3. Colby-Jack

How do you say, hey, come back? Let’s go back to when you and I would draw together. I can’t say what my (older) brother had been interested in as a kid. I don’t remember much of my childhood, and I definitely don’t know his story. But I do know that he drew sparingly: crude “stick” figures that were more like sausages with more sausages for fingers. He adapted his style to normal stick figures when he came up with the idea of “Jack the Robber.” A short-lived franchise. I still wonder where his self-made comics on printer paper went, maybe discarded with the rest of our useless junk which I would do anything to see again now.  Jack the Robber was quite the robber; he famously outran the police on the “Nimitz Freeway” and hoarded guns in his house. Lots of money bags, teleportation chambers, welding, and banks were involved. I was hired to make a poster advertising the comic at age 8. My art drastically contrasted my brother’s, but we still taped it on our stairway wall to display t...

CW: violence I remember the way you say my name. It’s casual, friendly, and amiable The words gurgle from your mouth like a fountain And we bask in them together like hummingbirds Or perhaps we are riffle beetles under a rock With the water stream sheltering us in our own familiarity. I remember the way you say my name. A barely audible whisper, accompanied By the lightest of taps to ask me a question “How’d you solve #4?” “Why’d you integrate here?”  “D’you have a partner yet?” “Are there more wheels or doors?” “Wheels,” I answer. I will never tell a soul, but I always enjoy moments like that. I remember the way you say my name. Loud and boisterous, perhaps multiple times Sing-songy, it is an aria in its loosest definition Calling my attention to an insect Or telling me a joke, its contents escaping between each stifled giggle I entertain the concept of your jest, hoping to find it funny Or to laugh convincingly enough. I remember the way you say my name. Or rather, the way you ty...

 “Life is Simple in the Moonlight” → It’s an atmosphere I couldn’t possibly replicate for you, no matter how hard I try: it’s night, but the sky is a deep cerulean blue. Dark, but as if the sun could jump out at any moment and bring the world back to life. We’re all asleep, my family and I, but my sister and I aren’t sleeping, our parents’ snoring is far too loud. We aren’t talking to each other either; it’s far too quiet. Had I gotten out of my bed and taken five steps towards the door, I would have been greeted with a captivating view of the bay, but I chose to stay inside where it was warm. I put on my headphones and listened to music.  Even today, the music I listened to takes me back. I couldn’t give you a list off the top of my head, but every so often I’ll hear a song and feel a strange sensation, like the wind against my face, or hear a strange sound like the waves falling on the shore.  what a calming view.   "Feel Again" → It’s not so much an atmospher...

  7:10pm The last of the blue sky was kissing the horizon to sleep when I left rehearsal. The horizon was blushing all shades of orange and purple, and I was glad to be out late for once. Was it me, or getting to actually stand my neck straight up and look out, and see stars. Milky way droplets on a dark satin sheet, the distance was so vast, and the walk to the car too short. I’ve never actually seen shooting stars before, but tonight was one of two I’ve ever seen.   Was it me, or was the weight on my shoulder a little lighter? The baggage on baggage has broken all our backs once or twice (let’s be real, it’s more than that). The stress aches your soul, you know. When was the last time I held a paintbrush (can’t really get away with this one, I have Art 1 every other day)?  Okay, but really. I can’t remember where I put my sketchbook last.  The air is only slightly cold, like the huff from a closing door. The ride home is quiet, a limbo between workplace and wo...

Sometimes I will just be sitting in class and wonder what our future holds for us. Looking at my classmates makes me irrationally sad at times. What if we don’t talk later in life? What if they forget me? Worse, what if I forget them? I have been having these thoughts long before I entered junior year and before the idea of college and leaving home became an impending thought.  As I am writing this I keep glancing up from my keyboard and I see classmates that I have shared classes with since seventh grade and some since kindergarten. I sometimes get embarrassed because I am almost positive that they don’t think about our past shared experiences as much as I do. The time they helped me up after I fell during band rehearsal. The many Discord messages asking if the math test was easy or if they needed to dedicate five hours to study. The chip packets we randomly share throughout history because who really wants to learn about tax cuts. Again. The minutia details I acquired over the co...

Being a younger sibling means missing out on a lot of core family memories.  Before I was born my parents and older brother lived in 3 states, 12 cities, and 14 different homes. How one family can move so much in six years, I will never know. However, this has made recalling family memories rather disconnected for me.  For example, when we decide where to go on family vacations many of my ideas are shut down because my family had already visited the place before I was born. Or, we’ll be talking one evening and my parents will bring up these memories of my brother as a child, but when they talk about me, all of sudden their memory becomes foggy.  It is not entirely their fault though, they’re getting older, and my brother was their first child. You always remember your firsts, but why can’t we remember the second.  Nobody ever remembers the second; the second person to come to America, the second person to create a painting during the renaissance, the second person to...

I am currently eating an açaí bowl.  Looking at its composition and intricacies, there are so many feelings being induced by this palm-able bowl; it's kind of poetic.  To start, sliced bananas rest slanted on top of the volcano of fruits—and other natural constituents (which I cannot name, literally). These bananas remind me of my cricketing days, the sweltering sun beating down as I spent eight hours competing while my friends relaxed in a refreshing pool. They remind me of how my body used to ache, how I cried both tears of pain and realization that I wouldn't be able to continue. They remind me of sports.  Diamond-cut strawberries decorate the plastic bowl like rubies to a delicate hand. These strawberries transport me to the days when I could say grandparents, plural. I remember pacing the aisles of red-studded-bushes in search of the perfect berry, only to realize the joy of picking strawberries has almost nothing to do with strawberries.  Pulpy gold—that most c...

Back in February I watched an intriguing series called Hyouka . It seemed to be the typical slice of life, high school genre but actually revolved around mystery and far deeper themes than a simple carefree show. What drove me to watch such a show (which was a bit outside my usual taste for thrill) was its use of color and the incredibly effective color palettes—characteristically stellar work of the one and only Naomi Ishida of Kyoto Animation.  Hyouka -- Ep. 1 Just look at her mastery of emotions. Ishida also tweaked and checked every single colored frame of critically acclaimed works like A Silent Voice, Liz and the Blue Bird , and much more, all by Kyoto Animation Studio or adjacent. Her dedication to color designing was unmatched and I could never imagine it being replicated by anyone besides her. Her extensive 26-year career largely shaped many of KyoAni’s title films and supported its reputation as one of Japan’s most legendary animation studios. Naomi Ishida died on July 18...