I turned 30 on Sunday (May 1st). To celebrate, my parents, son, brother, grandparents, and I went out to a park. We chose a park to keep it outside and hopefully avoid spreading COVID to my grandparents.

When I arrived, it was a little overcast, but we didn’t think too much of it. My dog was ecstatic about being out and about. Then the wind started to pick up. By the time we sat down for dinner, it was getting tricky to hold on to our food. Most of us had coats, so we bundled up as it started getting colder.

Then it started to rain. It wasn’t a downpour, but it was cold enough to make us uncomfortable. My mom suggested moving it to their house, which was a ways away. I asked about my grandparents’ house, which was around the corner. My grandparents agreed, so we packed everything up and relocated to their house.

Everything turned out great in the end. That got me thinking that life often goes like this. You make your plans, and they don’t turn out the way you expect. But sometimes, when you’ve got people who care about you, people who love each other and want to help each other, everything turns out for the best.

That night, I wrote How Life Goes as a reflection of the day’s events. It was nice to think about that. All the people looking out for me, and how we can all work together to turn a dreary day around.

#StoryBehind

© 2023 Sky Starlight CC BY-NC-SA

When I was a kid, I loved the show Beast Wars, a continuation of The Transformers TV series. Despite having seen only a handful of the episodes, I collected a bunch of the toys. Along with LEGO and superheroes, they were what I played with the most, even though at first, I kept having my brother help transform them.

Recently, I read a webcomic called Dumbing of Age (warning: not for younger audiences), a webcomic about, among other things, college. The author is a big fan of Beast Wars, and it comes up a lot. Every time it did, it made me think a little of how much I loved it growing up.

Finally, I decided to dig out my old toys from my parents’ house. They were quite dusty from not having been taken out in years, and the joints were a little stiff. I could remember how to transform some of them, but I had to look up the others (fortunately, I have the Internet for that).

As I played with them more, the memories of those times came back to me. The depression and stress that have become so constant washed away, and for a little while, I could be a kid again. No deadlines. No anxiety. Just me and my toys.

I wrote Back to Those Days thinking of all of that. Celebrating the brief return to those days, opening up the box of memories and smiling again. And reminding myself that every now and then, it’s good to drift back to happier times.

#StoryBehind

© 2023 Sky Starlight CC BY-NC-SA

Most of my friends are solitary people. Introverts, loners, however they label themselves, they don’t tend to reach out. It’s often up to me to reach out.

When they have problems or go through difficult times, as a result, they’ll just deal with it themselves. Or worse, ignore it and hope it goes away on its own. This is never a good idea, and no one should do this.

As I’ve always been, I’m different. When I have problems, I want to talk to people about them. In the absence of someone to whom I can talk, I’ll talk to myself about it, and resolve most of my problems that way.

I have friends, and we don’t need to deal with our problems alone. We can deal with them together, because life happens. It happens to everyone, and when it does, we needn’t deal with it ourselves. That’s why I wrote Get Through Life Together. As a reminder to everyone that, so long as you’ve got someone, you never need to get through life alone.

#StoryBehind

© 2023 Sky Starlight CC BY-NC-SA

One day when I was eight, my class played a trivia game. This particular instance had the class split in two, and my team lost. When that happened, I knew what was coming next, and I tried to hide it. But I couldn’t. I started crying, as I always did at that age when I lost. It wasn’t a temper tantrum; I was so upset that I couldn’t help but start crying. I didn’t understand why. All I knew was that no one else did that.

Jump ahead to when I was twelve. In German class, my teacher used a series of videos to help us learn, and one assignment we had was to act them out, showing that we’d learned and understood the material well enough to recite it from memory. I got the part I wanted the least, and that set me off again. I started crying, but I was old enough to know how to hide it (mostly). I still didn’t understand why I was that way. I just thought it was because I was upset and couldn’t help it.

Both times were because I was upset, although I didn’t understand why I was so upset. Why could everyone else get over it so much more easily than I could?

Jump ahead to present day. I’d long since identified that I clutched memories that involved me making mistakes far longer than was healthy, and no one likes making mistakes. But I identified a bigger problem than just not liking to make mistakes. And what helped me do that was my job.

