When I woke up yesterday morning, I couldn’t use my own strength to get out of bed, lest I let another muscle spasm in my back get worse and bring me right back down to earth. This two-hour long struggle culminated in me passing out due to the pain, which is a sensation I have never quite experienced before.
It felt like I lived another life for years, and woke up in someone else’s body, staring at my ceiling. A hot flash later, and some lightheadedness passing by, and I realized where I was again.
Hello from Radio Reality City! This is your host, Jake Thomas Shaw, back on the attack. As a wise man once said, “Attack your body before it attacks you!”
Boy, I can hardly remember the last time I took a crack at one of these journals. I guess that’s a good thing when you try to trend towards a more professional website. As included in the upgrades to our lovely .city address from which you now read this journal, I have also shelved away the entire section to below my About/Contact page. This isn’t to isolate it, by any means, and though a lot of people seem interested in my day to day, I’d rather my work be at the forefront. It’s still there, just takes a bit of digging.
So what’s new? I usually discuss projects or acquisitions, but I must say that the station is in a bit of a maintenance period at the moment. As a whole, production is on a big upswing, but the newer devices I’ve gotten my hands on still have some kinks to be ironed out. Helios lens needs some getting used to.
I put together my first drone build some weeks ago, was able to get it off the ground and dispatch radio telemetry to my goggles just fine, but it’s refusing to arm now. I’m in talks with BETAFPV to troubleshoot.
Putting it all together, soldering what needed it, and throwing the frame over the top is some of the most fun I’ve had on my own in a while.
Also part of the latest series of escapades is filming for a local club, the Airport Tavern. Some pretty good people out there, and maybe it’s not my scene, but man is it fun to go out and actually talk to people who’s entire lives are about music. It was weird to be able to throw out criticisms of old Simian Mobile Disco and Basement Jaxx, and get a response. Maybe not my scene. But maybe it is a little bit.
I’ve made some contacts with the Art Institute of Seattle, and have been accepted into the Digital Film Bachelors program there, so that’s awesome.
As I type this now, the menu music for Destiny 2: Forsaken plays, and the rain outside my window increases in volume.
Sometimes, things seem to line up. No matter the cervical sprain, no matter the rejection, no matter the sundrance of what you thought was normal, there’s always a way.
I think a lot of people look at life like an algebraic equation; there’s a set of variables that need to be in the exact way in order for everything to work out. As if there’s only one right answer to living properly.
It would be highly disagreeable to think that at any given moment, you have only one path forward. There’s an infinite number of ways you could live, and live well, you just have to seek opportunities. They may not come crashing down at your feet, and in fact the door may be locked to you momentarily. Does this dissuade you from achieving? It shouldn’t.
That door should be looked at with contempt, and outright disgust for its intrusion and blockage of your path.
I talk a lot about what it takes to overcome obstacles in life. Not every time that I bring it up do I bring it up for whomever might be reading this. Sometimes, I need to remind myself that 4 years ago, I was alone, afraid, vulnerable, and had no idea what life I would ever lead. What aspirations I might someday have.
Was I ever afraid of becoming something I didn’t want to? Was I afraid of running out of time? Yes and yes, and to an extent, I still am.
But every day, I wake up, and make the dreams of an 8th grade me come true. Never in my wildest dreams could I hope to think I would have ever been through what I have and be right where I am now.
Tungsten promise ring on my finger, and a copper and amethyst one on hers.
As my love’s birthday approaches, I am reminded of a weird point in my life that signaled the end of the easy. This September 14th, she’s celebrating another year lived, and fought hard for. Another year down in the flight of years to climb on your way through memories and experience. We’re celebrating a lot together, but apart.
On September 14th, 2010, I was excited to be opening up my copy of Halo: Reach, not understanding exactly what any of it meant, but enjoying it all the same. The end of an era of sleepovers, of wishing to be a YouTube star, of wanting to make short films, of experimenting with things I had no business experimenting. The end of an era where I went to school with my best friend, and the end of an age of innocence before high school would make each of us try to find out who we are.
I don’t think I found out who I was until 2014.
Lo and behold, with the advent of new friends comes sleepovers, clubbing, studio photography, going out to Seattle to go to class, and so much more. The beginning of a new era.
The beginning of Year V of Radio Reality City.
My poetry is no longer cordoned off by era, or month, no it’s all out there on its page free and ready to be scrutinized by anyone who cares to take a magnifying glass to my words. Do it, I dare you, it’s fun for me.
This limbo has not come easy, but it will leave with grace. Helios lens on my hip. Drone in my pocket. I’m ready to go forth again.
Thank you for continuing to consume reality, from all corners of this plane, and from anywhere you might see me. I’m here, and this is my city.
Radio Reality City.
Consume Reality! 