Kern Carter's Blog, page 46
April 12, 2022
A Beautiful Feeling
Photo by Michael Fenton on UnsplashThe heart dances in joy to feel for someone
It does not know the name of the relationship between the two souls
The duo just dances in pure honesty to decipher the language of the heart
Is it love? Oh! I do not know. For I know not what qualifies for love
Shall we be together? I do not know as I need not know
For now, the only relief the heart feels is when I acknowledge the feeling of my soul
It is a soul-bonding where one just wants to heal the other in return for nothing
No commitment, no expectation, no togetherness, not even seeing in person
The mind knows that he is in trouble and she knows how to heal him
Sometimes the only obligation the heart knows is to save another desperate soul
Maybe this is the soul contract the ‘he’ and the ‘she’ have in this lifetime
To find solace when the other is in peace
It took some time, though, to understand the language of the heart
There was a fight between the heart and the mind
The ego never wanted to acknowledge the feeling of the heart for him
That she is destined to heal his heart in this lifetime; and he is destined to make her believe in love once again
The mind questioned again and again why this affection if there is no possibility of togetherness
The heart then replied — being together is not always happiness and being separate is not always painful
There is a joy in being connected by heart
The universe wanted to make us believe that
Once she realized this calmness prevailed in her heart
The white clouds may float separately, but they are united by the vastness of the sky
The drops of water may be scattered here and there, but they are tied to the largeness of the sea
The flock of birds flies high up in the sky in perfect unison — who taught them to fly in the same rhythm?
The leaves of the trees bounce together against the wind — they know the secret
Maybe all of them follow the same law of synchronicity — even though they are separated physically, they are united in their heart
The law of the heart is the same
It just KNOWS
That she needs to pull up the other person when he falls — and when he rises again in full strength she leaves never to return
Because that is their contract for this lifetime — to teach each other what they need to learn; to give each other what they deserve the most
[image error]A Beautiful Feeling was originally published in CRY Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
April 9, 2022
The Living Years
There are so many songs… but this one by Mike and the Mechanics (1989) speaks to me right now. I heard this song again on my birthday last month and the ‘feels’ just hit me so hard in the heart, like a ton of iron bricks. I cried.
Photo by Ed Leszczynskl on UnsplashMy parents have just arrived by plane to visit us after two years of COVID travel restrictions. My heart stopped when I saw how much they aged. They move slower. They are more absent-minded. They cannot see clearly. They need help.
Waves after waves of sadness overwhelm me with the foresight of seeing the knowledge of passing time unpeel before my eyes. There is so much left unsaid, still. So much that cannot be said in the living years.
“Oh, crumpled bits of paper / filled with imperfect thoughts / Stilted conversations / I’m afraid that’s all we’ve got”
“We all talk a different language / Talking in defense… / So we open up a quarrel, / between the present and the past / We only sacrifice the future / It’s the bitterness that lasts”
Photo by Stephan Holzinger on UnsplashMy parents and I have not always seen eye to eye. I have never told them how their actions made me feel. In my family, we don’t talk about our feelings as much as we should. We have always been taught to think with our heads and not with our hearts. Constantly applying an external filter to validate (i.e. reason) and to ‘quantify’ the intuition (i.e. irrational). Feelings can always be invalidated, or better still, ignored over the merits of reason.
What do I know about feelings? My heart is an urn of buried feelings and mislaid secret dreams... Who is able to process this living grief? Is there a saying… when in muddy waters, try not to drown?
To be brutally honest, I haven’t found the courage yet. And, I know, I may live to regret it.Lydia Davis’ poem… tells it like it is.
Head, Heart
________________________
Lydia Davis
Heart weeps.
Head tries to help heart.
Head tells heart how it is, again:
You will lose the ones you love. They will all go. But even the earth will go someday.
Heart feels better then.
But the words of head do not remain long in the ears of heart.
Heart is so new to this.
I want them back, says heart.
Head is all heart has.
Help head. Help heart.
Photo by Pierre Bamin on Unsplash“It’s too late (it’s too late) when we die (it’s too late when we die) to admit we don’t see eye to eye.”
Thank you Kern Carter for this thought-provoking writing prompt,
https://medium.com/cry-mag/call-for-submissions-what-song-makes-you-cry-7e239a6c329b
[image error]The Living Years was originally published in CRY Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
April 8, 2022
If you ask me? I’m speaking up.
My reasons. (Photo by Author)When I was in the third grade, I transferred schools for the 5th and final time. After moving around so much after my parents’ divorce, I was glad to finally have a school I could call mine. It was at this school that I met Mrs. Brown and discovered my first love. Like most relationships in my life, my relationship with writing has been inconsistent. Still, I will never forget the night that our class put on our very own authors’ night in our school gymnasium. If you were to ask me why I write, that night is where I would start.
Before the divorce, before learning that emotions aren’t simply happy or sad, and before meeting a mean girl who criticized me for smiling “too much,” I was very outspoken. Like most children, I said whatever came to mind and was unapologetically honest. Over time, I became withdrawn and silent around anyone who wasn’t family, and sometimes I didn’t even talk to them. In Mrs. Brown’s class, we learned to write about everything and it was in her class that I rediscovered my voice through writing.
I’ve always created worlds and scenarios in my mind and as an only child, I became very good at acting out these stories through play. As I got older, talking to myself became less appropriate, although I admit I still do at times. I was always seeking ways to make those stories come to life. Once I begged my mom to buy me a set of assorted Play-Doh so that I could build an entire town. In my mind, I had created the family I wanted to live there, what their house and car would look like, and exactly how I would build the streets they would drive on.
