My critical mind is active, but my creative mind is a little too silent. 

I started my new summer classes, both with a professor that I’ve only had online before. The class I took online with her sucked, but I looked forward to the subject matter this summer as both classes are related to macro practice in policy and organizing. I am not sure what I expected, but so far (one class in) they are very introductory and I haven’t felt challenged. Some of the assignments are cool, (researching leaders in the field, doing a community tour, meeting with a community leader), but once again… didn’t I ask my students in sociology to do a community tour? Go observe and analyze! 

My professor is really exciting in that she is outspoken in her political beliefs, but I also found her ability to structure a discussion underwhelming (like previous profs). There is no challenge or follow up… no building on an idea, no momentum. Instead, a list of ideas thrown on the board, for what purpose? Where is the application?

Our buy-in became apparent right away, and she seemed thrown off by this as if she were prepared for an argument that never occurred. Instead of rolling with that and building off it… “So what in your experience has lead you to that conclusion? What did you miss, what did you need?” she went on with her planned activities anyway with us losing steam all the while. 

We watched a video about how structural-environmental changes impact health… as if that were revelatory. These profs are not ready for our generation of experienced, smart people. And instead of pushing them to up their game, most of us sit back and cruise through because we are too exhausted or busy to demand a challenge. It’s disappointing for me, but I understand most of my peers –really are too busy because they have full time jobs. 

She also basically said that she saw her biggest impact in the field as her research, and felt held back by having to teach 9 classes a year.  9 classes a year… I’d love that. 

I find her personal experience *which she shares openly, helpful but I wish she would make it a discussion instead of a lecture that shallowly dives from topic to topic. I am hoping it was just the first day… but we only have 3 more in class sessions and will spend half listening to our peers’ presentations. So… what is this class really worth?  She said it wasn’t a class about “community organizing,” but why not? Why shouldn’t it be a class about organizing and policy, and if they save that for the second year of the macro program –then clinical folks are missing out, and macro folks aren’t getting the experience in the field of doing the work. It’s all a missed opportunity. The whole programs design is flawed… they aren’t organizing us, or teaching us to be leaders, instead they’ve become accustomed to people seeking a degree and cruising through the program. 

There is a table full of young christians in front of me, and I want to ask. 

I want to argue and persuade.

I want to listen and learn. 

I want to do both without jeopardizing the ability to do either. 

Instead I don't. 

One of the grossest things that has ever happened to me...
So lately I've been coughing a lot. It started when I was really sick a month ago, but now I feel like I am perpetually getting something stuck in my throat -which is annoying. Maybe it is more swollen than it used to be... who knows.
So I am about to fall  asleep, and I feel like I need to cough. Then I need to cough a bunch.  It gets irritating so I drink a bunch of water. I am about to fall asleep again, but the cough comes back. This time I don't move and just try to clear my throat, 5 mins, 10 mins... still irritating coughing.
I roll onto my back and sit up a bit, cough, it seems to help so I lean forward and suddenly I start throwing up all over myself (must have been a bad angle).
Then the smell of vomit garlic bread hits me. This is the most disgusting instant vomit inducing vomit smell I have ever smelled, and immediately I throw up again, and again, and again. every time I smell it!  my shirt and blanket and the garbage next to my bed are all disgusting...
I run to the bathroom, throw up in the toilet and try to keep myself from smelling everything again.
I furiously scrub myself down. Throw my shirt in a plastic bag -I want to keep it, but I thought about throwing it away. Scrub my blanket and remove it from my bed. blah blah blah and then I shower.
It's still freaking me out. And I still have the damn tickle in my throat that caused it all.

moral of the story, garlic makes for the worst vomit.

mayday

It’s Monday the 1^st of May, 2017. I have a headache, seated awkwardly on a wooden bench at Blue Moon coffee shop, listening to hippie music from the 60s and 70s. It is snowing, then raining, then something in-between, then just cold with wetness gathering up from the cars that drive by. I have to go to my internship tonight to do intakes. My phone will die. I am not looking forward to it, mostly because of the shriek in my skull when light hits my eyes just right, or when a chair is scraped along the floor. I’ve taken medicine. I’ve taken coffee.

