What's Next?

Tallahassee, Florida has been "home" for the past 15 years and Florida State University was the future. 

My future.

My preference for FSU stems from my father's involvement around the university. He spent countless hours working near several athletic programs such as baseball and football at Florida State during the 1990s. 

  

Since 1998, the ritual consisted of driving to Wal Mart for two large bags of Lays chips, two large Cokes, while plopping on a faded brown colored, torn couch for my dad and I, as we tuned in every Saturday afternoon or evening to watch the Florida State football team dominate opponents for years.

Over time, my dad and I began to explore the "Harry Potter-like castle" (Doak Campbell Stadium), and eventually, the rest of the campus and facilities. 

From the Suwannee dining room to the Westcott fountain, I couldn’t help but fall in love with the constant autumn-like ambience and the never-ending bricks. It’s impossible to feel anything less than curiosity and excitement when walking around the campus.

Then, high school crashed in like a tidal wave, with all of the pressures from my parents and teachers, and the need to select the “best” school.

But all that glitters isn’t (garnet and) gold.

My future became my present.

But this present wasn’t gift-wrapped nor did it have a beautiful red bow on top.

This present is just another station on this conveyor belt of life that I’m cruising on.

The memories of a midnight dump in the blistering, icy water in Westcott Fountain for my birthday, Saturday afternoons spent chanting “FSU” as the football team fight, fight, fight for victory, and avoiding FSU police, after roaming until two in the morning, for sketchy side entrances to facilities on campus, from sports stadiums to creepy tunnels.

Maybe this conveyor belt can carry me along to another station so I can appreciate more my moment in life.

But I don’t want myFSU experience to come through as filled with disappointment and eager to move on to the other phase of my life.

While Tallahassee will remain as my home, FSU is engraved in my head as my “home away from home”. I preferred to extend the distance between my parents and I from single digit miles to triple digit miles.

The dream of exploring a new city became a fascination and an obsession, but I’m satisfied with my time in home away from home.

College graduation is around the corner and the future becomes foggy again.

So now, I spend occasional midnights, sitting in front of Doak Campbell, with Stevie Ray Vaughan’s “Lenny” playing on my laptop to remind me of all the childhood memories I planned.

Here’s a toast to the future

Day 1

As if there wasn’t enough darkness in the world.

Friends and family members come and go.

  
Others are pronounced with a death sentence, while we watch, frightened and huddled together, Mother Nature sending us another warning to remind us of how valuable our Earth is.

“The day was ending in a serenity of still and exquisite brilliance…"

Yet, somehow, my daily five-thirty afternoon sunset drives around Tallahassee remind me that the world has endless hidden beauty. 

"The sky, without a speck, was a benign immensity of unstained light…”

So imagine how I felt reading about Zach Sobiech’s story:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sDC97j6lfyc

I learned about Sobiech’s battle against osteosarcoma from one of my friend’s posts on her Facebook. The title on the link my friend posted read “This Kid Just Died. What He Left Behind is Wondtacular”. Osteosarcoma is a malignant bone tumor that develops in teenagers. After becoming diagnosed he is given 6 months to a year to live.

As a form of closure, Sobiech wrote the song “Clouds”, which currently sits at number 1 on the iTunes charts. The happy and hopeful melody contains lyrics of acceptance, happiness, and relief. A song full of inspiration, but more importantly, hope. 

In contrast, it is too often that we discover moments of pure ignorance and brilliant idiocy. 

But a miracle does occur once in a while:

http://jezebel.com/5946643/reddit-users-attempt-to-shame-sikh-woman-get-righteously-schooled

And so there are still these precious moments of promise in which I dream that the people on this planet will understand the importance of his/her role in the overall scheme of our existence. We make positive and negative contributions to the health of the planet, and along the way, the fantasy of good existing is becoming minimized and trivialized. 

"And at last, in its curved and imperceptible fall,"

Rather than continuing the wall of cultural and/or ethnic division, similarly to Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness, we need to take the Zach Sobiech by beginning to approach every day with a little more positivity and hanging on to the dream of fighting the pressures of evil away. Even in the thick darkness, there is always a heart of light that can be found.

"the sun sank low, and from glowing white,"

Now, my late afternoon drives becoming more self-revealing and introspective because I worry that my generation will not be able to help the economic crisis, global unbalance of peace, and persistent fight for power. 

" changed to a dull red without rays and without heat.”  

The clouds have a new meaning, while the late afternoon drives matter more intimately. This sunset had the beautiful delicate shade of dull red, and without many rays, but the lack of heat to compliment the scene perfected the moment. 

Don't worry, it wasn't that dark out while I was driving.