A Collection of Musings: On Knowledge, Life, Love and Poetry

By John Espinoza

Having just found the path to self-publishing, it all seems like an incredibly long road traveled to reach this point, but the road makes a great metaphor for life. The excitement of a road trip contrasted with long stretches of monotony that are marred with the occasional signs of tragedy, detoured by the promises of new construction, spoiled with ruts and jagged holes that may disable you, or if you're lucky, just jar you momentarily from your daydreams. You will make pit stops because you need to eat... always with the eating. But then you're back on the road, heading somewhere; perhaps with dread but hopefully with excitement, yet either way, before long your mind loses focus and longs for distraction. When you tire and pull off for the night, the long road continues without you, and others whizz by on their own journey without ever knowing you at all.

This small collection of musings is a short ride along the highway with me, where I may ramble on during a lonely straightaway, or perhaps share a quick anecdote while sitting in the McDonald's Drive-Thru lane. I hope you enjoy your time in the car with me and will take me up on the offer to go cross-country when the time comes.

• Language: English
• Publisher: John Espinoza
• Release date: Sep 19, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301690718

John Espinoza

John Espinoza started out wanting to be a baseball player, but that dream died a quick and merciless death due to subpar skills. After giving up on his next dream of being a rock star, he worked as a musician for a short time and then tried other things like soldiering and being a helicopter pilot. He worked in the corporate world for 20 years and has contributed his DNA to four offspring. He likes lifting weights and is currently contemplating becoming a man about town.

Book preview

A Collection of Musings

On Knowledge, Life, Love & Poetry

By John D. Espinoza

Copyright 2013 JD Espinoza

ISBN: 9781301690718

Published on Smashwords

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Smashwords Edition

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Table of Contents

Preface

On Knowledge

i. Apes with Infected Brains

ii. Knowledge

iii. Ode to The Brain

iv. You Should Pass Judgment

v. A Failure to Communicate

vi: Dear Santa, I believe

On Life

i. I Remember

ii. A Trust Fall

iii. My Father Laughs at Inappropriate Times

iv. Traumatized by a Vacuum Cleaner

v. Back in the Day

vi. Soldiering

vii. An Automaton Society

viii. The Population Bottleneck

ix. The Long-Term Ramifications of Shopping at Wal*Mart

x. A Lack of Proportion

xi. Royal Baby My Ass

xii. You've Changed, Man

xiii. Autumn is Less Good Than Spring

On Love

i. My True Love? I Think Not

ii. A Love Story

iii. The American Dream is a Sham

iv. No Expectations

v. To Tweet my Weiner or Not? That is the Question

On Poetry

i. What is Time Really?

ii. The Scorpion and the Turtle

iii. Willow

About The Author

Work Cited

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Preface

Writing is something I can't seem to stop doing, even when I have nothing in particular that I wish to pontificate about. I think the challenge of a blank page, to bring up ideas and jumbled thoughts brewing deep in my brain, satisfy and reward me in a way few things can. As a musician, I was often frustrated with the inability to bring a decent composition to life, even though I was a competent technician. The creative process differs vastly from the performance process and I could never bridge the two. But when it comes to writing, while I am technically not trained as a writer, I have practiced the performance process enough to pull it off with some occasional flair, and the creative process has found the home it never found in front of the piano.

While working on an autobiographical piece about my experiences as an Army Aviator, I began thinking about assembling and publishing a collection of miscellaneous writings. Once the idea was hatched, I couldn't stop thinking about how I could make it work as a small book that readers might take pleasure in. I paused reminiscing about my days behind the controls of an OD Green helicopter and started sorting the collection you have here. Some of these are older essays that have been sitting around collecting dust, but at least they survived, unlike many that were given a proper burial when I finally emptied the trashcan on my desktop. Some are hot off the presses, written for one blog or another, and have now finally found a permanent home.

As a teenager, I wrote a lot in a spiral notebook I carried around with me. I mostly wrote poetry, including one I still recall that started out as a doodle. As my doodle became a girl in a hat, I started to write:

Little Miss Muffet was trying to rough it

And doing the best that she could

Filled to the brim with so many cares

Her mind a maddening sense of despair

That Miss Muffet just rotted away

I excelled in Creative Writing and can still remember a piece I wrote about walking out into the sea. As my character walked, he reflected on his life and the myriad of seemingly unsolvable problems he was contending with. The further out he walked, the more issues he started to resolve. His clarity of thought began lifting his spirits, but the water was deep and cold and he could feel the soft undertow swirling around his legs. He began pondering if he'd reach an enlightened state of mind, free of worry and care, before he'd drown. I thought it was a haunting little self-reflection that was meant metaphorically, but this was the 11th Grade, so after it was read aloud (everyone's entries were anonymous and distributed randomly to be read in class), someone shouted, Who the hell wrote that?

I didn't write much in college as I was playing in a Top 40 club band by night, and working in an Italian restaurant in a large shopping mall's Food Court by day. Every attempt to form a songwriting duo or trio would sizzle out before the fires ever got burning, and after a few years playing the club circuit, I was burned out. Life has a way of getting busy, and the notebook and pen sit quietly in the dresser drawer for longer and longer spans of time. In 2008 I discovered the blog, and took to it instantly and have built, filled and deleted more blog sites than I can remember. Having just found the path to self-publishing, it all seems like an incredibly long road traveled to