Mr. Joyce Takes on the World

The Truth is Out There             I’ve been revisiting The X-Files lately. With each episode, I am reminded of why I gravitated toward this show in the first place. It wasn’t just the interplay between Mulder and Scully, though that was a big part of it. It was also the concept that one must search for answers.             As the old adage goes, “People do not seek the truth because it is lost, but because they are lost.”             Some seek the “truth” through a religious system, and feel they have found it. Others, seek the truth internally. Still, there are others who seek truths by going into the world, and exploring it. I’m into two of those categories. I explore the world, and then I reflect inwards on what it all means. Religious systems brought up more questions than they did answers. The major...

Draper's Mourning for Icarus  Part of me is embarrassed by how I've felt in the past two months. Every insecurity I have has come to the surface. My greatest fear is that I'll drive people away with them. They are my imperfections that usually have caused relationships to end. Though, truth be told, the people who couldn't accept that I'm not perfect aren't the sort of people I should have been around anyway. Part of me is reminded of what Samuel Beckett once wrote, "I suffer, but cannot remain silent." Another part of me wishes I'd just kept my mouth shut, and stayed calm. Like I should have known better by this stage in life. It wasn't just my mother's death, but everything else that has followed it. The uncertainty has caused me to shift from my usual, rational self, to being somewhat irrational. I don't want people to see that side of me, ever. Sometimes I can't help it. I think I've experienced so much ...

The Yew Tree and The Viceroys I expected to have dreams about my mother after she died. While I haven't actually seen her this way, I have had one dream. I dreamed that I had gone to Ireland by boat, in order to plant her ashes into the ground. In this dream I dug a small hole into a field near the sea. With the sound of the waves in the background, I carefully placed her ashes into that hole, and then covered it with dirt. Within a matter of seconds a yew tree stood where her ashes had been buried. It was about as tall as me, and the branches were full, and sprouted berries. I took this as a sign of growth and rebirth. Just as the ancient Celts believed that life with return with every spring, I saw this dream as a similar promise. Currently, my sisters and I are in disagreement on what to do with mother's ashes. She had wanted to be buried, but we couldn't afford it. So, eldest sister suggested either burying them, or placing them in a ma...