This quickening...

An entry from the first months after moving to the Bay Area...
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A dear friend of mine has termed this blog San Franciscan Ruminations and i feel that i've never truly delivered the product promised by those words. I wish to finally do so...

Narrowing the limitless options of self-definition: my person must represent either some aspect that we all carry in regard, or a certain personality confined to a body, absolute. And needing to choose so deliberately for this endeavor, i select the pollyannaist whose over-optimism is both easily dissuaded and shied by hindrance, as encouraged by ease and fluidity. This personality is seemingly vulnerable to subtle fluctuation, but spared many distresses self-inflicted. And this in tow with my particular upbringing creates a metropolitan anomaly, maybe.

I'm gaining and losing here in this city; it's mostly velvet as the gamblers say: i think i'm winning. This ability to be both anonymous and gregarious at whim, near simultaneously, is the heart of my heart in San Francisco. To satisfy both of these wants, and likely needs, is a momentary gift that i hold onto. I feel in some part, that i have a secret that distends my appreciation for this city life. All that i've ever lived, until now, has in some way been diametric to this paved grid littered with life. This tight mixture of sound and smell, the sweet and the fetor together, combine into something almost richer than the pure beauty i've often been surrounded by. There's something more believable about this unification, as it encompasses the human being too~ both gentle and fierce.

But, what i'm losing is my sensitivity and mild candor for all. As the world grows bigger, i grow smaller and for whatever reason, i feel less. It's survival in an overly-stimulating environment that begs for attention. We harbor more unconsciously and find safe doses for semblance and sentimentalism alike. I don't know if i really buy what i'm writing, but part of me knows that my skin is thickening. That what remains untouched is my deliberateness and calculation, but what narrows is my aptness for affection. Not absence, because it is my core, but quicker reluctance to showing it. And not just showing it; feeling it.

I remind myself not to hurry. All these things around me i've wanted at some time, and now they're here with me. Perhaps it's just an apprehensive time and all of us feel our steps are hurried, whether they are or not. Perhaps it's some American way of living. Either way, i trust it... that which threatens me and holds me strong, reassuring.