"at first you will fail then you will recognise
the mistake was in giving what you never could own
you might be young now and you might be alone
you might have one thing that you do well
and people will tell you the world it looks this way
but they're all the same they're just useless waiting here"
Hopefully this will be my last column ever… written from my old room. I lived in this flat for 20 years. I changed to another room when my brother moved out right on my 18th birthday after a minutes-long date with a girl I had the biggest crush on. She kissed me in the middle of town. We met, made out, she handed me a letter saying Happy Birthday, kissed my forehead as a farewell, then left. I went home and felt like even if I hate this room now life is kind of alright. It is. Or was. And maybe it still will be.
I hated this flat at first,
then not only accepted it but also began to love it. This was the room where I
was. Where I was myself. Where I did everything. Came up with bands, lyrics,
songs, zines, tours, shows, columns, mails. Made out, loved, cried after break
ups, made hour-long calls. Here slept a few dozen friends and many bands, and
that was the place where I had a breakfast with Al Burian and a cute techno
band while we were listening to CRISCO THUNDER, eating bruschetta.
This is where I learned about the whole world, but also where I
brought the whole world and this is where it opened up for me — where I could
always return and it would make me feel better even if I never left. We all are
born into a wrong place if we care too much about our whereabouts. But after
all we just live in rooms and that’s all we ever change. If you feel stuck it’s
you and not that place where you are. You can’t escape planet earth.
Now my records are boxed up and so are my books. All of my clothes
are washed and ready to be put into several plastic bags. I feel like I will
miss my mother though cause she was a great person to me. And I would be so
glad if I could tell her—and she could understand—what kind of things I did and
in which things was she my silent partner, always trusting and supporting me
and setting me free to do whatever was my thing—except when I came home with a
bloody face or puked next to my bed. To tell her also how I achieved almost
everything I ever wanted and now I’m just striving to maintain these without
selling my soul. But one of the reasons because I had to leave was just that I
could no longer hide some my feelings from my parents I just didn’t want them
to see me like this, because I wanted to hide myself and also find myself in
better shape.
The thing is I’m so far from feeling alright. There’s nothing
glorious, spiritual or meaningful in depression. It just makes you sad, tired,
and weighed down, so if you can, you’d better avoid it. I don’t even know if
I’m depressed cause I still take baths before going out and I still eat food to
be alive, although both activities seem more pointless day by day. But for some
reason I like to smell my own skin cause it calms me down. Even at a show two
friends of mine started sniffing me once and I laughed… so baths might save me,
and I want to be saved so I have to carry on.
Yesterday on my way home from a show I blast my headphones to the In A Car EP from the MEAT PUPPETS. And
it felt good. Fuck it, I gave in: I need a tote bag but will only wear one if
there’s one with the design of this EP’s cover. Music might save me. Listening
to music already did—finding myself all swept up in it and just the pure liking
of punk music.
Sometimes I wonder how much it matters if you know the person whose
whining you have to listen to. I try to believe there is a way everything
sounds interesting. I mean, I could love songs that are about things that
really don’t matter that much to me, but still every time they make me feel
that this is the only thing that exists. I even have stupid tattoos from songs
which I have no idea what their lines mean.
I’m telling you this because I was wondering about it as I jam my
friends’ solo album, which is another one of the things that is also saving me
at the moment. It’s great and sometimes when I’m really drunk I start to sneeze
to it due to trying to keep a balance between a total breakdown in tears or
being happy that I’m not alone, even with my problems and my instant loneliness
rushes. But this solo record is just too true. When you realize it’s everything
and everyone and so it goes. Sometimes there are just words what would be
meaningless out of context but knowing the person and their background they are
just even better for me, while maybe for others it’s still nothing. But in
reality it’s everything. And I would feel dissed if I had missed this album.
This is how for some people everything I do is just stupid
rambling, but for others it’s hopefully something more. When I started writing
for MRR and I sent out the columns to
my friends here they responded to me saying how cool it was that everything I
wrote about is something we had already discussed, or how cool it was that I
secretly referred to them. Maybe being an outsider made me endorse insider
things, but in the end we are all just humans making and telling our stories.
It’s all about desires, requires and communication.
Yesterday when I left my old room with the last round of stuff,
while waiting at the bus stop I almost cried. I just didn’t know what I felt or
what I should have done with these vague emotions. Heading to our new flat I
ran into my new flatmate who asked me what was wrong. I felt beaten. He said I
looked sad. And I just got amazed how much this person knows me while I tried
to hide all my feelings. I failed in communication, but he succeeded in being a
friend. I’m scared and heartbroken not just moving and leaving the old family
nest. I’m afraid nothing will change because this is just how I am.
But I also recall something someone told me once: there is nothing
I can’t do. And it’s true for all of us. So I recall many things, and I realize
this more. It’s funny how most of the times I feel fucked up, people from
different parts of my life without knowing anything about my condition just
find me to cheer me up. Getting e-mails, and nice words. Or recalling the
moment when Mariam ran her hands over my cheek and told me I have an
interesting brain. Or Francesca home taping me the second SON SKULL LP in
seconds after I blamed the internet for not leaking the album, and mailing it
to me from the other part of the world. Or having paranoid dreams and skull
fuck thoughts for a whole night, then waking up and receiving an email from
Perennial telling me they wanna send me records to review. Or my friends just being
my friends. My favorite secret terrorist editing this every month.
For a reason this time I’m noticing everyone around me, and thus
feeling guilt for not always being the person they liked. Like not answering
those lovely mails and just being flakey. Not finishing overdue things. Losing
contact with people who I would really love to talk to, sometimes they’re even
just staring right in front of me. And sometimes I fall for these weakened
moments thinking there might be some glory in sorrow and pining. But there
isn’t. There’s glory in sitting in front of a bar and talking with a person I
shared bands with for 8 years about doing yoga now and being punk forever. That
Greek smile and Szeged hug. Everybody everywhere. Band members, collaborators,
partners in crime. people I swam with once. Always just too many who just as
well as me sometimes go home and feel alone, but somehow they know this is not
the end of the world, even if it is 2012.
It has to be working on something that will always make me feel better.
I always got together with girls and otherwise felt great when I did something.
When I was putting sweat on something I liked and was proud of. It gave me
self-esteem and I was just a healthy person. Cause who likes someone who is
just wondering around in his self-generated tragedy? What scares me is
sometimes I know I’m not a terrible loser but still I feel low and I don’t know
why. It just hits me and there is weight on my chest and confusion behind my
eyes in my skull. I can feel my thoughts and fears in my body and it scares me.
For such a long time I lived my life in a bubble. I liked to call
it punk but I was just a messed up kid in love with punk. I didn’t care about
people other than my bandmates and a handful of friends, mostly outsiders of
the scene. But this doesn’t mean that now I love everyone, it means that back
then I wasn’t even talking to anyone else other than just six people in the
whole world. Although I never thought that I’m better than anyone else I just
didn’t care about the rest. They say if you like something do it with full
heart and then someone will find you. I have found myself. And I got lonely
only when I finished these things. I wanted people to find me, but now I blame
myself for being too blind to not see how many of them did. Thus while pining
in the dark and thinking hard on what went wrong I should just think about what
is still right and make efforts to turn everything around for the better. I
never was lucky, I just didn’t give a fuck about failing cause you know. Ever
try, ever fail, try again, fail again, fail better.
Thank whatever for Michael Gira and fuck the haters!
