I’m reading tons of old emails and thinking, Do we ever really change? I keep finding evidence that my character hasn’t changed, it has just unfolded. I’m remembering when I was thirteen and I got mad at Mark for not figuring out how he was going to get home from a Boy Scout event so that my […]

This post marks the end of the first unofficial jackvalentine.net hiatus and the beginning of my time in San Francisco. Here’s a rough breakdown of the past six weeks:

57% idle time in Chicago with excitement for the move at a stalemate with the tedium of last days; no energy to write
28% traveling through the midwest […]

Minneapolis. Dinkytown. Espresso Royale Cafe.
On the road–finally.
Starting to think all people are just manifestations of various archetypes; I swear I’ve met this one at least twice, and a couple first-time repeaters just walked by.
Meetings with old friends are as familiar and ephemeral as recurring dreams.
Am I as tough as I think I am? What’s […]

Seventeen days and counting until I begin the trip that will, a few weeks later, land me in Oakland. And I certainly am counting.
I’m in a lull I haven’t felt since last year before I moved to Chicago. I’m totally disconnected from this city, from these people, even from myself. All I do is wait. […]

It’s like–the word is at our fingertips, but we’ll never grasp it. We can forgive ourselves in the middle of a midwest winter, when it’s enough to just survive. But summer is the time of times. Summer is when we live and love. Summer is when anything is possible.
Summer is half over. Time is flying. […]

Traveling broke takes more work. Today I dropped cash on new bearings for the hubs on my bike, but only spent $1.06 on food. Before that, I tried to case all the places that sell bread, but almost everyone was roundabout in telling me they didn’t trash expired stuff. I don’t know if they knew […]

This city has a different pulse than Chicago. It’s not working as hard. When I pass by, I don’t catch the reek of sweat, don’t see the pit stains, don’t hear the grunts. Madison is daydreaming. Its heartbeat is slow, and its breaths are deep. It floats along.
There was a time when I would do […]

On my way to Minneapolis. For a wedding, and conveniently timed to give me space to reflect.
The past several days have been filled with disorienting and powerful interactions that had just begun hinting at normalcy, and now I will jet from the familiar-unfamiliar to land in a soup of dichotomies: concrete and flesh, tears and […]

Here we are: orphans of truth in a society that continually casts meaning aside. We felt something inexplicable–a sense of purpose like a relic of childhood–a trailing cloud of glory that began fading long ago. Yet as we grew we could not ignore a sense of mystery shrouded beneath the rules and the routines. We […]

The next day is always rough, but I have never regretted staying up all night lost in conversation.