Life is a balance between marathon and sprint, both are integral: if you only sprint you hasten to achieve and leave no room for error–you can only patch mistakes–while if you slowly achieve, like laying bricks each day instead of all at once, it does not matter if a few slip–the struggle is not to build the monument, but to persevere. Chase something and you will never achieve it; strive towards something greater and it will fall in place along the way.

Therefore, following this corridor of speculation, in the marathon the monument falls into your hands while you strive for something else. But if you cannot sprint, the brick laying will make dull things and nothing worth the effort will come from it–to strive towards something greater, you must sprint–no? This is the first stage of life, sprints the lightning and marathons the thunder of a primordial world wracked in storm. We waken to that lightning but it cannot sustain us and so we take on the crutch of hard work, and thereby slowly regain the senses found and lost in the lightning. To regain what was lost! What lies beyond this primordial state, once the faculties return burdened and strengthened with lessons of living?

Pain of regret and longing becomes louder and deeper and the reasons of our regret become more complex and clear, until it becomes evident the mind is coming back, and that is the indication of the pathway.

Below: charcoal leftover from a while-ago-mentioned art class and large newspaper bought on the same grounds. There's an embarrassment had when the clothes overshadow the man such that the wearer is totally insufficient for the clothes– and yet it would be a greater embarrassment to let already-bought articles languish on account of meekness. They have been bought, after all, and exercising some practicality with consideration to that gratouitous done-deed compels me. In this sense, money is the equalizer of senses: a need for financial practicality, or at least recognition of financial cost, comes about.

Charcoal is hard–getting a line can be frustrating–and yet a sense of refreshment flits from this and everything which is not 8.5in x 11in.