Forgotten notes

I struggle sometimes, to connect the reasons (at least what I think were the reasons, which, given the gap of twelve years can be a bit hazy, to say the least) I first started writing this blog, and indeed the sort of things I used to write about, to my reasons for writing the once-an-end-of-month post these days and also the sort of things I write about.

On the one hand, I feel I have become less open about my life. I somehow no longer write with quite that abandon of freely holding up my thoughts to all that might stumble across them. But at the same time, I always did obfuscate somewhat, when it came to things that I held really close to my heart. By that logic, are there more things in my life today that I hold dear? :) Well, I would like to think so.

But this space, with its almost contradictory mix of privacy in the public domain, is something I do cherish. There is some part of me that likes to be able to just throw out some of the thoughts that flow and swirl within the confines of my mind onto a somewhat better illuminated medium (with all its imperfections, such as they are), so that I may perhaps examine them a little. Maybe find something new and exciting in them!

Case in point, my frustration over Chester Bennington's recent alleged suicide. I mean, OK, so frustration may not be the best way of putting it. But allow me to elaborate. Famous people have been dying from less than natural causes at a ripe old age for about as long as the idea of famous people has been around I suppose, but the 'closeness' I've felt to one of these demises has been insignificant up until rather recently.

There was the whole Robin Williams thing. And to a lesser extent Philip Seymour Hoffman. And now this. Linkin Park wasn't just any old music for me. It wasn't the peer-approved, appreciated-for-a-decade-by-the-time-I-heard-them-for-the-first-time Pearl Jam fandom. Or the disregard for Pink Floyd that was almost because it was so thoroughly universally appreciated by everyone else around. Linkin Park was fun, catchy music with sometimes powerfully relevant feeling lyrics that I could appreciate and love with no sense of judging or being judged. Unadulterated, in other words, by the need to fit in or rebel in any way to any establishment.

I my mind, the Linkin Park stuff I'm most familiar with, coinciding with my time at university and the years immediately after, were never classics. They were far more personal than that. Not distant on some pedestal, but thoroughly approachable, and therefore all the more enjoyable.

Yet, I had not listened to them for months.

Rather than going down the heavily nostalgia (and mildly guilt) driven path of listening to Everything Linkin Park for a few days, I tried to stop and think what is it that Bennington's untimely death meant to me. I have to admit I have found no clear answers. People die, sometimes people you know well. Sometimes they do things that seem impossible to understand and leave a sense of indignation. But, selfish as it sounds, I guess the pain I feel is from a sense of joy taken away. That those songs are no longer just songs I loved to listen to and still bring me a smile every time I listen to them. They are now part of a wider narrative.

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I was going to write all that the day after I first read about Chester's death. But somehow couldn't really bring myself to think about it. Too much else is going on in life to worry about rock idols from a decade ago, right. Still, it's important to take a bit of time now and again to toss a few thoughts out into the murky light of late summer nights.

Speaking of which, this is rapidly growing into a summer like no other :). I know, every season is its own thing, but some are more special than others! :D Of course, this is where the obfuscation kicks in, and I refuse to go into any further details. But life is about to change rather dramatically, and I suspect, in ways I still do not fully appreciate. 

However, in the midst of all that, it is nice to remember some things how they used to be, and how they are now, and enjoy the distance we have travelled in between :).