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Josh Allan Dykstra
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Just A Bit Of Silliness, Really

January 14, 20050Comments

I'm not sure what happened to me.

You should know, before I begin, that I'm one of those people that saves every email they've ever written or received. So, as you can well imagine, approximately half of my 40GB hard drive is taken up with email (just kidding, but it's really no laughing matter how far back these things go).

I was looking through my Sent Items folder and realized that I had doubles of every email I sent between the dates of March of 1999 through October of 2000 (or thereabouts). Being the technological guru that I am, I realized that was a rather large amount of emails taking a lot of space that didn't need taking.

But that's not really what happened to me.

So I'm scrolling down using the clever little wheel on my mouse (those Microsoft geniuses!), selecting every other email so I can rid my sanity of these duplicate space-takers. As I scroll, I am reading some of the email subjects... and they're funny! I never knew I was funny!

There are emails with obscure Austin Powers' references like, "No, Mini-Me, we don't gnaw on our kitty," nonsensical crap like "Wadaladabingbang," and even frightening apocalyptic things like "IT'S THE Y2K BUG - WE'RE ALL SCREWED!!!!!" I've even got one with this subject: "Mini-RE: It's a flu shot, I don't want you getting sick..." -- can you even stand the wit?? Mini-RE:... man, I just crack myself up. (Keep in mind these are just subject lines; can you even imagine the infinite depths of humor that could be contained in the email body!?)

But that's not what happened either.

As my wheel continues it's journey upwards toward the more recently written emails, I am getting the impression that I am, sadly, getting less and less funny. I am just not as jovial... I might be getting actually, kinda, boring.

What happened to me? (There's the question.)

I'll tell you what happened: I "grew up." I started conversing with quote-unquote "adults" and thus, had to obviously rid myself of the extraneous wit. Professionals have no time for such nonsense, you know.

The only problem is that I think I liked myself better before -- that person who wasn't afraid of smiling, of being a little goofy.

In a fantastic movie called Finding Neverland, Johnny Depp's character, J.M. Barrie, has a conversation with a boy named Peter that has adult syndrome — he's grown up too quickly and acts older than he actually is. Barrie creates an imaginary world where Peter's dog Rufus becomes a bear in the circus, and Peter says "This is absurd. It's just a dog."

Barrie replies, "Just a dog? Rufus dreams of being a bear, and you want to shatter those dreams by saying he's just a dog? What a horrible candle-snuffing word. That's like saying, 'He can't climb that mountain, he's just a man,' or 'That's not a diamond, it's just a rock.' Just."

It's just a bit of silliness, really.

Well, I should hope so.

A little more silliness sounds pretty good right about now.

//

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Soul

January 13, 20050Comments
So, I just finished writing (literally, just now) a new song called Soul, and, oh, am I all about moody songs right now. You know the kind: the beautiful and terrible poems set to music that elicit visions of nostalgia and fear, of joy and hatred. (If you need artists, reference Damien Rice, Patty Griffin, or pretty much any artist on the Garden State soundtrack.) I'm not sure if my songs live up to this, but it is certainly something to aspire to. I've noticed that humans have a gross tendency to scrutinize each other to the point of weakness. Where the line of fair expectation and ugly realism meet is where life seems to get really blurry. It's a mess, really. We all carry the paradoxical weight of expecting idyllic behavior from everyone we encounter while gladly giving ourselves free passes to behave however we see fit. I don't claim to understand this instability, but I am certainly repulsed by it, especially in myself. To me, everybody who inhabits this strange planet has roughly the same amount of "broken," and to expect something less or more than that is simply foolishness. Remembering that isn't easy, though. Somewhat conversely, I think everybody also has the same amount of "soul" -- the passionate essence which comprises the "who" of "who we are." Most of us spend more time burying, hiding, suppressing, repressing, or ignoring that soul than we do trying to release it, but it's in there. I know it. //

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The Beginning

January 12, 20050Comments
Welcome to my first attempt at "the blog!" For the longest time I had no idea what "blog" even meant; I thought it sounded like some kind of jello mold gone awry or an obscure Star Wars character, but no, in fact, it's THIS. So here we are and away we go... By way of introduction, my name is Josh Allan Dykstra, and I am (naturally) the person writing this. I'm not sure how you found yourself on this page; it may have been through my website, through friends or family, or from a search engine (you know what, God bless Google!), but however you stumbled across this page, I hope you'll stay. Maybe even find something worthwhile written here. I must say, however, by partial means of warning and a firm prerequisite, that this blog might occasionally offend, upset, or confuse you. It's not my intent, but we all know it happens. My goal isn't to unnecessarily trouble anyone. Honest. But that doesn't mean I won't cause necessary trouble. Hopefully, any unrest I cause will indeed serve some purpose: perhaps it will be a new idea that stretches us in new ways or something that begins a dialogue where we can learn something from each other. All of this notwithstanding, (and to avoid sounding entirely like the back of a Lemony Snicket novel) I do feel utterly compelled to write and share. And I'm grateful that you're joining me for a time on the path. I sincerely do hope that somewhere between my thoughts, the words they create, and the gentle pressure of language having its subtle effects on our souls, some transference of meaning will be gained and maybe -- just maybe -- both our lives will be made just a little brighter, bigger, better. To beginnings! //

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