Weekly Updates

So it seems as though I have found a way to settle into what I had originally intended this site's rhythm to be: weekly posts, sometimes more mini-posts like this one to update people on what was coming next.  Basically, I'm writing a new short story right now about the best bad decision I ever made.  It involves me cheating on my girlfriend and discovering who I really am.  

Enough of a teaser?  More soon...

Home at Last...

So I'm finally home in lovely Rancho Palos Verdes, California!!  Freaking gorgeous night, too.  I can see all the stars and it's warm outside.  Anyway, I condensed all of my cell phone posts into this post to save space on the homepage.  Here is my list of texts from early early this morning until tonight when I landed...

SATURDAY, JUNE 14, 2008

All posts from now until late Sat night are sent from my cell.
finishing packing right now, will try to sleep before cab comes.

SCRIBBLED BY JONNY GOMEZ AT 5:18 AM

Finished packing. Exhausted. Someone please call me at noon, central time, to make sure
i'm awake. Flight's at 5:40, cab is @ 2:00

SCRIBBLED BY JONNY GOMEZ AT 6:17 AM

Just called my cab. Will be here in hour and a half. Hard to believe i'm now a senior in
college. It's unreal.

SCRIBBLED BY JONNY GOMEZ AT 1:07 PM

Just got in cab, on way to O'Hare. Nice indian cabbie, very talkative. Will update soon.

SCRIBBLED BY JONNY GOMEZ AT 2:54 PM

I think my cabbie is a United rep. He keeps talking about United Airlines like they fellate
you in your seat.

SCRIBBLED BY JONNY GOMEZ AT 3:10 PM

Freaking twenty bucks to check two bags. Madness. Standing in line for security.

SCRIBBLED BY JONNY GOMEZ AT 3:39 PM

Sitting on plane. On time. JetBlue flight #937, ETA 7:41 pm PST.
Will post again from California. See you on the other side!

SCRIBBLED BY JONNY GOMEZ AT 5:23 PM

AhHaha. Weight balance issue on plane. They're moving people up in rows cause we're
back heavy. I'm in last row with 2 LARGE women

SCRIBBLED BY JONNY GOMEZ AT 5:43 PM

Just landed in beautiful, sunny, Long Beach, California. Really turbulent flight...

SCRIBBLED BY JONNY GOMEZ AT 9:47 PM

Old Poetry

I was hanging out with Kacin the other day and we started going through old poetry the other had had written. Anyway, I figured I would post some of my favorite poems here:

[Untitled]

How can life confront me with these choices,

When I have been so needlessly confused?

Should I take heed of all of the voices,

I'd be left feeling senselessly abused.

I see your brown eyes, and they say to me:

"Get away from spirits haunting your past.

Hindsight is not life, you're here presently.

Find what it is you need for peace at last."

Tender words of wisdom given freely

Like warmth from a comforting summer rain.

No audible speech is necessary;

Water from Heaven washes away pain.

Wisdom can be, quite unfortunately

elusive.  It can drive a man insane.

--Jonny Gomez

June of 2003, 15 years old

Dynasty

The sun shines sweetly down

shining bright as heaven's gates.

A springtime dusk approaches,

the moon behind me waits.

He waits with ravenous desire

to steal the Light King's throne.

The sunset dims, the moon will win,

his victory trumpet blown.

Wicked stars come forth to claim

positions in his kingdom.

Yet darkness fades, the moon does know

his time to rule is soon done.

A rooster yonder crows,

behold! The herald of the morn.

The darkness slips into remiss

and thus: a day is born.

--Jonny Gomez

February of 2002, 14 years old

Anyway, those are a couple old poems that I found.  I'll probably post more under new posts to make the title look fancier, especially the poems I like a lot more than these I just posted.  Interesting fact, that first poem was written about a week before my grandfather passed away from cancer.  Poetry written after his death gets a lot darker for me...

Sent from my cell phone:

Update! Two hours till my final paper is due and I only have one page left!

Teh lite at teh ends of teh tunnel!
I sees it!!!

IQ Scores and unfulfilled potential

So I recently took a few of those online IQ-tests, and made sure to follow the actual rules, which are pencil and paper only, no calculators, etc.  Wikipedia suggested taking three tests and averaging the scores together to get your "true IQ" score.  So here are my three results:

140-\

154--> An average, or "true IQ," score of 149.33...