The internet isn’t working too well. I am missing the good parts of the book I am reading, because my jaw is clenched too tight, causing a fog that swamps my eyes.

It feels like late fall, but the evening is still bright and tempting, so you crawl into the warmth beneath the covers and console yourself with an extra couple hours of Netflix.

I have determined the future. It looks like another year of the same. Afterwards, I have contemplated and come to no great conclusions. I’d like to travel. I’d like to spend some time in Portugal and the areas of Spain, I was too hasty with.

I’d like to see Southeast Asia before it drowns or burns. I’d like to have someone I feel attached enough to invite. But these are the dreams, for now it’s just head down, assignment, head down, reading, head down, internship, head down side work…

I’m considering giving up the side work. It doesn’t feel worth my time. I’d rather spend it writing. I wonder if I can write while I am in school? I’d like to spend the summer writing, really putting some substance to the frame. I want to get further along in the project, but I also want it rich. I want it buttery, hardy enough that people feel nourished by the writing and not just the story. I want the story to be intriguing, I want it to be so delicately woven that people end up rereading for the pieces they missed. I want the characters to cause aches in all the right places. I will save the desirous pleasures for later characters. I am too ahead of myself with certain areas. The more I slow down, the better the writing can be, but I need time and energy to give lovingly to the project and that is hard to balance.

I am intrigued by this world. It’s mayday after all. I should be protesting, but I’m grinding my teeth instead.

I watched Thirteen Reasons Why, and though the story was completely different, it did a lot of the things I want my writing to do. It made me want to re-watch it when I finished, to see what I had missed.

Before the retreat into my bed covers this weekend, I had actually been quite social. I had last week off from coffee shop job, so I was able to hang with some folks –some new peoples from Augsburg, some old people from high school. I haven’t seen any of my morris friends in a bit.

But it was weird how it was simultaneously comforting to be social, and also worrisome. I felt more human, more involved, part of something other than the world in my head I have created… but I also felt like I knew it couldn’t last…like my period of socialness… was doomed to let someone down. Maybe my retreat was an attempt to make sure it wasn’t me. This weekend I invited the isolation. I really didn’t want to talk to anyone. The headaches made it easy.

couple weeks in a row here... its a roll

Sunday, 5 PM. What have you done today?

Well mostly I've been sleeping. I also read a couple chapters in the Parable of the Sower by Octavia E Butler which is good. It is the combination of dark and spiritual that I am going for in certain chapters of my book. Yesterday I spent some time writing part 3.2 and I went home thinking about it. I like to write dialogue scenes and fill them in with details later. Anyway... I slept in too late and stayed up too ate watching the new Iron Fist show on Netflix. I did laundry last night and the motor on the dryer went out halfway through the first load so I had to air dry all my stuff. I am hoping it won't smell all week, but I also hope we can get the dryer fixed so I don't have to do this again. I finally shaved and cleaned the bathroom. 

Shaving revealed that my jaw actually is swollen from the blow I took in the tub the other day. It doesn't necessarily hurt on its own, it doesn't hurt when I chew or talk, I have the full range of motion BUT it is bigger on one side. Gives my face a sort of off kilter look if you look too close. It still hurts in a very dull tightened way. I will probably end up getting TMJ and having jaw pain my whole life. This is how it starts, slip in the shower when you haven't slept all night.

I am pretty sick of work. We had to hire a bunch of new people, but some of our January cats are becoming shift leads now, so I don't have to worry too much. Maybe quit this summer? What will I do for money? 

I am pretty sick of my classes this semester. 
In field class I am learning nothing. In research methods I am learning nothing new, but because it is online there is this feeling like I have to pay attention to the details... in group class I feel like I haven't learned anything from day one... this week I facilitate a group discussion (wow). In my favorite class -which is Friday night, this week we covering substance and trauma.  Our small group is  doing PTSD as an in-depth thing and we read this book that probably won't bear much fruit. 
I like that class, but I would like it more if it were every day or a few times a week. 

I basically haven't seen anyone but Illy (last week) and my family (also last week). It isn't that I am intentionally avoiding people, just not reaching out and I must have trained all of them not to do the same... I am pretty happy with my isolated little world most of the time, but in terms of life I don't feel satisfied at all. There is nothing big. There are no new changes. Nothing I am working towards except slow progress on the book, and boring school. 

