As I sit down to journal, these lyrics arise in me:

As I burn another page,
As I look the other way
I still try to find my place
In the diary of Jane

Breaking Benjamin, The Diary of Jane (2006)

Before I put these words down onto paper, they already feel days old, another page shelved deep down the hallway of my library labyrinth. What substance is this? I want to say that I was ALIVE once...that I had a voice...that I never could be easily shoved into a categorical box...that I was a lot like you.

Look around the Internet, what do we see? A lot of echo chambers on repeat about the heroic Us vs. the villainous Them. What else? Subscribe! Patreon! Pull out the O'Jay's "Money, money, money...money!"

Is that the totality of life? We know it's not.

1. So we say yet another thing...
2. Try hard to pay no attention to everyone else's focus...
3. Line up our sight picture...
4. And leave a mark in the diary...

I listen to Focus '80s Hits, this time around Human League's Human (1986). My Psychology teacher in high school was WRONG in '95: '80s music is stellar!

But the problem I have with it now...*sigh*...is that I am nostalgic for the past. When I listen to new wave—I'm not that way; synthesizers are the wave of the future! And its rock really is just something of the spirit I had in college. But, as for its pop? I yearn for another time: a time of Pronto Pups I suppose.

I need to shake that off. 'Cause I can't change things...and now the anthem of If I Could Turn Back Time (1989) plays on the stream.

Good! Another Climbing-Out-of-a-Trans-Am song is playing: Def Lepard's Armageddon It out of '89.

I suppose if I'm honest with myself, today isn't my world. I nestle away in the pages of history books; I reminisce of a time when the world was a better place; I lament lost connections. These days, it is more enticing to get lost in woodworking ideas, model building dreams, radiating sunsets, and becoming carried away on a breeze toward the call to adventure.

I know it's August 6th. What's today's high gonna be? 97℉? I look at current events and my heart is heavy. THIS isn't the time to think of Christmas, is it? No blanket of snow, no fat ol' man in the sleigh, no savior in the food trough.

But, I want Christmas. Joy and goodwill. A big ol' Christmas that's gaudy with decorations, memories and bubble lights! A panoramic train set! And a HEAPING HELPING of all that classic Christmas music! Making memories for my kids like I had with my all-time favorite gift: Castle Greyskull!

Yes, I'm Dreaming of a White Christmas.

I'd say a thing or two about the yuletide snacks and eggnog, but ONLY because I am so burned out on sardines. Eating them now demands the willpower of an ab workout to get through that horrible fish! This morning was 3.8 oz and I didn't want to continue the second half. And it's just depressing that I've got another one queued up a couple of hours from now. Today marks the 13th day in a row in which they either were featured in my diet or were the only thing I ate. I wish I had a dog or cat to slip 'em to, though I don't suppose the added tsp of cayenne would go over well.

I know, I know: sardines are nutritious. I get that, I really do. And that new scale I've got says good things about me. I lost 3.6 lbs in five days which again, I lost 2 lbs in 42 days with 39E! But why must this be such a practice in asceticism?! Truly, I find water fasting more enjoyable! Cayenne and SARDINES annihilate appetite. But in application, coffee and butter do a better job.

As my high school Geometry teacher lambasted us, "Keep It Simple, Stupid." Though I prefer an approach to life of "Keep It Stupid—Simple!" Technically, I prefer a Ryan George "Keep It 'Super Easy—Barely An Inconvenience.'" KISEBAI, man, KISEBAI!

Truly though, just run with burger patties and bacon with the coffee drinks!

I turn my AccuRadio attention to 1990s Country. Ahh, Reba's Fancy (1990). Then there are these words that today's music has lost:

He'd never had given much thought to dancin'
But she gave a lot of thought to bein' asked
Well he'd never been good
At comin' right on out and askin'
And she'd never been given a chance
But somethin' moved across that old gym floor
When fear was hold'n fast
And to his surprise, the words came at last

Rhett Atkins, She Said Yes (1995)

Naw, I never changed; they moved on. 90s country sounds good like it ever was. I'm still the me from then. I don't know if that genre gets much better than Alabama and—OH, and Garth Brooks' Ropin the Wind album, specifically What's She's Doin' Now (1991), something I've never heard from a streaming service until now. That reminds me of being 14 and 15 again with a Tim McGraw "A heart don't forget something like that" (1999).

While it was 30 years ago, just 'cause the world's gone done gone crazy, don't mean I gotta be. As for me regarding this "new" world, I "pop a top again" 'cause as Clint Black twanged, "Somehow we sell ourselves on love, I just don't think I'll believe my heart this time" (1992).

Cause a row of fools on a row of stools
Is not what's on my mind
But then you see her leaving me
It's not what I prefer
So, it's either here just drinkin' beer
Or home remembering her

Pop a top, again
I think I'll have another round
Set em' up my friend
Then I'll be gone
And you can let
Some other fool sit down

Alan Jackson, Pop a Top (1999)

I begin this entry while listening to Top 40: July 11, 1991. I had just stepped into my teens, 8th grade was but weeks away.

It's funny how I was just a kid in those days with my cassette singles and a newspaper collage on the wall, but this core remains to this day, just one that's far more identified. And life has given me a deck's worth of trivia along the way! I no longer have that section of this diary available, words typed up on that old 486. I miss his voice, but what did I ever know then? (what do I know now?)

I'm looking for a reason
Roaming through the night to find
My place in this world

Michael W. Smith, Place in This World (1991)

It is difficult to look back at those times. I see all the people, places, and things that are gone. We live in a ridiculous world these days—a ship of fools. Can I disembark from this Barge of the Dead headed to Gre'thor? Yes, in those days at 13, my nose was always buried deep in some Star Trek novel or something in the respective novels of Orson Scott Card and Dean Koontz. Yes, I can reference the Klingon hellish afterlife for the dishonorable because that 8th grade me is still me.

I suppose I'm an old, nostalgic fool myself, wondering why things had to ever change. I haven't, but they have—time is moving so head-spinningly fast. I want to hold close to those things that are so meaningful to me, but I know they will slip away into the sands of time just as the precious substantives did before them.

And as I ended that sentence, this song came on:

Don't be afraid, oh my love
I'll be watching you from above
And I'd give all the world tonight,
To be with you
Because I'm on your side,
And I still care
I may have died, But I've gone nowhere

The Escape Club, I'll Be There (1991)

Perhaps I ought to just sit here with a tub of popcorn with Another One Rides the Bus on repeat?

Or, perhaps I don't concede; I react like these lyrics:

So I'm gonna sit right here
On the edge of this pier
Watch the sunset disappear
And drink a beer

Luke Bryan, Drink a Beer (2013)

There's a spiritual component to this world that's often dismissed by the contemporary world, powers that I've tapped into even as an NT rational. And among the rationals, I find that their box is too small. Does this spirit not animate this flesh? Why must I believe that the spirit follows the flesh's playbook?