154-/

This handy chart on Wikipedia says that I'm "Highly Gifted."  The only reason that I'm posting this is because it reminds me of what my parents have always gotten on my case for. My parents used to always tell me that I wasn't living up to my potential, that if I were to actually try hard in school, I'd get straight As, etc. My teachers usually echoed the same sentiments, frustrated that I would slack off in their classes and still come out unscathed with either a B+ or A-. 

My older sister practically killed herself in school, she had incredibly organized notes, study guides, and to her credit got a pretty good SAT score and got into Baylor University (the first in our family to get a degree, btw, so incredibly proud of her). Then there's me, the kid who shrugged it all off, almost missed getting  his letters of recommendation and applications in on time, only to find an acceptance letter in the mail from Northwestern University.

This isn't meant to be some sort of bragging thing, and for all I know those IQ tests weren't accurate and I'm really normal IQ'd (?) at around 100.  The point is, I've never cared about grades and academic assessments because I'm an artist. Such a black and white measurement of talent or worth has always felt gross to me.  Remember, writing is my art. But then again so is filmmaking, acting, singing, and playing music.  I understand the sciences but I don't want to. I don't want to look at a star in the sky and think "wow, look at that massive luminous ball of plasma!"  I want to be able to look at a star and see a pinprick of light shining down on us from the heavens able to represent... anything and everything.

My mind wanders. My brain is constantly traveling faster than I can write or speak and I often find myself consciously thinking about something two topics from now before realizing that I'm still talking. The result is often a blank look on my face and the question, "Wait, what was I saying?" 

(Editor's note: I now pause for a moment to capitalize the "i" and change "sayig" to "saying")

Shit.  God-forbid if I get a typo like I just did right now. I have no idea where I was going with that last paragraph. I apologize.  Um... 

...

Nothing. So much for that bullshit IQ score.

Ebbs

You
inspire
in my heart
the art of the
divine; heaven
blessed inspiration
sent down to me from
you that fills my life and gives
me a reason to live like a
blind man who missed
so much life suddenly
given eyes with
which he sees
the world for
the first
time
enough
to notice
that haircut
or the way you
smile at me when
you think I'm not looking
at your eyes, your laughing
eyes that never take anything
seriously like that time I came home
so frustrated and all you could do was
laugh at me and tell me I was being
childish like you never act like a
child who sits there pouting in
a chair asking anyone who
cares to listen why no one
is paying any attention
to her when maybe
someone is there
just across the
room writing
a poem all
about the
way she
moves
him.

Creative Writing

So that last entry was an essay that I wrote in my Creative Non-Fiction class that I took in the Fall here at NU.  It was taught by the lovely Professor Fran Paden, who may very well be the greatest writing professor at the university.  I've found that English and Literature teachers tend to become obsessed with one form of the language or another at times, and Professor Paden was absolutely enthralled with the sentence. One of the first exercises she had us do in the class was to take a sentence by a specific author, such as Annie Dillard, and replicate the syntax and rhythm as best we could.  For example, she gave us the following on day 1:

"His journal is tracks in clay, a spray of feathers, mouse blood and bone: uncollected, unconnected, loose-leaf and blown." -- Annie Dillard

And here was my attempt to replicate the sentence:

"Her music is pen on paper, a rhythm of words, ideas and tone: no melodies, no harmonies, a sonata all her own." -- Jonny Gomez

It was this type of work that got us thinking about sentence structure as more than simply iterating an idea.  A sentence could be as beautiful as a poem, wrapped up in a tiny syntactical bundle and hidden away within the walls of a paragraph.  

In my senior year of high school, my AP Literature teacher used to wax philosophical whenever we ended class early. Our bags would be packed and we'd be getting ready to bolt at the first sound of the bell when Mr. Colin (yes, my Lit teacher's name was actually Mr. COLIN) would lean his tall, lanky frame against his podium at the front of the class and begin to audibly mull over the thoughts in his head. People were usually too busy checking their watches and staring at disbelief at the clock on the wall, silently willing the bell to ring a few minutes early, to pause for a moment and listen to what he had to say. On this one day, I actually listened.