I need to pay taxes, fill out FAFSA, have my car looked at, pay some bills, register for classes, find a new internship, finish the semester with whatever the typical grade is... and move on with my life. 
Summer is two classes I think -no work, no internship (or at least less). 
I am thinking I will do a lot of writing and editing. Also thinking I may have to move if my internship is somewhere else... I am pretty sure I want something more clinical -counseling related. I would probably learn more in a hospital setting, or as a case worker... but I don't think I want those kinds of jobs in the long run so...
Maybe if I interned at a hospital I could meet a doctor or a nurse who would pay my bills after they paid off medical school. THAT'S the PLAN right THERE. Gold digger. 

This week I am having dinner with my Mom and Brothers to celebrate our birthdays. The monotony of life is not comforting to me, having to celebrate everything twice... The yearly rituals that mean nothing to me. New Years, birthday, birthday, birthday, birthday, birthday birthday, Easter, Easter, birthday, Mothers day, birthday, Fathers day, birthday, random american celebrations, Halloween, Thanksgiving, Thanksgiving, birthday, Christmas. Christmas. Repeat. What else is there?  If my beliefs or passion were tied to any of these things maybe they'd be more meaningful... but I don't care. When I was a kid I thought it was sad that Witnesses and others didn't celebrate birthdays and christmas... now I think they are on to something. 
I've been thinking about how that was the same with work when I worked... it was the same cycle of events and traditions and to some extent they felt more meaningful because we were doing it for the kids, but at the same time I was always happy when they were over. Celebrations shouldn't offer relief when they are over. 
In my book all the believers do daily rituals, they are involved in regular celebrations, they have cities for pilgrimage etc. But their daily existence is tied to these things. They offer community support, they obligate people to feel involved and when people aren't involved there is an assumption of something being wrong. I often think "How would an introvert feel in this world?" and get a little squeamish on their behalf. 

I did some of my homework and I am not sure how much more there is to do. Its like fill in the blank work at this point. I need to do some reading with books I didn't bring, but I am not worried about it at all. I also need to prep for my next series of big assignments, but when I read their description they didn't scare me. Do a family assessment based on a  chapter of a book... ok easy enough. 
I am more worried that as things build up to the end I will just lose more and more interest. I already asked for a few days off from work -assuming I will need the time for intern interviews and writing papers. Seems like it has been way too easy this semester. I always did better when I had more classes to keep me on edge. 

thats your boring update for the week. 

Oh hey,

When was the last time you posted on here kid?