A lot of software development is trial and error. It’s not fun when you get partway through coding something, only to realize that the entire design, the backbone of what you were doing, has a problem and has to be torn down. This kept happening to me throughout the year, as I went from one volatile component to another (this itself was a mistake). Every time it happened, I got angry, I got upset, and I got depressed. Thanks to a friend of mine, the next time this happened, I identified something so internal to me that I hadn’t noticed it: my perfectionism.

When I am forced to face the fact that I’m not perfect, I get upset. I get angry, and I get depressed. This has been going on constantly throughout my life. The two anecdotes are only two of the many examples of this happening throughout my life. Now, finally, I can identify it.

I wrote I Am Not Perfect as a constant reminder to myself that I am not perfect. And that’s okay.

#StoryBehind

© 2023 Sky Starlight CC BY-NC-SA

I write a lot about being different. I’ve always been different from everyone else, as far back as I can remember. I managed to find people a lot like me, but I was still different. We were different.

One thing I noticed was that I’d get excited when other people wouldn’t. I still do, but I’m better at hiding it. I want to express how happy I am to see someone, but I don’t want to make that person uncomfortable, so I restrain myself. Part of it is having ADHD; my emotions fluctuate more than others’ do.

I started thinking about that a few weeks back, and realized it wasn’t just getting overexcited to see people. It’s also the opposite end. When someone will tell me something, I want to be happy for them, but I don’t feel anything. Sometimes it’s because my mind is somewhere else entirely, others is because I wouldn’t care if it weren’t someone about whom I care telling me.

As I thought more about it, I remembered many times I’d written poetry to express my feelings throughout my life. In particular, I’d try to express something that has always been challenging for me to express: romantic love. Instead of saying “I like you a lot, will you go out with me?” (something with which I still struggle), I’d write a poem expressing that. I stopped when, after several attempts, my success rate remained 0%.

Even though people haven’t always understood or accepted the way I feel, I know that somewhere out there, there are people who will. I wrote My Emotions Don’t Work Right for everyone like me, who struggles with this, so they’ll know they’re not alone. Maybe people didn’t accept me back then. Not everyone accepts me now. But there are other people like me, and we all deserve acceptance.

#StoryBehind

© 2023 Sky Starlight CC BY-NC-SA

Despite having written hundreds of poems, I don't read a lot of poetry. I rarely find anyone that writes the same subjects as I do, that is encouragement, hope, etc. Instead, many other writers tend to focus on darkness, turning their pain and suffering into poetry. While it can still be beautiful, it's not what I want to read, nor is it what I want to write. I don't want to drain other people of their happiness and leave them feeling empty.

But life isn't always like that. People aren't always like that. Sometimes, it's important to remember that people are still suffering. As uplifting as I try to make my poetry, and my work in general, I don't always feel that way. While that comes through in poems such as Lost in the Storm and Anxiety, most poems that get into the weeds tend to be more like the former than the latter: they start out dismal, and end up with some sort of encouraging or hopeful message.

Instead, I wanted to write something that didn't try to hide everything going on inside me. I knew it would end up dark, but that's what I was trying to write. And this time, I wasn't planning to accompany it with something light and happy, because, as I said earlier, life isn't always like that. And so I wrote Deep Down.

To anyone worried, know that I'm okay. Depression is something with which I've lived for a long time, and while you never entirely get used to it, I can still live with it. Not everyone can, and that's why I keep writing. Because I want to help other people that feel this way. And maybe together, we can all make it better.

#StoryBehind

© 2023 Sky Starlight CC BY-NC-SA

In March 2021, I watched a movie called The Breadwinner. It’s a movie about a young girl growing up in Afghanistan in 2001. After her father is arrested, she disguises herself as a boy in order to take jobs and provide for her family. Along the way, she tells a story of a boy trying to retrieve seeds from the Elephant King.

I connected with the girl, not because of her struggles, but because she used the story to help her cope with everything happening to her and come to terms with the death of her brother. While the ending of the movie isn’t “happy” like you’d think from a fairy tale, it is positive. It also ends with a great line:

“Raise your words, not your voice. It is the rain that makes the flowers grow, not thunder.”

