Michael F. DuBois

I have alot of weird dreams.

Well, we all do I suppose. But once in a while, there is one that stands out.

They must all mean something. They must be there for some reason.

A while back when I started my first year of art school, I was completely oblivious to the idea of art, the idea of creating, what it meant. I had gone to a normal high school, grew up in a quiet little town. I knew what an imagination was, I knew what paintings looked like, and I knew that once in a while somebody would be born with a talent that allowed them to draw and paint beautiful images. But that was it, that was art to me, and that’s all art is to most of the world.

But then, I had one of those dreams. The kind of dream that sticks with you, that stays in your mind, that makes you think long after you open your eyes. In the dream I was walking down a street in my town. Everything was the way it always was, quiet, not many people around, private. But as I walked I came upon this man on the side of the road who was painting a giant mural on his house. It was of nothing, just colors, just shapes, and lines, and expressions. And as I stood and watched this man paint I slowly began to realize that I was now surrounded by people, all sitting on his lawn, watching the same thing that I was. This man.

There was something therapeutic about it. The way that he was just painting, just moving the brush, feeling every stroke. His entire body was into it. He would get angry, paint tiny little precise circles and then turn it into happiness, taking broad strokes and being free with his brush. It seemed to go on, just continue, for so long until finally he stopped, stepped back, and took a breath. He was finished. I looked up at what this man had created. It resembled nothing, I saw no figures, no bodies, no shapes that I could connect with anything tangible I had ever seen during my life.

And then he said it. It was simple, but it was real

“This is what I was” he said, pointing to his work. “And this is who I am now” pointing to himself.

And that was it.

It took me a while to understand it. I wrote it down immediately after I woke up, and looked at it for days trying to save the image in my mind and not let it fade like most dreams do in time. Weeks went by, months, and nothing. The winter came, and I kind of forgot about it, I let it fade into the back of my mind. I let it go. But things have a funny way of presenting themselves at the right time, sticking with you until you finally understand it. I believe that nothing in life happens randomly, that everything has a reason, everything has a purpose and this dream was not done with me just yet. There was something I had to figure out, something I had to find, something it was trying to tell me with just the image of this man. I was going through my old journals, my old little notebooks that I keep, and I came upon it once again.

“This is what I was, and this is who I am now.” It was written down on November 3rd, 2007. There it was, in my little book, just waiting over a year for me until I finally understood.

And with patience, after all that time, I did finally understand…and it felt good. You see what that man had painted on the side of his house was what he had felt at that time, what his emotions were inside of him on that day. Every singe one of us has a life, we all feel things every day. We all go through our lives trying to make money, trying to support ourselves, support our loved ones. Most things in our world today involve some level of stress, involve some sort of hard work, both physically and emotionally, and by the end of the day we are worn down and tired. If we come home every night and just shut off from everything, if we try to just forget about all the pain and stress, it will all just build up inside of us and we will slowly just become numb from it all. But with art, with creativity, we are allowed to let it out. This man was painting his day, painting what he felt, painting what he was. And by the end, he had let it all out, put it all down onto the side of his house.

He had set himself free.

“THIS is who I am.”

I was going through my facebook today, looking at all the pictures of me that have been put up throughout the past few years, and I came upon one picture that proved everything to me. It was actually my profile picture for a while. It was taken at nighttime in a dorm room after I had just finished my homework for drawing class. It was a black and white picture, I had a t-shirt on, nothing special. I was covered in charcoal, my hair was a mess, but I had this tiny little smile that explained everything about how I felt. I looked more sane, more alive in that picture than I have felt in a long time. It was taken right after I had finished drawing, right after I had gotten all messy with charcoal and let everything I had been feeling out and onto that paper. I was happy, I was so happy, and I was alive.