Its the 12th of March, a Sunday fun day, filled with homework and the peculiar mist of waking up too late. It is snowing hard and I am listening to Joanna Newsom and wishing I were such a poet. I've been editing and rewriting the same poem on immigration for a month, it never feels right but I was thinking eventually I might post it for public consideration. The issue is that they are other people's stories so it feels a little weird to discuss openly. -At the same time, totes necessary in a time of pushing...  earlier a couple of guys were having a conversation about the world and it made me really angry immediately -and I assumed they were not very bright, when probably I just don't know them. 
I just got done reading about self care and laughing at the honesty the authors suggested about counselors being narcissistic and believing no one is smart enough or understanding enough to help them. I think of the way my friend and I don't reach out for each other enough, often until we are falling apart. Its a pattern in my life, I reach when there is something concrete enough to get a simple response, and hold back when there is anything complicated enough that I need to consider it first for a long long while. 
You'd think with four shots of espresso and a caffeine pill I'd have some highways in my mind, but it feels very murky. I think I need a new regiment that might include a coffee maker that turns on automatically. That would be a nice way to wake up... the smell of deliciousness gliding across the room. 
Last week in class there was a moment when we were talking about mental disorders and somebody said something about "losing a year of your life" and I was suddenly sad. I feel like a good portion of my life is lost by not engaging, but at the same time, I also feel overwhelmed with other people... feel too smart or too understanding (see above). On the way here I was thinking about how there is this idea that you just choose someone and make it work, but I think of all the people I've met, which one was I supposed to have made my life with? Which one did I spend too much time with, so that I didn't notice another (the opportunity cost right?). Which one is waiting patiently for me, rather than reaching to choose me? Is this another wasted year lost to excuses or is this just a recognition of reality -of which depressed people often have a better understanding.  
I've been playing EU4 and it gives me a lot of sustained enjoyment, prolonged entertainment, lost to some other reality. It's not as fulfilling as writing, but to write you have to have a highway and a good cup of coffee early in the morning, and I've been staying up too late playing computer games to have either. It was also spring break at MCTC so I didn't have a paying job this week and I really liked that. It was far less stressful and I am relatively ahead of most of my homework just in time for spring break at Augsburg (this week).  Which means little, because I will still be reading homework, and I will be working at MCTC and I will be at my internship all week... so a pretty busy week coming... but I have the weekend off (I guess that is my break).  
I suppose if I gave a true update it would go something like -I haven't seen most of my friends in weeks and I don't know if that is my fault or if I care.  I should get together with my family more often, but we are all busy. The weather sucks. I don't really want to kick it with my roommates but I am glad the price is so low. I am sick of my internship and would probably stop going if it weren't required. I am sick of being a barista too.  More and more I think about how I wouldn't mind being a college professor and I am sort of hoping that I have the opportunity to pursue that because most of the "social work" jobs don't seem very appealing. I'd write up some curriculum and do a lot of processing with the students, I'd challenge them personally and intellectually and I'd offer more feedback than I am getting. I'd be able to live on a small salary even if it was like 30,000 again, I could make that work for a bit and then look into more opportunities as they come or work on my book and finish it before I am 40. I'd learn Spanish. I'd volunteer for political things and go to a meditation group. I'd take time for travel: Europe, South East Asia and the islands, South America again (Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Bolivia, Peru), West Africa, South Africa, eventually Australia...  and the middle east if things ever settle down. I'd maybe have a family?  Do I need to leave Minnesota to find something worth living for? Do I want to keep living this life, in this world, for how long? 

Book Update

Well obviously it has been hard to write, but sometimes I do a little editing. I still really like the concepts and enjoy the process but it gets difficult to read the same passages over and over -they start to feel too simplistic, but the most feedback I've gotten is that things are too complicated, so I don't want to overwhelm. Often I think about how I want to add more description but that comes the least easy to me. Description seems difficult to do with the format I've chosen. I also think about how I will probably need to cut a lot of stuff and how -at this point I am pretty unwilling to do so.  When I compare my concept to something like A Song of Ice and Fire or the Century Trilogy it doesn't seem so crazy. But comparing it to a regular book, it just seems absurd. Too many characters, too much movement... the world itself is a character in world building epics-I need to keep that perspective that it isn't about the individuals (though they anchor or move the piece), it is about the human condition, the world we have created. That is why I like part 2 and 3 the most because they have the most expressive details about the new worlds... part 1 is too much too quick.  It could be 10 books on its own. It would be the thing to jettison in its entirety. Same with 4 and 5 SO FAR... but 5 should serve to really ground the whole thing in philosophy and mythology. 2 and 3 in power dynamics and systems. 1 in what the fuck?   4 in perception. 
Nobody gets any of that so far... its a lot to unpack. People have this idea of a simple story. It is not that. 

At christmas tonight  my Dad brought up that I used to sleep walk when I was younger. He thought of a few humorous times I guess. James said he remembered me sleep walking numerous times when we lived in an apartment and shared a room. He said they weren't humorous, they were scary, and when he said it he looked scared. Dad asked him what, and maybe James was just covering for me in the moment, but it looked more like it was something he didn't want to share because it was painful or horrifying.
I remember having a lot of nightmares at that age. On a few occasions I remember my emotions or my imagination getting too far ahead of the rest of me, and not being able to calm down. Some of my more shameful stuff was probably beginning at that age, but I don't have a clue what he is referring to.
There are a lot of things in my life that I keep secret because I wish they hadn't happened... there are things right now that I wish weren't happening and worry me regularly, but it terrifies me to think I am not even aware of all of the things that are being kept secret.

Yuckers

Im fiening hardcore lately. Thursty - is how the kids put it.  Every where I look,  and way too much on the internet. 

