Thoughts on Identity

Thoughts on identity, Per Craig Keens class, modest mouse, reflections on a book we are reading, thoughts from fellow travelers, stories from fellow exiles, and tears from fellow sufferers, and my own messed up story being written as I close my eyes and write these scribbled lines in the sand, hoping that some words might stay, knowing that nothing will; 

and we'll all float on ok. 

it almost defines us, as a generation, we have generally been unwilling participants in the game of classification. The web and flow of information, culture, and story, has spread so quickly through the mainframes of our collective consciousness (via internet, technology, facebook?) that we no longer find a sense of belonging in our "sameness" of culture, or "identity," but in our differences of creating identities. 

and we'll all float on okaaay. 

It's too simple to say that we all want to be the same, and it is too difficult to say that we all want to be different, yet in the same way that we seek acceptance and affirmation, we shun conformity and sameness. The counter culture has always been a staple of each generation, and its presence has always been a testament to the fight against hegemonic forces that seek to control the way we see the street signs, read the newspaper, and navigate through life with the symbols and words they give to us. I suppose i mention this since i loosely find some identity in this "idea." But as I move forward, i sense that this loose description of "counter-culture" will lose its meaning and slip through the cracks, even as I reach for it in these words.

Already we'll all float on Now don't worry we'll all float on 

All this of course is only relevant to speak a little bit to my own story, and to speak to others that might benefit from hearing a story similar to their own, and willing to accept that in the midst of difference and the struggle for identity, we might have to allow some space for unconventional and subversive ways to arise from our discourse with identity, but also allow for hope to guide us into something that finally brings us home.

Aliright don't worry even if things end up a bit to heavy 

I am lost in my own identity, and I sense that the more we seek for something to hold on to, the more we slip. Each moment we try to stand on something, we get undercut by the moment of being just a second behind, or a second too early, or maybe you finally got there on time, only to find that the second you were there, was literally a second long.

Even if things get heavy we'll all float on 

It may be foolish of me to believe that we are all hiding, grasping, running, reaching, yearning, for something. Something. SOMEthing. SOME EFFING THING. But in my foolishness, i might be convincing myself that "something" isn't to be had, or made, or synthesized, but imagined. Imagined in a way that creates space for new or foreign experience, imagined in a way that allows for the in-breaking of difference and the other, followed by the experience of being thrown off-center into something that dislodges us to just enough imbalance forcing us to readjust our steps, to get back into focus. There is room for this imagination in our collective psyche, yet our willingness to participate is cut-off by the discipline of hegemonic forces. We are disciplined by the tides of capitalist language and structure that give us the road maps by which we translate the rest of our realities. And we seem to be stuck in between the flow of where all the fish are going, and knowing that where all the fish go leads only to death and destruction. 

Don't you worry we'll all float on 

Perhaps we need to find a way to stay a float on the slipping slide that is our identity, or we can continue to mingle our difference in the words that are not spoken, and wander around pretending to fit into something that no one even asks us to fit into. If our exclusion is too abrasive, our inclusion is even more oppressive, perhaps they work in the same proportionate measure. 

We'll all float on... 

If we are on a journey to find ourselves somewhere, and yet we constantly find ourselves nowhere in the midst of long and grueling excursions, perhaps the map that we are using to get there is a bit off, or maybe just completely wrong. We’ll never really know until we are bold enough to ditch the map, and navigate together in the dark. And maybe if we all just whistle loud enough without fear of being off tune, we will finally be able to participate in whistling the same tune together. 

All float on.....