So I think its time for me again to wake up, time to start creating again, time to start making more art. Its what makes me sane, what makes me feel alive, and what allows me to let go of every little thing that has been inside of me for so long. Maybe its just me, maybe I’m the only one that feels this way, but I at least challenge you to try it, try it just once and see what happens. And by saying this it does not mean that you have to go out and start painting your feelings. Art comes in so many forms, it is everywhere. Art is anything that you enjoy that expresses how you feel. Yes, it can be a painting, but it can also be something as simple as talking. Your art can be a dance, it can be a walk, a poem, a song. You can sow, you can knit, you can go for a walk, go for a run. You can take your cushions off your couch and make a fort like a child or you can even just make shapes and designs in the mist on the mirror after you take a long hot shower. Anything that lets your express yourself, that lets you get out what you feel, is art. There are no boundaries, no rules, no mistakes. And most of all, it doesn’t matter what anybody else thinks, that’s the beauty of it. It is your art, it is you, and nobody else can tell you what you should or shouldn’t do. Let it all out, make yourself free, and I bet you that by the end you will feel more satisfied, more happy with your life and who you are than you ever thought you be could. And to be honest, at least for me, all anybody could ever really ask for is just to be happy with who they are.

Here are a few songs Ive been listening to alot lately that make me feel good. I wanted to share them with you. I hope they make you happy too.

Ive been tired lately. I feel like I’ve grown up way too fast this winter, way too much in these past few months. There is this idea that since I’m young, I don’t really understand the world, I don’t understand what pain is or what it feels like to truly be sad. The truth is, although I may still be alive, although I may still have food and a house and an education, although I may still have everything that many people wish for, Ive never been as unhappy in my entire life as I have been this winter. For nineteen years of my life I was known as the one who was always happy, who was never down, who was always smiling and laughing and jumping around. Sad things would come and go, but I would always be able to find my way back to happiness. But this winter, something changed inside of me for a while. I can remember mornings when I would wake up and “I’ve never been this unhappy in my entire life” would be the first thought in my head, the first thought of my day. I lost a lot of things that brought me happiness. My dog died, my best friend. I began to worry, to think a lot about my mother, about her illness. I started to question myself, question who I was, whether or not I was going in the right direction or down the right path. The work was piling up, the film I’m working on alongside my school work was starting to become too much, too big. I’ve never been as unbelievably stressed as I was this winter. It was like the work was just endless, like there was more work in a day than there was time. My body stopped wanting to sleep, my mind blocked up, I couldn’t think of anything to write about anymore. I was growing up, more than I wanted to. I was seeing life, seeing how fast the world was, and it scared me.

I’ve never been this open, this completely and utterly true about my feelings and what is going on inside me. Especially not publicly, out in the open, to everyone and anyone. But I feel like it is necessary to talk about this past winter, to talk about how I felt, because I know that at some point in life everybody feels this way, and I want people to know that, I want them to know that everybody feels these things.

So, this is how I felt, this is how I was. I was stuck, I was in place that I had never been to in my life, and I wondered how I would get out.

Last weekend I was back at home, out of the city, back to where I grew up. I was in my parents bedroom. My father was already asleep, and I was saying good night to my mother and giving her a hug before I went back to my room to lie awake. But something was different that night. Something knew that I had been sad for too long, that spring was coming and it was time for me to let go of the winter. I cant remember the last time I had a bad dream and ran to my parents for help, cant remember the last time I thought there was a monster under my bed, but for the first time in years I laid down next to my parents and was finally able to let go, just for a moment, of this idea that by growing up and getting older I was supposed to be on my own and alone in this world to solve every problem that arose in my life. I hadn’t felt that comfortable, that real, that alive, in a long time, and for a few minutes, I just laid there and cried.

And that was it, that was all I needed. That was all it took to finally just let go. I’m not jumping around right now, I’m not laughing and smiling and joking every single second like I once did, but Ill get there. Right now, I’m just breathing, just feeling, just letting my heart beat. The snow on my soul is finally starting to melt and I’m beginning to open up again. Slowly yes, but still, opening.

