Somewhere in the ether...

I'm not sure why it is, but lately I've been feeling more productive while I'm taking my heavy duty muscle relaxers. Or maybe productive isn't the right word; perhaps I'm fooling myself that I'm simply more inclined to create. I don't know whether its my subconscious coming out to drive or merely the "taking the edge off" effect of the medication, but I feel more conducive to sitting down and not only writing, but analyzing the ambient universe around me.

Maybe that's the sign the intrinsic creative well is dammed up: when you write about whatever is hopscotching its way across your neural pathways. Sort of a first-person travelogue of whatever the hell crosses your mind at that precise moment. Of course, give the fact that, ultimately, I'm using this blogging source as a cathartic outlet, it does rather render the point moot. Maybe its nothing more than flexing the synapses and trying not to let the mind atrophy. So, to that end, I hit the random button on not only my thought processes but on the "Ambient Music" folder on my iTunes and write about everything and nothing as I listen to things like Tangerine Dream, Tubular Bells, and Patrick O'Hearn.

So, in an effort to have a better grasp on the Lovecraftian horror that I'm intending on weaving throughout the pulp serial that I'm working on I've started reading "Supernatural Horror in Literature," by H.P. Lovecraft himself as well as "Danse Macabre" by Stephen King. Admittedly, Lovecraft's work is much more scholarly in its approach: what does mortal man fear and why? He conjectures that mankind is born with a pathological fear of what it cannot understand or "what lies beyond our ken." In a juxtaposition, King postulates that man is inherently attracted to that which scares us for the sheer, primordial rush that it gives us. He even goes on to delve into the personifications of monsters, (i.e. Vampires, Werewolves, the undead, etc.) and why we're so attracted to them. While I find this a very interesting topic, it is not as helpful as Lovecraft actually letting the studious reader understand where his head was at when he created the Cthulhu Mythos. Still I think its good to have a balanced perspective when trying to blend really scary scenarios with a good, compelling action story. I hope I can do it justice.

Okay, in the swirling Brownian motion of what's passing for coherent thought in my mind at present, I find that, toddler like, I'm already bored with my last train of thought and am waiting for something new to emerge from the wispy ether of my subconscious. Once again, I find that I'm inadvertently bastardizing Socrates' "Euthyphro," by wondering if I'm writing all this stuff down because it has value or does it have value because I'm choosing to write it down. (Were I not pretty high on 800 Mg's of pharmaceutical grade ibuprofen and Hydrocodone, I would be ashamed to admit that, for a fleeting moment, I viewed the aforementioned thought as a legitimate "conundrum.")

Damn. Has it come to this? Getting pleasantly ripped on pain medications and then jotting down whatever enters my mind?? Sad. Really. I need a girlfriend or a job. Right now, the latter is the more reasonable goal so I'll focus on it.

And, on that note, I can see that my consciousness still has enough hold over my brain to tell me that its time to sign off, and read until I fall asleep.

Tomorrow, I'll most likely print an apology for the vacuousness of this whole entry...