meditations, believed that through causal principles, god's existence can be proven (after stripping everything that ever existed before him to nothing--attempting to start over). he had an idea of god, and that idea must have a cause. and that cause of the idea of god, must contain at least as much reality as the idea, being in an infinite reality. so somewhere, in the causal ancestory of his idea of god, there must be something (with an infinite reality) whose existence is formal. taking this argument, could the same be said for santa claus? or is saint nicholas part of a finite reality because he is limited to clothes he wears, the elves he dances around with, and his inability to be omnipotent? once the church was established, icons and murals of god and christ erupted--humans attempt to figure out in their own minds what god is, what god looks like, etc. so in return, one could say that god is like good ole saint nick when referencing the icons of god and christ.
i believe god exists. but not through an objective lens like decartes. i believe god exists through subjectivity, my own experiences and observations. i haven't conducted experiments and i haven't seen the face of god. i don't even know if god has a face. my picture of god isn't even a picture, for i believe that god is so much more greater than i am, the human language which i use to communicate my ideas, can't even capture god, and portray god correctly.
so after all of this, i still don't see a value in proving god's existence.

i wish i could write like donnie (ie tuesday april one two thousand three).

why blogging is not indie (to me):

recent outcries in the student body (and those people that surround you) have been making statements that "blogging" is indie (a common word substituted here may be "emo" as well). i disagree with these stereotypical comments. by lumping blog's into the indie stereotype (or any stereotype), one is doing a great disservice to the intentions of the creators of this means of communication, and severly limiting its capabilities.
moreover, have you read some of the other blogs people post by browsing the blogger website? if your answer to this question is "no", i suggest you do so. many of them suck. i am not making the claim that anything indie does not suck, what i am simply trying to say is that there are many different types of people that use this form of technology, many of them have no idea what indie even is. the comment about their blogs sucking is just a personal critique.
i am not the pillar of the independent community (whatever the fuck that is), so my statements may not have much validity as say, steve albini, but do recognize the fact that many people tend to lump me into the category of "indie" (again, whatever the fuck that is). what i'm trying to get at here is this: the things i choose to listen to, wear, talk about, and use, i choose because of the sheer enjoyment i get from them. this online journal (or what is called by those that protest, "indie journal") is simply my reflections on a world that exists around me and within me. these worlds i create. nothing else creates the world i live in, so that excludes steve albini or conor oberst or the red house painters or tim kinsella or modest mouse or athens, georgia or 4AD records or pitchforkmedia or tight designer jeans or chicago or one inch buttons or having a substantial vinyl collection. these people, places and things do not create my world. now, some of my thoughts and observations have influences, but not all of them happen to come from indie things, many of my influences extend to (and shake the hand of) different art forms, friends, childhood, etc. we all have countless influences for our ideas and creations. but protestors have made the faulty, illogical argument: "jonathan is 'indie'" (no i'm not),"therefore blogging is indie," which is by the way a hasty generalization. i guess that arguing here is pointless, because i will never be able to sufficiently explain to any human being or myself why i'm not indie until i stop listening to music i like or searching for music that i've never heard or stop wearing clothes that i like because they look good on me and are in stride with the current fashions. there's a lot more to me than the music i listen to and the clothes i wear. if you don't believe me, read my fucking blog.

*i apologize for the rant (this argument is more an argument for myself)--the blogging dissent opened the floodgates.

astronomical observation no. four: the waltz of neptune and pluto.

neptune and pluto have a 3:2 orbit-orbit resonance. the two planets waltz because neptune makes three orbits each cycle. however, pluto is not making three steps as well, so they are not really both waltzing. more precisely, it is like a pianist playing eigth notes with the left hand and simultaneously playing triplet quarter notes with the right.

the URL to the.cosmos.is.cracking is meant to be ironic:

the weather reminded me today that i always tend to settle for little things.
the breeze told me i was selfish.
a bird chirped at me as i walked to class, "why are you so guilty?"
the trees remained solid in their roots, unmoved. their branches swayed as the wind carried them, but they still remained intact.
the trees told me that i haven't been myself.
i looked to the clouds because everything around me, beautiful and perfect forced my head to drop, and eyes to focus on the path before me. i was sick of the path.
but the clouds were perfect too, even though they were ever changing.
the clouds told me that the horizon i've wrapped myself in will unravel soon.
the ramifications of wrapping myself in the horizon are yet to be determined.
everything has been working outside. everything outside is perfection.
i tried looking in the mirror and at the people around me to see if we were perfect too.
i now understand why animals exist in their community separate from us.
jonathan is not right, and never will be.
because jonathan isn't going to heaven.
jonathan still believes that religion means something, but jonathan won't go to heaven.
he's not perfect. i'm not perfect.