There is a girl at work who smiles slightly like she is hiding a secret... likely the secret is that she can tell I am staring.

I simultaneously enjoy the widening of my senses, the desire for sensuality... and hate hate hate it. I feel lost... and when I think too much about what anything means it just points towards danger or the very least an internal feeling of  humiliation. Working at mctc makes me really aware of the subtle line of eye lids and smiles... it's like you give a person just a minute of your time, smile shyly and suddenly they seem all flush every time they show up.  Still... I'm getting old. I am officially 33 and I think about how a younger version of myself had painted some idea of completeness by now... or settledness at least.   I think about how I judged my cousins for never dating, and now I am aware that I am grateful to have some context for what it means to be 33 and single.  My parents are getting pushy. .. and I understand it.  I understand that they see me acting helpless and want to offer advice, or even set something up. But they don't know the whole story. Maybe it's easier than I make it seem. Maybe as simple as saying "hi" but the intention to be compatible doesn't make you compatible, and a beautiful aesthetic doesn't make you beautiful. 

On age:

My new coworker said something along the lines of "yeah, I bet we're about the same, age, how old are you?" And then reacted strongly when I told him. Then he told me he just turned 25 last month. So at least on the boyish awkwardness I'm still kicking it live. I was thinking about that difference... that is a senior in high school vs a third grader... yeah we are probably the same age maturity wise... cuz I am still a third grader. 

I had a headache that grew steadily all day. I woke up I the middle of the night and my room felt like it was choking my brain cells. I don't know if it's the room or myself.  I opened a window, turned the fan on high, opened the door. Now it's cold but the air feels clean.  

I took some headache meds, switched pillows and drank some water.  It's not nearly as painful.

I need to pay my health insurance bill asap. Tomorrow is the last day of 2016.

A friend gave me some feedback on my writing.  I need a partner in so many ways.

Jesse is at a folk festival and will probably have a great celebration. It makes me envious because i don't think I am capable of that. I don't want to be around people but I want to feel special and loved AND I want to love someone enough that their presence doesn't annoy me when I have headaches or when the pressure to have fun is going to outweigh the possibility for fun. 

I don't want to go back to work or school or internships. I'm just starting to remember what my mind is like without the stress.  

One of my classmates is naked sans sister? Or cousin? 

Wondering if I should give up Facebook. And Instagram and YouTube and all of it really.  When was the last time I was genuinely happy with my life?

Had a dream yesterday in which b was 2-2.5 months pregnant.  She looked like she was 20 years old, and had cut her hair.   Her niece was about 8-9 though...

Update on life: End of the First Semester of Grad School and other boring things

Well it is 5:24 on a snowstorm weekend in December. We are just shy of the holiday week, and I will probably spend the next three weeks reading, writing, playing computer games and doing all the fun things I did all last year.

I am in Grad School, or rather, I just completed my first semester and I am in the time between the next set of classes. 
My initial thoughts were that I wasn't learning a lot and was often irritated by the poor design. I regularly considered that I could be as equally good Teacher as my profs, and I am still fairly sure that is the case. However I have also grown sympathetic to their position of being an adjunct in a stupid situation.
Overall classes were easy. The biggest stresses were the assignments, not necessarily because they were hard but because it was difficult to manage my time and motivation. The small forum assignments were actually harder sometimes because they felt like busy work, where as the big papers felt like a fun challenge.   In general I really appreciate my classmates, but not necessarily because they challenge my thinking, more just that they share values of service. They are good people.  
The design of the program and the direction still irks me. It is one of the things I want to address if I continue in the MSW forum (the student representation). I just think there are better uses of a person's time. How about getting people involved in things? Why cram their heads in books searching for obscure bullshit if you can have them in a meeting making changes?
Why are programs not coordinating with each other? The BSW forum and MSW forum  at augsburg don't talk... why? Where is the macro approach to THIS system?
I am going ahead with the clinical side, but still very wide-eyed about macro systems. In general I feel like I am probably at the top of the class in understanding -but many of my peers have experience that I can learn a lot from. Also I talk, and they don't always.