Its funny, to know that all the pain in the world, all of the darkness and cold, just needs love, just needs someone to understand. All I needed, all I was looking for, was for someone to understand what I felt, and let me know that they understood. Thats really all anybody needs. I guess what I’m trying to say, what I’m trying to get across with all of these words, is that while I know all of us will feel darkness at some point in our lives, and we may all feel it in different amounts and in different ways, I also know that we are never alone. While most people don’t like to go out and tell their stories publicly and write paragraphs about how they cried in someone else’s arms, we do all still feel pain, and we all still want love. If we are ever going to survive in this world, if we are ever going to make it through these streets and still somehow feel happiness, we need to turn towards eachother, we need to acknowledge one another, and we need to not be afraid to look in the ones around us for hope. Just be there for somebody, just understand, for a moment. Because at some point, you will need them, and if you are there when they need you, they will understand when it is your turn to search for hope.

We cannot survive in this world without one another, and just as we have legs for walking and lungs for breathing, we wouldnt have hearts if we were not meant to love and we wouldnt have eachother if we were not meant to live.

As many of you have probably noticed, I haven’t written a new post in a while. I had thought about it, thought about what I could write, how I could say it. But it wouldn’t have been real, I wouldn’t have felt it. I was stuck for a little while, Ive been stuck.

Its funny, the things we feel. Looking in on other peoples lives we sometimes see the things they take so seriously as just silly, as unimportant. The things that we feel, what hurts us, some people just find pointless.

Back in December my dog passed away. And, for most people, they would look at that as something small, something that may be sad at the moment but shouldn’t matter in the big picture of life. The truth is, it did matter to me, it does. To anybody else looking in on my life, she may have just been a dog, an animal that roamed my house and that I took for walks once in a while. And looking at it that way, it wouldn’t have mattered that much that she passed away. But the thing is, she was my best friend, not just a dog. She was my sister, a part of my family. She understood me better than anybody else. I could talk to her, she would listen. She would bring me happiness, she was there when I cried, the first one I turned to when my mother was diagnosed with breast cancer. She used to make her way into my room every morning to wake me up with a smile, would find me every night before she went up to bed, and would come to me with an understanding face every time she knew I was sad. Two years before she died I moved away to college. My parents told me that for a while she slept in my room instead of theirs at night, like she was waiting for me to come home. She was everything to me, I loved her so much, and I know for a fact that she loved me back.

A week before Christmas, right when I came home for break, we found out that she had cancer in her leg. The last week of her life she slept downstairs because her leg had gotten so bad she could no longer make it up. And, for the last few nights, I sung her to sleep with the lullabies my mother used to sing to me when I was little. Christmas eve night, my best friend passed away in the loving arms of my family.

See for most people, they wouldn’t see it as a big deal. She was a dog, and dogs die, far before people do. But the thing is, they never knew what I shared with her. Nobody could ever know what I shared with her, just as nobody could ever know what you share with the ones you love.

And that’s when it hit me. That is all that matters, what I share with the ones I love. As sad as I am now and have been for months, the only reason I feel as incredibly upset as I do is because she made me incredibly happy when she was alive. There are these bonds we make when we allow people into our lives, these subconscious contracts of knowledge that at any moment that person could die. Yet still, everyday, people continue to love. Whether or not we are aware of it, we choose happiness in the face of pain and suffering every single day. In our hearts we know that although someday our loved ones will pass, the joy we share with them now is worth the pain we could feel from their absence later.

This idea, this knowledge that people choose love in the face of heartbreak, fills me with hope. It reminds me why I am on the journey that I am on. It proves to me, that no matter what some may believe, we as people are strong. By choosing to continue the love you feel for the ones close to you every single day, you are proving that love still wins, even in the face of the most fearful thing of all…heartbreak.

Put love out into the world, and you will feel love back.

Its as difficulty simple as that.

When I was little I thought my Dad was a super hero.

I’ve never seen somebody work so hard, non stop, just so the people he loves can be happy. He has devoted his whole life to my family, to me, and I am so lucky to have him as my father. Through all of the things he has taught me growing up, all of the things he has given me, there is one gift that I am most thankful for…the ability to grow up to be just like him.

There is nothing in the world better than having a wonderful family, whether that be actual relatives or just close friends. In the end, what you do to and how you treat the ones you love is all that matters.

I’m 19. My Dad is still a super hero.

