Cranium Excrement

the sheet is blank...the sky is blue.....i am a clean slate, a rebirth in Christ

I am a whole person. My body is very tired at the moment. My fingers, are thankful for the typing lessons. There is a degree of unconsciousness in the device.

My writing gained impetus 1980. My English Composition teacher, Rick Moheny, had the bespectacled face of a young owl. He had long dark hair, parted in the middle. I was one of a dozen kids in his Advanced Placement preparation class.

There are several things that Moheny told me, that I still carry with me all the time. Certain words of criticism and instruction ring true, if they have that deep, honest resonance.

I believe that he considered Connie Fullerton or someone else to be the most charming poet in class. My writing was all over the place, and he was trying to be gentle about an assignment that I didn't score very highly on.

He told me, that I had," the potential," to become a writer. What I heard, is, "there is a great writer, somewhere inside you."

Thus conferred with the proper potential, I went on to secure the only perfect score on the test. Three years later, while I was attending college, I happened to notice the young Sensei, and his girlfriend, strolling the sand at Huntington Beach.

I dragged my girlfriend, Chan, over to meet him. I was curious to learn how the other kids in class fared on the test. After all, the post-class party WAS held at my house. He said, in his ultra cool cadence, "yeah, you were my five."

Eureka! I have found it! That is the state motto. I no longer see people as acting out their hostilities upon me. I only see people as vast reservoirs of potential. When I see a young couple, all I see is the potential joy and reward in front of them.

That reminds me of another very validating 'lesson,' from a high school teacher. I remember the exact day when the light came on. I studied very hard, yet tested somewhat below average on my first big spanish exam. As I got the graded test back from the teacher, I was very pleasantly surprised with a B-. That B- grade was intensly, deeply validating. So much so, that it would be a truly crushing grade, only a year later!

See the potential in yourself. Appropriately ask those around you, to see the potential in you, as you are doing the same for them. Try it! Flirt with a cute guy / girl. Let the guy behind you in line, go on ahead. And most important, whenever you have a chance, dance a little jig, romance a little heart, and laugh a light night away.