BECAUSE I FEEL LIKE IT.

Who am I?  My given name is Sean.  That means "God is gracious" to those few who can actually tell what names mean.  My name however means very little if there is no story behind it.  Who I am is an entirely different question from what my name is.  I have many names, and many people have named me.  One I like to call myself is Gish.  Gish is my impish side and causes all manner of trouble.  Gish likes to bite people.  Gish enjoys rather harmful practical jokes and frightening small children, but who doesn’t?  This isn’t "me" per se, but a part of my identity.  I am a being of light.  Of space and of substance.  I am everything and only one thing.  I am one.  I am zero.  I am a story.  In this story I have done many things, and there is little I am not proud of.  But I should give us a setting for our story.  I am also a Texan.  A native Austinite, as rare as they may be these days.  I live in the crotch of america.
 

Many would say that this place is unpleasantly warm, but I find it very comforting.  I love the heat.  I love the dark.  It suits me well to live here.  I have a strong connection to the land, and the location.  And here am I, the story.  The narrator.  Yet who am I?  I make things.  I make many things.  I am a maker.  I am a thinker.  I think of things that no one else would think of.  I build.  I am a builder.  The maker, the thinker, the builder, the bard.  All of these things are me.  Will these things be remembered?  Perhaps.  Will I ever be more?  I hope to be, but I get ahead of myself.  You would ask who I am, and not be satisfied with my answers.  I love riddles.  I love to play with words, so that they mean so many different things, yet they only have one true meaning.  But to know the meaning is to know me, and how many people really know me, anyway?  If I were to ask you right now who my idols were, what would you say?  Who are these people that I look up to?  Do I strive to be like them?  In spirit or in form?  I doubt very many of you could answer me that.  It’s rather unfortunate really.  I want people to know who I am and yet how many people have I told?  How many people care?  So all of this?  This diary?  These words?  This is me.
 

I love the feel of rubbing my bare feet on carpet or sand.  I’m a fairly quiet guy.  I don’t like to make a lot of noise, but I listen to everything around me.  I have excellent hearing.  Unfortunately my mind has trouble concentrating on a single voice for instance if there are other noises present.  It’s not that I can’t hear you it’s that I’m distracted, because my mind is listening to all of the sounds I hear.  I like recieving letters adressed to "Mr. Sean Ellison" because that makes me feel important.  When I open Firefox on my computer I have the same websites all open in tabs in the same order, because I like having things where I can find them.  When I put something somewhere I like to think it should stay there and not be moved until I need it again.  I’m rather lazy though.  I like to do things all at once, all the way through, or not at all.  The combination of those thigns makes my room very messy because I leave all my things right where I want them to be, but then if I don’t take the time right away to clean things up, it piles up and my room gets messy.  but everything is certainly where I can find it.  I wouldn’t have it any other way.   Unless, of course, I were to clean my room all at once.

My favorite color is green because it comes in so many vibrant shades, especially during Spring, which is my favorite season.  All the things that looked dead and depressing explode with new life and new growth, and the air is filled with a positive energy.  I can sense energy flows around me if I concentrate on it.  I can feel my own ki or chi when I focus my thoughts.  My life energy.  I can sense my own aura; my own presence.  I can certainly feel the presence of others, and I am consciously aware of it.  Most of us can feel the attention of others but we don’t think twice when we lock eyes with the person across the crowded room.  I can generally sense where a person is and vaguely what they’re doing anywhere within 20 feet of myself, regardless of whether I can see them or not.  I like mashed potatoes.  I like my food warm and filling.  I love a wonderous variety though, because I enjoy the very act of eating.  I like to chew my food.  I like to enjoy the flavors.  I can’t stand fast food because it’s not really made with anything my body needs, and it tastes awful because of it.  By comparison I’d much rather have a hand made home cooked meal.  Even a mediocre one.

I value highly concepts such as honesty and trust.  I also value freedom of expression and despise censorship.  I feel that expression comes from our very core and is a part of our true nature, and that supression of it is to make us all the same.  We’re all different because of the way we express ourselves.  We are each a unique representation of some thing inevitibly the same, and without free thinking, we cannot BE different.  I don’t care for materialism or vanity, but I know what I want and I know how I like to be.  I like to contemplate philosophy and amuse myself with unanswerable questions.  I like to consider the possibility of unquestionable answers.  I like to imagine.

I favor practicality and functionality over look and feel.  I like loose pants and supportive underwear.  I love meeting interesting people.  I love to go to new places and see new things.  I like skulls because to the ancient druids, they were a symbol of knowledge and wisdom, and to drink of a person’s skull was to take into yourself all the knowledge and memories and thoughts that made up that person.  They would fill their wells with the skulls of their ancestors to benefit from their knowledge and guidance ,and theyrespected that which the skull represented.  I respect the bones of my ancestors.  I love to find humor in otherwise unhumorous situations.  I love to laugh.  I love the feeling of getting high and getting drunk.  I still only do these things in moderation.  I’m not at all afraid of death.  I almost look forward to it, but I’m certainly in no mood to rush it.  I’m patient.  I’ll be content to wait for it.  I AM afraid of deep sea creatures.  I’m also afraid of lonliness.  I’m not afraid of heights, but I’m afraid of falling.  I actually love to fly.  I like to relax.  My thoughts are certainly more scattered than they appear here but they almost always have a common thread of connectability.  Even if it is an emotion or a certain feeling or type of situation.  I enjoy randomness.