In short, though the name "Travis Bickle" has become very synonymous with myself online, I sense that it no longer represents me, adequately. This became most obvious in my most recent visit to New York City. NYC was an integral part of broadening my worldview, and it seems to now be an integral part in my narrowing worldview. That poem to the right of the page sums it up quite well, as does Berry's "Jayber Crow".

After the experience of "Home Birth", nothing really looks the same, but everything seems to make more sense, especially when it comes to hope, peace, and resurrection, through suffering, pain, and death.

"Ágætis Byrjun" is spoken of, in "Heima", as " a new beginning" (symbolized on the album cover), but literally means "an alright start". The first 30 years of my life - yeah - an alright start.


Travis Bickle is certainly not dead in me, sadly, so long as I struggle with and through this post-modern cluster-fuck of lonely individuals trying to be community without full sacrifice and commitment to it - but so be it - because the Ents will not forever stand idle while being raped by our industries - and the self-destruction of globalization and industry will force us to once again depend on each other, and most certainly on God. and maybe then, doctors will no longer see birth as a "time-slot", but as our most beautiful and symbolic process, that cannot be overstated. Heima.