Internship, sometimes feels like a joke. It is really difficult to feel productive in such a small role. I want to make changes, but don't feel I have the authority. I want to work with people, not tip toe around the edges pretending I know what I am doing. Its not a good  collaborative effort, and that makes me sad. Maybe they need more push to be groupy... maybe they need less distinction between admin and service.  Maybe the thing on the whole, needs a push to be more change oriented and less service. Anyway, its a lot of reaching out for more information, and not necessarily having the connection to make change happen. Part of it is that I like my coworkers/supervisors but I don't necessarily respect their leadership abilities. Also I am not getting paid, but working the equivalent of 10 weeks for free... so thats cool. 

What else... coffee shop. Its.. ugg. I don't know -I feel like the reason I work there is to have access to faces. To feel like there are possibilities. and a tiny amount of spending money. I am not necessarily getting along with my coworkers. They are nice, but I don't feel they know me or care, and I don't care to know them really either.

Roommates... same deal. 

Other than that it is my own thoughts. I feel pretty disconnected from friends and loved ones... not the same as the last few years when I couldn't relate, but rather just don't have the time. People are in their lives, I am in mine. Very little meaningful overlap... plus it is winter. So, even though I am sort of positive and hopeful about the way I can impact the world, I am less connected to it. 

Also fuck trump, am I right?  

I spent a lot of time thinking about possibilities, and then wonder why things don't fall into place more easily. Like so many of the things I want, or think might make me happier/connected/satisfied are actually very simple... but the moment I consider making them happen they seem totally out of reach. Like the beautiful barista at this coffee shop, and all the people who are so pretty they are hard to look at... how does meaningful connection actually happen?

My car breaking down, and buying a new one. That is how it happens, when life thrusts you a situation and you begrudgingly choose a new one. 

Sometimes wonder if I should just run away again... live on the beach. Write a book. Be a bad person. 

Update on life

So let's see total update on life (Multidimensional)


Age: 32
Sex and Gender: Male and mostly masculine, missing my hair.
Living situation: Living with two roommates who I rarely talk to, however its an improvement from my last place, and I like the location in Saint Paul (despite the drives, and the longing for familiar spots in Minneapolis).
Health: Mostly good, but not getting much exercise and not eating healthily. Do not have health insurance.
Family: Fine, but hard to maintain connection with lack of time.
Friends: Similar, mostly old friends from High School and College. Not doing very well at maintaining relationships with new people I am meeting, nor with older friends/coworkers who I value but don't have a shared point of references with currently. Still talking to ex in tiny little tidbits on messenger regularly.
Relationship: I don't even have a real crush. It's awful. I feel like I have no prospects, no people I am interested in. I am on okcupid and tinder and neither are doing anything to increase my likely hood of meeting anyone. Despite other stresses, this is actually the area I feel the worst about.
Work: Working in Minneapolis. Sometimes I like the job because I get to see so many faces. It can be a stressful job, and I appreciate about half of my coworkers... but the real perk of the job is getting to see all the faces, wonder at who they are and where they are headed. I also see the people that are the closest I have to crushes there. Other than that, the job is repetitive and simple, and only sometimes anxiety producing.
Grad School: There are elements I like about it, I like learning, I like discussions. But I don't like a lot of aspects of my program, I find them poorly designed and not necessarily a good fit for me or my lifestyle. I've considered what it would look like  to drop out, or cut back to part time, but neither option seems fitting for what I want to accomplish with my life.
Internship: similarly poorly designed experience, but helpful in the sense that I enjoy some of the work, and the things I am seeking out (resources etc) are helpful to my understanding of the systems that affect immigrants and participants. Some of the people at the internship are cool, I feel like the time constraints really keep anything serious friendship from forming.
Hobbies: If I broaden that definition to "what are you doing outside of school/work?" I am watching a lot of youtube, occasionally some netflix and sometimes sneaking in a book. I am not writing. I occasionally draw something. But surfing the internet and youtube is kind of the big thing.
Coping: Some positive and negative coping strategies in place. Not sure what I can do, or should do to fix.
Things I am thinking a lot about:
State of the world (why is it so fucked?)
US elections (Trump)
My inability to do anything politically worthwhile
My low level of comfort around people/ low motivation to engage
My regrets related to past relationships and not being able to support people
(newest Lacey's wedding, oldest Krystin, Chris, Ali)
How poorly designed everything is, and whether I need to be in macro to fix shit.
How poorly organized my life is.
How easy it would be to fix shit if people just stepped out of the way.
How I want to be a writer, but don't believe I am capable of succeeding/also that I want to be involved in something more social as well.
It would be difficult to have a relationship, a family, or kids right now... and yet I don't see my life being very worthwhile with out these components.
How I want more time to play video games, read books, and write.
How I am mostly dissatisfied with my relationships, and my social skills (likely because of my anxiety), and that if I got out of my own way, I might be more happy.