This stuck with me. My first thought was “I wish I’d thought of that.” After that, I started thinking of a poem. When so many people shout and scream to get attention, it can be hard to stop and think about what you’re saying.

I took that idea and wrote Words Like Raindrops not long after I watched the movie. It still serves as a reminder to me that if the words I speak are meaningful, they’ll resonate with people, and there won’t be a need to shout.

I hope it can do the same for you.

#StoryBehind

© 2023 Sky Starlight CC BY-NC-SA

I’m not on any social media. This is for many reasons, but the biggest one is that they generally fall into two categories:

1. A front for data mining
2. Too small to connect with my friends

Take Facebook. At first, it started out as a good idea: connect everyone in the world. It lets you keep in touch with people, find old friends or teachers, and share important parts of your life with everyone so you don’t have to keep track of what you’ve told to whom. But then they realized how much money they could make off the information that people put on the site. It got bigger, eating up its competition to prevent anyone from challenging its power.

Normally, I’d be okay with ignoring it. That’s what you do with a service with whose terms of service and business practices you disagree. But our society has handed the keys over to Facebook. Events frequently only advertise and provide updates on Facebook, meaning if you’re not on Facebook, you can’t participate in those events. Friends post updates on Facebook, and often overlook those who aren’t on it. Despite the outrage people express when Facebook does something they don’t like, there’s no alternative. Facebook has worked hard to make this the case.

If we want Facebook to change, we have to work for it. They’re not going to change just because we glare at them. To this end, I’ve often looked for a way to explain my problems with social media giants in a way that doesn’t put people to sleep. I can reference as many articles from the Electronic Frontier Foundation that I want, but people don’t always want to listen.

The Gingerbread House is my latest attempt to convey my thoughts. I started describing Facebook as a gingerbread house months ago, and finally started putting more words to it back in April. While in general I try to avoid poems that are so heavy on metaphor that it’s not clear as to what they’re referring, I wanted to express my views on not only Facebook, but on many of the big social media companies.

Social media is a great idea. But for now, at least for me, the cost is too great.

#StoryBehind

© 2023 Sky Starlight CC BY-NC-SA

I was born and raised in Fairport, NY. I must’ve gone over the Fairport Liftbridge hundreds of times in my life, but never thought much of it. It was a bridge, there to allow me to get from one place to another.

In September 2019, the Fairport Liftbridge went down for construction. For various reasons, it needed work done on it, so it got taken out, leaving a gash through the town. This naturally left many people annoyed, not only because it was inconvenient, but because it diverted traffic away from Main Street.

The COVID-19 Pandemic slowed down construction, pushing it out months. On Friday, July 3rd, the liftbridge reopened, with officials holding a ribbon cutting ceremony to honor the occasion.

I didn’t realize how excited I was until it was happening. That important piece of my town be back after almost two years. I walked across the bridge a few days later and looked around. It felt like life was returning to the town, not only coming out of the pandemic, but from having the bridge back.

I wrote More Than a Bridge to honor the Fairport Liftbridge and everything it means to the community. Because, as I’ve learned from living here for so long, it’s more than just a bridge.

#StoryBehind

© 2023 Sky Starlight CC BY-NC-SA

Ever since I was little, I’ve always had a bunch of stuffed animals. I could easily bury myself in them. But the one I had the longest was Curious George. One of my mom’s friends got him for me at her baby shower, so I’ve had him my entire life. Then my aunt and grandmother each made me a blanket.

Every night I slept with them. If I went away to camp, I had to have them with me. Packing for a trip or vacation, they were one of the first things in my suitcase. Even after I moved out of my parents’ house, I took them with me.

Several months back, I heard about a charity called Project Night Night, which collects stuffed animals, security blankets, and books for homeless children. It reminded me how important such things were to me as I was growing up. As has become something of a reflex, I decided I wanted to write about it.

The resulting poem became Sleep Tight, a celebration of those three that were so important to me growing up. Even now, I know they’re always there for me.

#StoryBehind

© 2023 Sky Starlight CC BY-NC-SA