Twenty-Something Year Old Journalist

The following three pieces were written during my time in Spain. With a notebook in hand and settings that sparked moments of personal introspection and exploration, I dove into the complexities of human connection, the role of art, and the vulnerability that comes with creating. These are unfiltered and unedited thoughts that surfaced in these quiet, personal moments.  

---

From a Park Bench in Madrid

Art is about capturing the very essence of what makes life, life. The complexities of the human mind, the intricate emotions that have layers beyond belief. We all have a story, a past, we all have thoughts, feelings, and wishes that may never be fully understood. We all want to be happy; so badly, so painfully. Happiness is different for everyone. We pass so many individuals on a daily basis. Some we share a smile or laugh with, some we maybe share a few words, even maybe some eye rolls. But each individual has their own life, their own journey, their own thoughts and experiences. I will never know you, you will never know me, we may not be able to ever truly be ‘seen.’ But isn’t that the human experience? To recognize that it really is just you. Just you in this massively large and complicated world. Everyone who has ever shared this Earth was simply living their own life— maybe to their own accord, maybe to others. But despite that, what we all have is ourselves and the recognition that we are all trying our very best and all trying to make use, derive meaning, make sense of what it means to be alive. 

Even as I sit on a park bench in Madrid, Spain, trying to appreciate the beauty around me, I can’t help but stop and look when someone walks by. To think they are experiencing the same thing as I. To think we are looking at the same tree, walking on the same dirt path, feeling the same cold breeze as each other— yet it is all different. Maybe this is someone’s everyday commute, maybe it’s that couple’s anniversary trip, maybe that man is trying to find meaning, a reason to stay. I don’t know how any of these people are taking in the same physical surroundings as I, and I never will. All I can recognize in front of me is that these— we, are all complex creatures with mazes and knots and connections and strings within us, guiding us on how we see and interact with the world. To be alive, to be human, is simply to be. Simply to exist. Simply to recognize that at the end of the day it is simply just you. Just you with your own thoughts, feelings, and emotions, regardless of what is going on around you or who is there. You must recognize this while understanding the same goes for every other being that has ever touched this Earth. 

---

From a train ride to Barcelona

Here’s the thing— I want to create. I want to contribute something to the world. I started a blog and that has been a great outlet, but it is not enough. There are other forms of art I want to explore, want to create, want to attempt. I think constantly of Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s “The Nutcracker: Grand Pas de Deux.” His sister passed away during the creation of this piece and you can so deeply, so authentically hear the grief within the music. His ability to take one of life’s most devastating aspects, the loss of someone you love, and not only convey the complex and heavy emotions associated with it, but in such a beautiful, otherworldly way, is a prime example of the importance of art. 

Art is to create, to convey, to make you think, to take on another viewpoint. Art is what reminds us we are human. Art is what gives life purpose and meaning. 

A dancer’s ability to physically communicate, to show that music has life within it, a writer’s ability to perfectly piece together strings of words to convey a thought, idea, emotion, anything at all. A musician’s ability to create emotion and feeling from sounds, a painter’s ability to give a still image a story and a voice. 

---

From a flight home to LAX

I’m scared to write. I stare at this blank page as it screams back at me, berating me for my current inability to write, to put any string of words on the page.

It’s not that I have a writer’s block, per se, and it’s not that I have nothing to write about. I have lots I would like to write about and explore. Yet when I stare at my notebook, the fear and anxiety that moves within me is too much to handle. 

I try to recall the sun and the mountains and the light, but it’s as if I am staring into a deep, dark void that eagerly awaits my journey into this seemingly desolate, yet never ending vacuum. 

I suppose I am fearful of what words may find ease on the page. That I will lose all control and be forced to confront what words empty out. 

The fear is so great that I am unable to do anything about it. I want to write, I want to feel, I want to communicate, but I simply can’t. It is as if I am frozen in time. Both frozen in time and uneasy about what shall be there when— if— the ice melts.

It’s a bit of an oxymoron if you think about it. A feeling of complete emptiness and numbness taking up so much space, so much precious real estate in my mind and body. 

For being so abject, feeling so bare, so filled with nothingness, it completely encapsulates my every being. My every urge, my every wish, my every want ceases to exist. 

As I stare down the barrel at this blank page in front of me, I am unable to move. I am unable to write. Unwilling to find out what is beneath the surface. 

These words will have to do for now.