"Painters paint," he began in his deep, stentorian voice. "Musicians make music and actors act. But for me... Writing is my art."

I shifted the weight of my backpack from shoulder to shoulder and leaned in to hear him better.

"I remember being in college," he continued, "distraught over the fact that I was not artistic, that my talents only leant themselves to researching and cataloguing and the sort. Then one day a professor of mine said to me, 'Bruce, don't ever forget that anything can be artful. The simple grace of the dancer is no more art than the eloquent beauty of the written word. Writing, is my art.' "

Mr. Colin glanced up at his class, all of us there physically, only about half of us there mentally. 

"Don't ever be embarrassed to embrace your art," he finished.

It was sometime after this moment that I knew I wanted to be a writer. It took me some time to figure out exactly what kind of writing would be best, but it was that moment that I remember; tall, sweater-vested Mr. Colin reliving a moment from his past while his class looked on.  Only artists become so lost in their own minds.

On Naming, or How I Became Jonny Gomez

The screech of the well-worn tires signaled the end of the line for everyone on the bus. The driver opened the door and we piled out onto the sidewalk like livestock moving from one pen to another. The scene was epic: thick fog rolled past us while the upperclassmen disappeared into the distance as if called off towards some higher purpose.

"Where are we?" I asked to anyone within earshot.

A voice from beyond the billowing fog yelled back, "This is the end of the line, Freshmen! You walk from here."

Our backs together like soldiers in a battlefield, we moved cautiously towards the sound of the voices in the distance. No one told us that high school was going to be like this.

***

Growing up in San Diego, California, I had always been "Jonathan." It was the name that was printed on my birth certificate and as far as my parents were concerned, that meant that it was the only name people could call me.

"But, Mom!" I would plead, "Joshua's mom calls him 'Josh' and even calls his little brother 'Nicky!'"

"What did we name you?" she would ask.

I knew there was no point in trying.

My parents had become deeply involved in their church before I was born and had decided to name me after a biblical character as a result.  They chose "Jonathan" because the name means "Given from God." My mother chose Jacob as my middle name because she has a penchant for alliteration. Neither one of them paused to consider what could happen should people begin to call me "John" for short until the papers had already been signed.

I finally understood why my mother tried so hard to keep others from abbreviated my name when  I entered my first day of kindergarten. It didn't take long for the other kids to realize that they were classmates with a "John Jacob"; it didn't even take all of roll call before everyone had noticed it. Recess simply could not come soon enough for them because that's when it would inevitably begin.

"John Jacob Jingle Heimer Schmidt! His name is my name..."

"That's my name, too! Whenever we go out..."

"The people always shout!"

"There goes JOHN JACOB JINGLE HEIMER SCHMIDT"

"Na na na NA na na NA!"

What was so special about a nickname, anyway? It wasn't as if getting a new nickname would have prevented the other kids from picking on me. I tried to convince them to call me Jonathan but that just turned into "Yawn-athan," Jacob became "Gay-Cub" and Gomez became "Blowmez." I learned that simply changing my name couldn't change other people's opinions about me, that sometimes "people are going to be the way they're going to be," or so my dad always told me.

***

The light from the stoplight refracted through the fog and formed a massive red blot on the other side of the street. As I stood there waiting for the light to change, knowing that my future lay beyond this final crosswalk, a fleeting memory of my first day of kindergarten flashed through my head. My eyes grew ever wider as I stared across the street.  John Jacob goes to high school, I thought to myself.

"Hey move it, asshole! It's green!" some kid yelled from behind me.

Later that morning as I sat in my first period English class, I started to think about my friends from junior high. We had all gone off to different high schools, which was fairly common for private school kids in the area, and only three people from my middle school had gone onto Palos Verdes Peninsula High School: two girls whom I hardly knew, and myself.

"Gomez? Jonathan Gomez?" the teacher asked the occupants of the room as she checked names off a list.

People began to glance around the room; most people assuming this "Jonathan Gomez" person had not shown up to the first day of class. I was lost in thought and staring absentmindedly at an Elvis poster on the wall when I heard, "No Jonathan Gomez? No Jonathan Jac--"

"Huh-um-what?" I blurted out. "I'm sorry. Here. Present."