Specter of October

Its a gray sky day, the orange leaves accent the abysmal with their fire, but as the light fades it's easy to feel the gloom. 

It's easy to imagine the warmth of another person, pressing their fingers into the too tightly held flesh of my shoulders, it's easy to imagine my own fingers interlaced in her hair, as familiar as the warmth rising from the cup of coffee I sip, the smell of some long lost home. 

It's easy to think of the past, with regret, with adoration, with longing for the laughter, that heartfelt jubilance that comes with knowing someone well enough to enjoy their laughter, their knowing eyes smiling back. 

It's easy to recognize the changes, the distances, the unshared experiences like a mountain path winding back and forth making that which is permitted (welcomed even) too formidable to grovel-through. 

It's easy to know what is missing, easy to feel the sway, the drifting nervousness that accompanies all ventures when one is as anchor-less as I. 

and it's easy to smirk at other people's attempts to cut through the cloud that binds me, that swirls and drapes, and shadows all light, masks me with indecision, marks me inconsiderate, and fragments my strengths as the anxiety of distance permeates each capillary, bloodied me other. 

I guess all I am saying is, I didn't need to dress myself up to be a ghost this halloween. 

A thought on empathy and politics

I think I just figured out why anti-abortion positions never made any sense to me.

With almost all things, i tend to review them through as much of an empathetic lens as possible. For instance war doesn't make sense because -hello humans killing humans... Drug laws, why put someone in prison for hurting themselves? 

But abortion... Who are you empathizing with? Do you remember being a zygote? A tadpole embryo? A tiny otter skinned chipmunk looking thing? A hairless pygmy marmoset the size of an apple? 

Vs the mother, dont you clearly remember a time when you were terrified and overwhelmed, and feeling like you just can't handle shit? Why don't you empathize with that? 

I just don't get it... To me the person isn't arguing based on anything real, except this abstract idea that has no basis in reality (the completely unknown of what could be) or they just want to dictate how people should live their lives. 

Some will say, oh but all that potential is wasted, but then why not focus on the potential we are wasting all around us?

Some will say, you got to protect the vulnerable, but then why not focus on the vulnerable all around us?

Some will say, you got to protect life, but then why not protect the life around us? 

I don't get it. 

Bonded communication.

I've been feeling stressed and a little needy lately. It's the work/intern/school life.  It makes me want someone to hold, or who will hold me back. But I hate the idea of all the work to get to know someone, I want it to be easy.

In the dream she was pregnant. (this particular ex gave birth a few months ago, so I don't think that is likely) She was many months pregnant, like my coworker who is due in early

November.  She swayed from hip to hip, not quite uncomfortable but very aware of the weight. Her stomach and chest heavier than she would have liked. We talked. I don't know what the words were, I was too busy watching her reactions. She seemed like her mind was somewhere else, and yet I was fully in tune with her. She kept her eyes elsewhere, while I traced her newly formed curves, while I wanted to place my hands on her stomach, and her back and her hips, and the skin of her arms. 

She wasn't unaware of this, but she saw me getting sleepy, she understood I wasn't fully myself, that I was wanting. I fell asleep on her couch, but when I woke it had become a full mattress. Not the mattress she slept with her husband on, but a guest in her home. He was coming home soon and she was only a little worried about my being present. She talked again, and I swayed in tune with every singe motion, every feeling and thought. I didn't need to listen, and she knew it. She kept her eyes distant but she couldn't help but smile out of the corner of her mouth. She knew, she felt it like a tug on her, and she didn't mind when I moved closer. But I mentioned it. I said I'm sorry for invading your space and she played along, though she knew I wasn't, and she wasn't either. 