This is the music video to one of my favorite songs. It pretty much explains how much I looked up to my father when I was little and how much I still look up to him today.

I posted the lyrics below the video.

Well, I’m rumblin’ in this JCB.
I’m 5 years old and my dad’s a giant sitting beside me.
And the engine rattles my bum like berserk
While we’re singin’ , ‘Don’t forget your shovel if you want to go to work!’

My dad’s probably had a bloody hard day
But he’s been good fun and bubblin’ and jokin’ away
And the procession of cars stuck behind
are gettin’ all impatient and angry, but we dont mind.

An’ we’re holdin’ up the bypass
woah
Me and my dad havin’ a top laugh
oh-woah

I’m sittin’ on the toolbox
woah
And I’m so glad I’m not in school, boss
So glad I’m not in school

Oh no

and we pull over to let cars past
And pull off again, speedin’ by the summer green grass
And we’re like giants up here in our big yellow digger
Like zoids, or transformers, or maybe even bigger

And I wanna transform into a Tyrannosaurus Rex!
And eat up all the bullies and the teachers and their pets
And I’ll tell all my mates that my dad’s B.A. Baracus
Only with a JCB and Bruce Lee’s nunchuckas

And We’re holdin’ up the bypass
Woah

Me and my dad havin’ a top laugh
Oh whoa

I’m sittin’ on the toolbox
Oh
And I’m so glad I’m not in school, boss
So glad I’m not in school

And we’re holdin’ up the bypass
Oh

Me and my dad havin’ a top laugh
Oh whoa
I’m sittin’ on the toolbox
Oh

And I’m so glad I’m not in school, boss
So glad I’m not in school

-

Said I’m Luke, I’m five, and my dad’s Bruce Lee. Drives me round in his JCB.
I’m Luke, I’m five, and my dad’s Bruce Lee. Drives me round in his JCB.
I’m Luke, I’m five, and my dad’s Bruce Lee. Drives me round in his JCB.
I’m Luke, I’m five, and my dad’s Bruce Lee. Drives me round

And we’re holdin’ up the bypass
Whoa-Oh

Me and my dad havin’ a top laugh
Oh-whoa
And I’m sittin’ on the toolbox
oh-oh

And I’m so glad I’m not in school, boss
So glad I’m not in school

I said

I’m Luke, I’m five, and my dad’s Bruce Lee. Drives me round in his JCB.
I’m Luke, I’m five, and my dad’s Bruce Lee. Drives me round in his
Aw, I’m Luke, I’m five, and my dad’s Bruce Lee. Drives me round in his JCB.
I’m Luke, I’m five, and my dad’s Bruce Lee. Drives me round in his JCB.

The trains in Boston get crowded around 5pm every weekday. Yesterday on my way home, I found myself jammed between what seemed to be thousands of angry people in one small train. I’ve always wondered what makes people so angry about being around others, why everybody in crowds always seem to be unhappy. I’m ridiculous, and in my head I always picture that there is one man that starts it all. He enters the train station really angry for no reason at all, and slowly but surely infects every single person he comes in contact with, causing a chain reaction that slowly spreads the anger to every living being in the entire train station. Maybe some day Ill find this man and let kittens and puppies loose on him so he can never again be angry. Ever.

ANYWAY. I was on the train, hundreds of people, everybody angry. I was standing, bumping into every single person around me, and probably making them even more angry because of it. I knew that at some point the angryness would find its way to me and I too would find myself in a bad mood. What I was not aware of, however, is that the day had different plans for me.

There was a lady sitting in a seat next to where I was standing. She was reading a book and once in a while would turn to her notebook and write down something she had just highlighted. She was in her own little world. Then, as happens at every new T stop, the doors opened and even more people flooded in, packing everybody that much closer together. Squeezing through all of the people came a little boy and his father looking for a seat. Among the hundreds of people that filled the train, most of them standing, there had been a seat that by some amazing odds has just opened up right next to the lady. The little boy spotted the seat and jumped right up onto it, leaving the father standing next to him.

