Perhaps a return? 

the crumpled ball of white lined paper with words scribbled across the face, illegible, slowly fell to the floor.    Exhausted and exasperated the man crushed another in his hands.  It too faced the same destiny, too lay there, unused and another sight of failure.  With the tip of his thumb and index fingers he reached over to the old metal ash tray and picked up the cigarette.  The smoke rose in its ghostly manner swaying freely away from man.  The record player was playing 'La Dolce Vita' and the trumpet was swaying and the notes falling.  He puffed another smoke from his lips and the complexity of his nature, his insane infatuation with redemption, longing to reverse time, to bring back life from death was ending with the song.  As the song slowly grew faintly he closed his eyes and a torrent of tears fell off his face and onto the cold wooden floors.

the song ended...

I saw my youth slowly drip away.

you know it only took me a couple hours to lose myself that evening. As I swallowed and stomach churned with the alcohol and displayed my horrid beer pong skills and the women around me grew increasingly attractive; I had forgotten about everything. That I wasn't going to graduate anytime soon, that I was indebt and wanted so much to quit my job and just read and write.

That perhaps I could run off and leave my home.  A common idealogy in Buddhism is that attachments lead to suffering.  As I look around my living and watch my father struggle with each breathe and crack a smile at the television and my mother by his side, and my sisters slowly growing up and becoming young ladies; the realization is that this family though eventually we'll be on our own paths with roads separating.  I still cannot leave them.  The memories of my childhood haunt me but in a good way. 

I still see the ghost of my youth unfold like a play right infront of me in the empty rooms and spaces. 

I hope they never stop haunting me, because the day that happens is the day that I have let myself go into samsara.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
This is my last life, my last time in Samsara. I know it because I've had this fearless air of arrogancy and carelessness all my life. Eventually I will fade away and even some tears may be shed, those that knew nothing will whisper to each other of how young he was and about his old poor parents, some will even have the audacity to say 'what a shame'. but to those that knew anything about me, even held some minute relationship, will know.. that ...

I was told that my realistic belief in the world being black and white was mines alone.  I was told this from the other's that didn't want me to see what they were seeing.  They said I was equal, but to whom I asked and they never answered. 

I stood on the corner of Guanto Ave. and 3rd, in front of La duena's Bodega.  A robust woman with dark red hair and honey colored skin.  She was a good woman.  She'd tell me, "hoy chico toca la trumpeta."   I'd respond,  "what do you  wanna hear today  mama?" 
"Lo que sea"

"ok a lil' bit of Benny More"
I would unlock the trumpet from its leather case, gave it a nice spit shine and run my fingers across the cold metal.  I'd make my lips tight and close my eyes which hid behind black sunglasses and I would play man.  I'd play like I was at some world class venue.  There'd be thousands and thousands watching me and listening to my sad song and the story my trumpet told. 

My father never approved of my music ambitions.  He'd tell me to get a job, to be a doctor to be something meaningful in this life.  That they had left their homeland and families so their kids would have "la opportunida" as he would say.  He never went to my school concerts.  I was pretty good I'd have all the solo's.  My teacher said that I played with such fierce emotion.  I even brought him to tears once, I was improvising this piece and I dont know what it was, but something had taken over.  My fingers had become like the hands of God that created this universe, but my creation was la musica.  I recall my hair standing on its end and a rush of warmth all over my body, it was this perfection that people all their lives had try to attain.  I had it for a glimpse of eternity I was perfect and in harmony with every exisitential thing.  After I put the trumpet to my side, tears ran down, my eyes burned, and I was filled with such sadness.  My teacher too shared my tears and he turned his back and went back to his desk.  It was this metaphysical connection that took me years to realize that that morning after Papa left for work, he got a massive heart attack.  It was in the unlikliest place of all.  It was in the music store.  She told me he was arranging lessons with the owner of the store for me. 

When I play, its not only for me but for Papa. 

My ego would never let me settle with the idea that I was a failure from the very start.  Even in early elementary school I had displayed the characteristics of an average kid.  I wasn't one of great stature, athletic feats, or even one to "woo" women as easily as my peers.  I knew early on that things would never work out the way I had planned, they never do.  Perhaps my greatest mistake was to believe in myself too much.  This sickly display of optimism had blinded my rational side, my real self.  This self that I had not taken account for was my laziness, my carelessness, and lack of ambition.  With each failure that I had succeeded with I had grown familiar.  My fear of failure was nill, non existent. 

 

In high school I had no desire to do the coursework and settled for just passing the classes.  Instead I had created my own curriculm in which I believed would lead to my real education.  I had began reading, not really my initial start because I always had a fondness for reading even in elementary school.  I'd recall the librarian asking me if "The Stranger" was the book I wanted to take out and I would reply a confident "yes".  This was the beginning and thanks to my mother.  She would take me to library daily.  I'd spent hours looking through random books and another hour or so searching for the 'right one'. 

 

And so, I created a reading list in high school.  A liberal education, ranging from philosophy, art, history, and literature.  Math was never my interest or strength.  Kerouac was the early phase and he was simple enough.  Followed the Russian writers, which I still haven't been able to complete, partly because they were my favorite.  Dostoyevski, Gogol, Lermontov, Tolstoy, Pushkin, and Chekov showed me a whole new world.  They had changed my personality completely.  I didn't care about high school at all anymore, instead I thought about the world, people, society and relationships.  Connections, these connections that everyday, people would miss or ignore. 

It was a Kurosawaian rain, mercilessly pounding the ground , the kind that stung the skin, the kind that starts with a telling of a story. 

 

A figure moved swiftly across the brick layered streets of some town that is better left unmentioned.  It moved with such urgency and fear that the streets were barren and only the echos of each drop were heard.  Heart beating, racing to find some kind of familiarity in this desolate place, perhaps some corner where discovery was unlikely.