"Okay." She checked a box on her attendance sheet. "Do you prefer being called Jonathan or something else?"

"No. Just Jonath-- uh--"

I still don't know what made me say what I said next. I had never been spontaneous before but I suddenly felt as if this were my only opportunity to change my life for the better. No one knew who I was at this school, no one had any preconceived knowledge of who I was supposed to be.

"I'm sorry?" the teacher asked.

"Jonny. People call me Jonny Gomez."

"Nice to meet you, Jonny."

It worked; but one answer to a simple question couldn't possibly erase years of being made fun of. I suppose at that point it didn't matter -- I had a new name: a name that I had chosen for myself. Whether or not I could build a new reputation around the name remained to be seen. I knew that changing my name couldn't make me a different person, but I felt that if it was a name that I picked for myself then I could build a new life around it.

After first grade, I moved from San Diego to Los Angeles. I was home schooled in second grade, beaten up regularly in third grade at a new school, and then teased relentlessly up through the eighth grade at yet another school. There was nothing about me that deserved to be treated as I was, indeed I cannot imagine anyone deserving that kind of treatment. Yet I lacked the confidence to ever stand up for myself, to push the bullies back, or stop them from being mean to other kids. No. John Gomez lacked the confidence. Yawnathan was unable to stand up to the bullies. Jonny Gomez could do anything. He was a kid that no one knew, arriving at a high school with over three thousand students from an intermediate school of less than a hundred and twenty.

Jonny Gomez was ready for high school.

On Copyrights

Just got official permission from Gijs van Kooten to use his art on my website.  I'm really excited.  Gijs is a Dutch art student from (surprise) Rotterdam, the Netherlands.  He has some really touching 3d art on his site, and i plan on incorporating it into my page every now and again.  Anyway, I'm just excited i have a new friend halfway around the world (4111 miles* away as the very very energetic crow flies).

Copyright is a very important thing to me, and is something that my professors here at Northwestern are constantly droning on about.  Little known fact: it only costs $0.41 to copyright a document, or the current cost of postage.  If and when you write something -- screenplay, stage play, really witty letter to the editor -- simply make a copy, and then mail it to yourself.  As long as you don't subsequently open it when it arrives back at your house, the postmark on the envelope should be enough to hold up in a court of law that as of the date on the letter, you had already completed whatever it was you completed.

I think Gijs may have been a bit surprised that I even asked permission, most people on teh internets just copy and take as they wish.  I just feel that if I had written something and was to to stumble across it one day, being used without permission by another rando somewhere out in the ether, it would upset me to some extent.  Now, if I were at least quoted, then I guess it wouldn't be so bad, but that's the nature of Free Use.  One of my film classes had me ripping video files off of DVDs for the purpose of rearranging and editing my own narratives.  Speaking of which, keep an eye out for a YouTube bar to appear over there on the right, soon.  I'll have links to some of the stuff i've been working on at Northwestern since i've been here and hopefully some old stuff from high school.

*6616 kilometers

The Sacrificial First Entry

Hello reader. See that date up there? That's when this was written, the very first post on my soon to be very filled blog. Either it hasn't been very long since this website was started or for whatever reason you were compelled to journey through the archives all the way to the beginning, to see how it all began. Unfortunately for you, all you're going to get is a paragraph with some words that basically confirms that the past ten seconds of your life happened.

((By the way, can you spot Jesus in the ultrasound?))

So this is it, the great beginning from whence all great stories and blogs must eventually come.  Perhaps as you are reading this the blog has already become famous, gracing the cover of WIRED for being the greatest blog ever penned (typed?).  Unlikely.  More likely than not, I've known you for some time, it's about three in the morning wherever you are, and you're just too tired to look at porn like a normal person.  Well shame on you.  As my older sister would say, there are flaccid children in Africa, so go jerk off!  Actually, she would never say that at all.  That's a really disturbing command when it isn't a cabbie screaming it.  I digress.

I feel as though it would be necessary to raise a toast, so here goes: 

"To Google, to Blogger, tried and true.

To YouTube, and iTunes, and TiVo, too.

The information age is here at last,

but this person's stuck reading blogs from the past."