I think my favorite album will still be Queensryche’s “Operation: Mindcrime.” This album is filled with such incredible music, amazing lyrics, and a truth of the depravity of humanity. This rock opera-esque concept album details the fall of drug addict Nikki who is swayed by his radical group of dealers to do their bidding – which largely includes or revolves around various assassinations and ensuring the growing addiction of the people of the city. When Nikki is charged with killing the ex-prostitute nun he has fallen in love with he refuses, so the group does it anyway and lets him take the blame. I love the raw humanity and the revealing nature of society’s flawed nature here.
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Life Without Music
In a word, life without music would be atrocious. I am a dedicated lover of music – almost as much as I love literature, if we’re being honest. I listen to music from cultures all around the world, from time periods as old as we have record of, and with little to no discrimination. Granted, there are some types of music I can barely stand listening to (looking at you modern country), even those are sometimes better than no music. I take a lot of inspiration for my writing by listening to music. I even find that different types of music inspire and assist me in getting into the right mindset for different genres and different tones. Knowing what I want to write can help me in many ways to pick and choose the right music to keep the mood up and flowing as well. Likewise, in the car (if I’m not listening to an audio book) I have to have music playing. I rarely embrace real silence in the world. Even nature, to me, is a sort of music. So, life without it would be indescribably hard to fathom.
Celebrating the Holidays
This is a bit of a subjective question really, but I typically like to do it up big. For things like Halloween and Christmas especially, since they’re my favorites. I listen to themed music, decorate, eat food related to the holiday and just generally make merry as best I can.
Leading
I do see myself as a leader. As an educator, a writer, a traveler, and someone who loves to help my fellow man as much as possible, I think that quality is very important. Often in today’s world people confuse being a leader with being controlling and trying to manage or even force people to live a certain way, but that is not the case. In my opinion, being a leader is more about guiding and helping other with strength, knowledge, and experience rather than trying to drive them toward your own idea of what their end should be. Making carbon copies of yourself is not the goal anyone should have in this world. We all deserve to be ourselves, and if you are indeed a leader, it is your responsibility to lead and guide those looking up to you to be themselves and no one else.
Bad Personality
Acting holier-than-thou, judging others, looking down on anyone, and lying. These things are actions and traits that pretty much guarantee I am not going to be your fan. There is no call for being this type of human and I’ve put more than one person in their place for behaving in these ways. I like to live simply and treat others well. Respect goes very far with me.
Relaxation
Personally, I find books and music to be among the most sensational forms of external stimulus to help me relax. I usually don’t do anything without some kind of music playing if I can help it. There is always some kind of music playing in my classroom, in my headphones at night, when I write, when I read, etc… These things are immensely relaxing to me. Nothing, though, is quite as relaxing as having a nice conversation and a good hearty laugh with my wife. More often than not we are in tune and our inside jokes keep up grinning. Ultimately, I have a multitude of blessed relaxation techniques (don’t get me started on my video games or moderate addiction to being in nature….), and I couldn’t be more thankful.
Giving up Words
As a writer, a lover of literature, an English teacher, and a general goofball there are a lot of potential answers to this question. Full disclosure, for those who may not know me in person, I do indeed curse. More than a little. But not quite a lot. If that makes sense. I’m a believer and I do live by faith (I shudder to say that I am religious, because I prefer to say I have a relationship with God) so there is always the conviction by those – particularly of the holier-than-thou crowd- who say you can’t possibly love God if those words come out of your mouth. Granted, the meaning behind words is only assigned by our personal and societal belief and assignment of them. But that’s a whole other subject. Anyway, I’ve done the attempts to give up cursing for lent, and I’ve stopped/cut down a lot as I got older, but there is one of those words in particular I desperately want to stop saying and strike from my vocabulary, but that’s another matter as well.
Today, the big word I think I would love to strike from my mind and my future is a simple one that we all use too much.
CAN’T
It’s a plague upon the world, if I’m being honest. It’s a crutch. One many of us use far too much, as well. I can’t do this, or I can’t do that. I can’t make it work. Some of us, my wife will tell you I’m particularly guilty of this at times in an attempt to disperse future disappointment in myself, actually use the word “can’t” before we even make an attempt. To say we can’t do something, though, is not only showing doubt about our own strengths and the intentions and faith of our creator (or the universe, or fate, or whatever your personal guiding principal is) but it is showing a lack of willingness to put forth the effort.
In a world where so many people have given up their strength and use any and every excuse possible to avoid not only failure but success as well “can’t” is one of the worst enablers possible. I want to do my best to stop saying “can’t,” at least not without making every effort possible first. It might not be the easiest thing I’ve ever done, but it’s something I CAN definitely do.
Daily writing prompt
If you had to give up one word that you use regularly, what would it be?
Holding Grudges
It’s kind of human nature to dwell on things that bother us, events or people we feel betrayed or let us down in some way or another. Sometimes it can be hard not to return to those negative thoughts about how we “should” have been treated, but it’s really not healthy or helpful. Holding grudges can be fairly common. You’ll find it a lot in nature. Wasps can recognize faces and will attack someone who threatened them, dogs and cats will fear or lash out at someone who has hurt them in the past, even elephants and other larger animals on either side of the food chain have the ability to hold an almost instinctual grudge against someone who has brought pain or negativity into their lives, so why shouldn’t we? Chiefly, because it doesn’t do anyone but us any harm. Holding a grudge against someone doesn’t affect their life in the slightest. Someone who is going to treat you poorly enough for you to need to hold a grudge against them is probably not worth the saliva it would take to spit on their face, and they certainly aren’t out there worrying about whether or not you are upset at them. Take it from someone with plenty of reasons to hold grudges, from a deadbeat dad who ran out on me as a kid, to cheating exes, to horrible bosses who threw me under the bus to save their own skins, the list goes on and on. But so does life. And I promise, it is a lot better if you live with a positive outlook.
Far From Home
I am a huge lover of travel, of course, and I take every chance I can to get out and about. My wife and I love to go to new places, and we have seen some fairly far ports of call. I do think the farthest would either be San Juan or Cozumel. I can’t help but feel like Samwise Gamgee sometimes, though, realizing when a new destination will take the place of that “farthest from home” trophy. It’s a good feeling, though, to get out and experience new places, new cultures, new worlds. I can’t wait until our next long trip!
Daily writing prompt
Share a story about the furthest you’ve ever traveled from home.
Ideal Home
What does your ideal home look like?
Realistically, I have a lot of ideas about what my ideal hole would look like. Sometimes it’s a beach house. Sometimes it’s a mansion. Sometimes it’s a futuristic palace with a bowling alley, etc.. More often than not, though, it’s a gorgeous, simple cabin in the mountains. My cabin has all the comforts of home: a fireplace in the living area and master bedroom, as well as the library, a wrap around porch, a deep cellar with plenty of storage for canned goods. It sits right beside a beautiful and peaceful creek where I can sit and read or write. There is a vast overhead view clear of trees so I can stargaze all night. I could go on…. one day!!
Damean Mathews 