I find myself writing.
The time is, well, too late to be early and too early to be late…insomnia has struck again.
(Just for the hell of it I throw on “Romeo & Juliet”, the Baz Luhrman version of course. You know, the one with the fantastic soundtrack and colorfully speedy cinematography? Right, that one.)
And then it hits me…the reason I can’t sleep. The reason many of us in the world can’t sleep.
…something is missing.
(I love how Baz Luhrman takes a young, hip, violently elaborate approach to Shakespeare’s words. Because seriously, Shakespeare knew what he was talking about and that was over 500 years ago. I also enjoy how guns replace the swords in not only a metaphorical but also literal sense….fantastic.)
…now where was I? Oh yes, I’m missing something.
Often times it’s simply something to eat or drink. Occasionally it’s throwing in an old DVD, like Romeo & Juliet for example. And every now and then it’s to devour those final few spoonfuls of Pralines & Cream I tried to courageously leave for another day.
But could it be more than that..?
(When Romeo first spots Juliet through the glass of the giant fish tank…classic! And if I’m not mistaken, that song “I’m Kissing You” sold, like, a billion records the year the movie came out.)
…but I digress.
Could I possibly be missing something else? Something not as materialistic as fancy food or films? Something with more meaning perhaps? I mean, could it be that my soul is actually missing something..?!
Tybalt’s words when he spots Romeo at the party: “What, dares that slave come hither to fleer and scorn at our solemnity? Now, by the stock and honor of my kin, to strike him dead I hold it not a sin.” Wow.)
What if something deeper inside of me craves more and I just haven’t realized it? What if it’s not just a physical need, but an actual, real to life, “holy crap I should probably feed my soul” need..?
(Juliet: “My only love, sprung from my only hate. Too early seen unknown and known too late. Prodigious birth of love it is to me that I must love a loathed enemy.”)
What if I need to stop my passions of freelance photography, traveling and writing and trade them all in for an actual to goodness job? Or perhaps I should just give up on New York City entirely and move to one of three cities to pursue one of three women that could have very well been “the one”.
(Prince of Verona: “I will be deaf to pleading and excuses…nor tears, nor prayers shall purchase out abuses, therefor use none! Let Romeo hence in haste, else, where he is found, that hour is his last…Romeo is banished!”)
Maybe I should move to California to be a better father for my daughter and stop chasing my own old dreams so I can help her focus on her new ones? Or maybe I should go back to college…I never did finish. It just wasn’t my style. I learn faster than most and I’m intelligent enough…I just couldn’t stand all those strangers teaching me things I didn’t want to learn before I got to the things that I did.
(Friar Laurence: “I do spy a kind of hope which craves as desperate an execution as that is desperate which we would prevent. If, rather than to marry with this Paris, thou hast the strength of will to slay thyself, then it is likely thou wilt undertake a thing like death…to chide away this shame. And if thou darest…I’ll give thee remedy.”)
…so many reasons I have to not sleep.
…so many things that I need to do or could have done differently.
(Romeo: “Let me have a dram of poison, such soon-speeding gear as will disperse itself through all the veins that the life-weary taker may fall dead.”)
…but I guess thinking about the past is just wasting the now.
(Apothecary: “Such mortal drugs I have, but Verona law is death to any he that utters them.”)
…and wasting the now can’t be any good for your future, so what do I do instead?
(Romeo: “The world is not thy friend, nor the world’s law. Then be not poor, but break it and take this.”)
…I toss and turn and think and think some more.
(Apothecary: “My poverty, but not my will, consents.”)
…then I get out of bed and eat Pralines & Cream while watching Romeo & Juliet on DVD.
(Romeo: “I pay thy poverty and not thy will.”)
…after that I wash it all down with something to drink.
(Apothecary: “Drink it all and if you had the strength of twenty men it would dispatch you straight.”)
…then I hop back in bed and thank the Lord for giving me one more day to think about things and one more day to change things.
(A glooming peace this morning with it brings. The sun for sorrow will not show his head. Go hence, to have more talk of these sad things. Some shall be pardoned some punish’ed. For never was a story of more woe than this of Juliet and her Romeo…)
Crap.
I’m still awake.
Fidel Everywhere 