ghosts & admissons

a sin I didn’t care for, a sin that paid my debts, a sin that feed my children

Okay here’s a resolution for you. On New Years Eve I was driving by myself in Vancouver and stumbled across East Hastings. Now I’ve heard of this place for years and had visited it already once before on my trip, but this time I was alone. Alone, a little bored, a little miffed that my girl friend wasn’t with me at this particular moment. So there I sat with the haunting guitar of the Pixies behind the apt words of Nas as I watched the residents of Canada’s poorest neighborhood. A red light afforded me a minute to watch as they ducked in and out of door ways, around corners and from behind cars, all with a posture and essence reeking of despair and humiliation.

I remember watching the documentary by Romeo Delaire entitled “Shake Hands with the Devil” and at the point where he discussed the feeling of encountering pure evil. The film showed images of rebels crawling on hands and knees up an embankment. They looked almost animalistic in their retreat, their movement, their actions; all was really reminiscent of primates as they scrambled up this hill. Through his narrative he attached an almost spiritualistic element to them. And I too felt this in downtown Vancouver. As I watched them, they appeared as specters skulking around dark corners, shadows cowering under the intense scrutiny of headlights and feeble and fragile shells blowing in the cruel and uncompromising rain of the mainland, I believe I felt a similar phenomenon.

I met the eyes of a man, no older then myself. His leather jacket, his un kept beard, his eyes that houses everything I had ever wished for, screamed for the one thing that divided the two of us. Now if only I could understand what the missing link between us was; opportunity? humility? luck? understanding? If there is one thing I resolve to do this year, it is to understand exactly what it as in that mans eyes. If I captured but a fragment of the intensity contained with his eyelids I would be a better person. Who knew that two weak and feeble flaps of skin could not only betray their owners but pronounce to others exactly how they failed their fellow man.

Peace be upon you. Where does that leave me?

posted by El Chupacabra @ 7:52 PM