I read this from Owl City's blog today and totally understand what he means. His concert on Saturday night was also good in the sense that his music transmit a source of positive energy to people. His song "lonely lullaby" has stayed stuck with me for the past three days and will continue to haunt me until who knows when.
Cue the Sun
-Owl City
I live alone in a big house on a cozy street in a small town. It’s quiet and quaint but that’s the way I prefer it. Sometimes I pace back and forth at 2 AM and try not to think about things.
Perhaps you can relate to what I’m about to describe because it’s the kind of feeling you can sense hurtling toward you before it impacts your casual given disposition like a hammer to a bell. There’s usually a dead moment before the explosion, a lull before the storm, a deep breath before the plunge — and then the painful memory is all over you like white on rice. Something you see or read, something somebody says, some random thought triggers another thought and the whole mess snowballs… it doesn’t really matter what causes it… it just reminds you of HIM or HER, and such a sudden pang of romantic remembrance thrusts a sharp knife into your spine, a painful antithesis to the old sentimental shivers that used to shoot down said spine.
It’s funny how insomnia has a way of hauling faded memories up from the cellar of the mind, unearthing buried bits of nostalgia from deep within and spreading the broken, jagged pieces out in front of you like a display of junk at a garage sale. It makes you feel cheap and guilty when you didn’t do a thing in the world to kindle the dull burn in your veins or the sting in your eyes. Some nights the painful past unexpectedly pushes up through the floorboards like an ugly nightmarish weed, and by doing so, cultivates and nurtures an entirely new species of headache.
Sometimes I’m asked why the music I create tends to sound like it does — why the optimistic flavor? Is that because you’re an excessively happy person? Do you ever have bad days? It’s an innocent question and I enjoy answering it because music has always been my way of “dealing with life” by way of escapism. Rather than create art that mirrors the inevitable dark days I’m plagued with just like everyone, I prefer to let my daydreams carry me away into places where one can go anywhere, do anything, be anyone, in a way that only the mind can allow. And rather than express whatever angst and malaise that gets dealt my way by writing profane songs littered with curse words or crude allegories or sexual vulgarities, I’d rather spend my time imagining how immensely BEAUTIFUL this life has the perfect potential of being. Of course, each artist to his or her own, but somehow “portraying true, gritty hard reality” tends to make me sick, whatever the medium of art. I can’t even watch an R-rated movie without feeling violated and totally nasty.
Regardless of circumstance, attempting to usurp the emerging enmity between yourself and the past is like trying to fight an endless army of vampires back up the attic stairs, armed only with a rolled up newspaper. Little can be done to avoid such sudden “attacks” if you can call them that, and what exactly are you supposed to do when they occur? Let them dishearten and harrow you until they’ve lost their perceived potency and you feel yourself caught in a slow death grind where compromise is inevitable? Do you battle the onrush back long enough to slam the attic door and lock it down with the biggest padlock you can find? And then what? How do you get rid of the key? Do you hide it in the bottom drawer you never use? Do you bury it in the garden under the lilacs? It’s only a matter of time until they break down the attic door, in which case it means you either run… or wait for them.
Memories are tough things to consciously ignore, especially the sad variety. They’re difficult to predict, hard to forecast, and once the downpour begins, it’s impossible to stay dry. Angry clouds jam together in the overcast like newly felled timber logs floating downriver, headed for a network of rapids, spillways, waterfalls, and ultimately the saw.
This is a depressing way to end a blog entry, especially for someone who just told you he prefers to skip the depressing junk. Cloudy days are terribly unavoidable and thus, I keep a line of text printed on the front of my mind to keep myself remembering why I continually strive to gaze past the thunderheads and on into a world beyond reality.
“Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For His sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in Him.”
- Philippians 3:8-9 (ESV)
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As I had a final on Tuesday and two presentations plus a group paper due on Friday, I was quite clouded by school and didn't have time to talk or "chill" with friends. Despite of that, I received numerous text messages that encouraged me to move forward and continue persevering through the "dark ages" as I'd like to call it. As a matter of fact, one of the most encouraging and caring phone calls that came through to me this week was from Billy, my friend and ex-coworker whom I didn't talk to for the last couple of months. Originally he tried to reach me by cell-phone, but since I didn't pick up his call (meanie me, when I saw him on my call display I chose to ignore it because I wanted to work on my paper =___="), he called me again at home and made his point across that I could always rely on him to take care of my mom for transportation during the time period that I am gone in Sweden. I thought it was quite sweet of him to do that, as he already has a lot on hand to take care of but he's still willing to take care of my mom. 
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