First page II

Many flatter themselves through failure. Failure is a trend nowadays. Moreover, it is a challenge. People are filing their common grounds through these social networking apps. I get asked about mine (recorded failures) pretty often and, don't get me wrong, I may have some. I have tried myself to be part of the rest. It's just that it doesn't feel entirely normal. It is still weird to my sense of what social, or trend, or challenge, mean, and I know these words may be counted as one of those but at least it will take me longer, and I can call it endeavor for my own pleasure.  It is still weird to my senses watching people watching their phones: on a table, o a birthday party, on a walk in the park; yes, a walk in the park where the sounds of the nature, or something like that, is supposed to embrace our vibes and take us along with its frequency, so we may, to put it in some words; climb into a peaceful place a little away from routines.

A little away from routines doesn't seem to be a place where we can go. It's more like putting our attention on a social app. Perhaps this responds to a need we hadn't acknowledged for not having the platform to recognize it in the past. Kind of like fashion, and then we may talk about fashion feelings. Is it depressed a fashion feeling? I don't think so but there must be something of it around. We need to figure it out. We need to figure out why we feel like obeying some sort of deconstructed gathering through social media. A question might be, now that you all have come so far with me on this, that if this feeling is actually what all these profiles talk about, or it is just our ego in need for being part of that collective thing. And by being part of such a collective thing, I take this space to understand myself on this if possible. Right now, for example, I am trying to place a few thoughts that start fading as the break time comes to an end.

Yes, I work. I'm someone's employee. An immigrant who works for someone, for someone who may never take a glance at these words... These words. These words I try to put on a certain perspective to see if I get to come around but it is more a let go. Of what? Well. Let's bring it on: I came to this country at the beginning of my forties. I lived 40 years where I was born. I got married there. I planned my whole life there. Circumstances brought us - My wife and I - to start over, to see if we can make something different from what we had, and we did. We had a son, at least one by the moment these words have been written, so you people could guess we might like another one, why not? It is because I became a parent that I want to make sense with this text. I thought my boy should have something written from me, specially if I end up getting a recognition after all. It's not that I'm on the path to it; probably I've never been but, you know, I might not be around by the time he reads this... or yes, and we'll just laugh at this and carry on.

First page

A fan spinning from the ceiling, making this iterated sound like clicking, like a metronome, yes, a metronome providing me with some tempo to place my thoughts in some memory. A summer day: hot weather, the air conditioning at its maximum, the sense in my skin in between, hot outside cold inside, I've felt it before: coming back to the hotel room from the beach, or to an aunt house from the street in Barcelona, not Spain. It’s good to be back, in my mind, I know. The pain is too real to forget it, but I’m allowed to long for a time when remembering, so why not writing it down, right? I can whisper, catch my breath, and close my eyes while sensing my son sleeping by my side. I feel inspired by him. That’s why I don’t want to get up yet.

This is my first attempt. I guess sometimes it will be in English and some others in Spanish. Should I have started long ago? Perhaps, but this procrastinating-evasive culture has got me, along with a lot of people, so immersed that we just feel bored about the idea of a long-term endeavor.

And another long-term endeavor is down as you see. Every time someone is excited at a new project in his life, this one just vanishes as scrolling down on those touch screens which keep us away from the previous feeling with all these so-called trends. Why do we follow trends in the first place? I understand that in some other time, people consumed what was available in the market through street announcements, old school publicity. Then advertisements had some power based on their influence. Anyone might state that it is still the same but I'm not fully sure, I mean, there's something further. Perhaps it is how I heard it once: if you are not purchasing the product, it’s because the product is you.

There is always something further when it comes to what we call appetite. These short-laugh-meant-to-be videos and images with which we fill up our daily perception, undermines, in a certain way, I guess, our disposition for a challenge. The word challenge itself has been changed from what is supposed to mean to us. Challenge appears not to be personal anymore. I mean, what's the point of recording yourself doing something a million more do as well? It fades with the traffic. It’s becoming in a single dot of one giant colorful flag. We could say it has always been that way, that it is so it, that perhaps this is where you find the reason why there are so many people sticking to the same choices, hoping to find that sort of abstract uniqueness through which many flatter themselves, but not in my head. I feel like I want more. I feel like wishing for a jump back in time for reading a book again at least.