Now for atleast a half hour I had heard nothing but angry breathing, screetching wheels and a computer voice telling me the name of the T stop everytime we stopped at a station. And then, out of now where, a human voice came from this little boy.

“What’s that?”

The lady looked up. Everybody around us looked up. With the few words that he knew, to a perfect stranger that could have been just as mad as anybody else on the train, he decided to ask her what she was holding in her hand.

“This is a book. Its my homework.”

And then, after two seconds of looking at his bright happy face, she smiled.

“That’s a one!” he said as he pointed to an L in the title of the book.

“No, that’s an L” she said, quickly looking through the book “But look, that’s a one! And look there! There’s a five!”

“FIVE!” he yelled back.

Slowly, more and more people around us began to listen in, and in time, people began to smile and even laugh at how cute the situation was. On a Boston train somewhere far underground, a group of perfect strangers shared a moment. We were all laughing and smiling, all in on the joke, sometimes even looking at eachother for a second to share with our eyes how absolutely adorable we thought it was. At that moment we were all friends, we all understood eachother. There was no hate, no miscommunication, no problems. All because of one little boy who decided to speak and one lady who decided to listen, people actually changed their emotion from anger to happiness, from closed to open, and from hate to love.

I will probably never see that lady again, she will probably never happen to run into that little boy and his father, but just knowing that for a moment in time they were able to make the people around them happy proves to me one of the most important things anyone can ever know in life…

Although anger travels from one person to the next, happiness can travel at twice the speed as long as we allow ourselves open up and feel it.

In 7th grade, a boy came into the cafeteria during lunch and announced that that the World Trade Center was no longer standing. From that day, for a long time, I hated the people of Afghanistan. I did not know anybody from that country, I did not know what they looked like or how they talked, and I did not know how they felt about me. Yet, without hesitation, I hated them.

I look back on that as the biggest downfall of my childhood life. It was a confusing time, nothing made sense, and I came to conclusions without ever putting any thought to what I was deciding to feel.

September 11th passed, a war was waged, and slowly people went back to their normal lives. My life, went back to normal.

It took me a while before I actually sat down and thought about what had happened years before. I had forgotten about the hatred I had felt towards that country, forgotten the anger I decided to show towards these people I had never met, and in my new maturing mind, I came to a new decision.

Life is all about circles.

There are beautiful circles in this world. There are circles that take the water from the earth and turn it into rain to cleanse the world, there are circles that represent marriage and the coming together of two people, and there are even circles that represent life itself, the idea that we are born, gain knowledge throughout our lives, only pass it on to the ones we give birth to before we die. And yet, among all of these beautiful continuous circles, there is one that seems to shamefully rule above all…the circle of hate. In 7th grade, I did not know anybody outside of my small town, yet because I thought that somebody on the other side of the world hated me, I hated them back. The truth is, they didn’t hate me. Not all of them at least. And yet, because a handfull of people hated me, I decided to hate an entire country because it was easier than trying to figure out the truth. And because I showed hatred towards an entire country, they slowly began to hate me back, began to hate my entire country back. Pointless, meaningless circles like this lead to nothing but wars, deaths and more hatred. Where does it all end? When is the circle broken? How do we stop hating when the hatred of the world builds stronger and more complicated every single day?

When you are in a dark room, you begin to feel hatred towards the darkness, wanting it to leave. Yet, no matter how much you yell and wage war against the darkness, the room stays dark, you get no where. However, simply light a candle and the darkness is gone. The darkness, the circle of hate, will never break until we break it ourselves. Until we decide to light our candles, until we choose love over hate and lead by example, we will always be stuck in this circle. It takes one act of courage to inspire another, one act of kindness to fill someone with hope, and until we shed our light on the ones we don’t understand we will forever be stuck in this darkness.

So, I personally challenge you, every day, to shine your light in the darkness that you find. It is not easy, and it will make no sense in the beggining, yet at the end of the day, if we have all lit our candles, there will be no darkness left to curse, no hatred left to hate, and we may infact find ourselves at the beggining of a whole new way of looking at the world.

I may not know you, I may never meet you, but I love you.