My mom finally bought me some Play-Doh, but unfortunately, as creative as I was, my Play-Doh figures looked more like the boogie man from the Nightmare Before Christmas than actual people. After trying again and again, I realized that creating things out of clay was not my calling. Then one day in Mrs. Brown’s class we were given the assignment to write our own books. This is when I discovered a new way to bring my stories to life.
For my book, I told a story based on the time I went camping with Girl Scouts. My book was complete with illustrations and in the back was my picture with an “About the Author” paragraph. That night I stood on a stool and read my story to my classmates and their families. The fear of speaking in front of people completely vanished when I began to read my words aloud. At that moment, I knew exactly what I wanted to be when I grew up. A writer.
Over the years, that dream turned into a dream to become a filmmaker. In my freshman year of high school, my dad bought me a flip camera (remember those? probably not) and I would record everything. For most of high school, I debated whether I would go to Full Sail University or The Los Angeles Film School. Then, during my senior year of high school, I changed course.
I spent those teenage years finding my voice in drama class, speech, and debate and learning myself through the words of all my diaries and journals. But suddenly I felt the need to silence myself again. To take what I thought would be the safe route. I abandoned my dream of film school and settled on a Psychology major. Why not? I liked to help people and I could get a real job and make real money with that degree.
I laugh at my younger self now. While I have had amazing experiences in my field and have worked with the most amazing children and youth over the years, I still have always felt that something was missing. Now here I am ten years out of high school, with a bachelor's and master's degree, wondering if it was all for nothing.
I don’t believe that it was, but it was a bumpy detour back to where I started. If someone asked me today why I write, I’ll probably mention Mrs. Brown. I’ll mention how my mom told people that I was a writer before I even believed it. The journals I collected over the years will tell stories about how I still dream of being in the writers' rooms of shows like Atlanta. A part of me writes because I still want to be amongst the Quintas, Donald Glovers, and the Issa Rae’s of the world.
Most of all I want to write for my daughter. I come from a long line of women who were brave enough to stand in their truth and be who they wanted to be. My daughter should know that she is limitless despite what society says, there is always a way. Never give up on your dreams because that’s giving up on yourself. A long time ago I gave up on the eight-year-old version of me. Today, I write to be the woman she always knew she would become, to let her voice be heard, and to give others permission to raise theirs.
[image error]If you ask me? I’m speaking up. was originally published in CRY Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
Suicide Was My Response to My First Loss of A Great Love
A lifetime’s longing for love and consortium realized, then snatched away
April 7, 2022
April 6, 2022
New York is always new
Art by Agnes (Author)It’s a city that is always changing. It’s like how they tell us all our body cells renew every seven or ten years, and so do the city’s cells. While I don’t know the scientific renewal rate in New York, I would guess it takes less than a decade. Take a walk down any street and you can see scaffolds and construction crews, machines, and bright yellow “area under construction” signs.
New York renews its cells in front of our eyes and loud enough for all to hear.
When I arrived in the city a couple of weeks ago, I didn’t really know what I was looking for. Maybe I was just running away from my routine. I had an old ticket the pandemic had hit pause on, and after many calls, mercury retrogrades, and a customer rep hero, my ticket was moved to the last week of March. For all the to-do’s I had before getting on the plane, there were none when I got off.
Undeterred by the not-so-warm welcome, I (added a lot of layers to my “spring” outfit and) set out to explore. I tried to find the city I loved in all the places I’d visited before, but it wasn’t there.
The weather was different. The spring weather was there before my trip and it was thereafter, but I got the freakish cold streak.
People were different. Maybe it was the weather, maybe it was post-pandemic stress. I don’t know what it was; I can only guess.
Places were different. Hidden gems had been bared and full of tourists. Not tourists like me, happy to walk like ghosts at NY speed, quietly, barely seen. The other kind, the loud kind, the kind that stops in the middle of the street for fifty selfies and knocks you with their handful of bags. No judgment here. You-do-you-philosophy and all that, but it wasn’t what I wanted.
New York is always new. It doesn’t hold up to your old sketch. Embrace the chaos it seemed to say. My mother, the wise woman that she is said, “it’s a new trip, just do new things.” So I tried that. I tried to embrace the chaos. I tried to go with the flow.
I would leave the hotel at eight am and walk. And walk and walk and walk. I let the morning madness move on the weekdays, marveling at the empty avenues on the weekend.
The city is always moving and I moved with it. But the city doesn’t tire and I do. I found myself trying to catch my breath. End of the day (defined by the time when it’s a little dark and a lot colder than I can handle), I’d collapse on my bed, and if I closed my eyes, I could almost see the next street up ahead, the cars driving by, and the sea of people moving around me.
I never stopped walking. There was always another sight, another “saved” location on my Google Maps until I went to the park, sat on a swing, and breathed. I remembered I was on holiday. I remembered this madness was not my madness and that my madness was many miles away. I remembered it was okay to stay still. After that, I saw a play, and I sat still for more than two hours, and it was perfection. I felt all the feelings. I laughed and cried and got swept away by the beauty of the music and the production. That night, I walked back to the hotel, freezing but not rushing. I went up to the rooftop, and for the first time in a week, or maybe longer even, I heard silence. The city was merely a hum below. It was not overwhelming anymore. I could see endless windows of all sizes and golden hues that looked like stars if I squinted. So I squinted.
I squinted and breathed.
If I tried, I could see people in the windows and I wondered how they did it: how they live here. If they embrace the chaos or they just know how to avoid it if they try to control it or if they are numb to it. I never thought my city would feel chill, but next to New York it did. I don’t know what I was looking for when I left, but I could see what I got: perspective.
[image error]New York is always new was originally published in CRY Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