As she continued to talk I slowly moved closer until my arms were around her. And she didn't pull away, she just rubbed the outside of my arms and hands which attended to her, like she knew it was natural, like she understood it was as it should be. But it didn't make her happier, like it had me.  It was just what it was.

And she walked away to her room to attend something else while I folded the blanket and waited for her husband to come home. 

When she came back into the room she was surprised, but hid it quickly. There was something about wrapping it up so soon, but she looked back towards the windows again, waiting for him. 

And i knew it was time to leave, to wake up. 

The glow

Pretty sure I just figured out why that beautiful professor was glowing. Preggers.    Still beautiful. 

First impressions

It's 3:08 am and I can't get back to sleep. My mind races from one topic to the next: Hmong culture project, how to facilitate a meeting, the problems with Augsburg, the problems with nh, the strangeness of people and their inability to design things functionally.

I am operating on too little information, and it leaves my mind to make judgements about the facilitation. Perhaps In the long run it will all be ok, but I'm amazed how little has been prepared to make it so. 

Obsessing

I am not sure if it is healthy or not, but i am suddenly obsessing and overthinking random things again.  

I haven't thought about my book in a week, before that it was also a long gap.

But I have been thinking about words and their meanings, and how best to use them to create social awareness and acceptance... And I have spent too much time arguing about that in my head.

And I have been thinking of this one professor lady at work who takes my words away, and how between the two of us we seem really dumb, but perhaps it's a mutual attraction... And I don't know her name or anything about her so it could all go bad super easy... But I sometimes dream about her. And seeing her brightens my day... And I have to practice words and phrases around her so that I don't get overwhelmed and ignore her - as a defense mechanism. 

Notes from moving.

I reserved a truck for 10 am. So I woke up at 8. Moved 6 items in 12 minutes. Ate fruit. Showered. It's 8:30. Still need to move my bed stuff which is the biggest item... But damn my estimates for timing are off. I have the van for 4 hours. If I load it with boxes I might make a separate trip to my moms house. 

I usually don't have a lot of cognitive dissonance in my life, it's easy to just say "things are complex, bigger than a simplified explanation or opinion."

But when it comes to food, there is still a lot of anxiety and weirdness. Today I experienced this at Leeann Chin, because I read that their fried rice uses mushroom soy sauce. I don't eat their fried rice, but it reminded me that I like

Mushroom soy sauce even though the idea of it gives me  a ridiculous  amount of dissonance verging on physical discomfort.  So odd. 

An apology story

My brother and I were talking about his summer, and about his going back to work. My step mother chimes in about how irritating the trainings are (valid for most who have esperienced them) we agree for a minute and then she names someone specific, a trainer who did a worship of "courageous conversations (concerning race)." She isn't opposed to this in theory, but her perspective of the workshop is that participants should still feel safe, in the "courageous" space. And she alludes to an experience she has discussed with me before where a group of staff of color berated a white man after he asked a question, basically insinuating the man was racist or being racist in the moment- it isn't clear which because she doesn't remember his question, or the tone, only the angry people of color who embarrassed the white man. 

She brings this up, and I role my eyes because it isn't the focus of our conversation and we have different perspectives anyway which she knows, so really she is bringing this up just to assert her whitevictimhood, but she asks me if I rolled my eyes and I reply yes, honestly and go back to having the conversation. She feels cut out and remains silent. Later she complains to my father and all the while my own tension grows to the point where I feel pretty guilty, not because I'm wrong, but because I've hurt her feelings.

Before dinner I decide I'm going to apologize and I do, in front of everyone though not trying to make a show, just to acknowledge I was rude. 

She accepts it and we go on with our days.

I consider my desire to keep the peace, my desire to maintain a good relationship, to keep things going- and I know I've made the right decision.

But I also know I wasn't wrong.

I wasn't wrong in the same way that baby boomers needed to roll their eyes at their own parents when they said something racist or sexist. 

It's not that I think I can win her over, though I'm sure we will have a hundred more conversations. It's that I think she should feel shame and guilt for propagating bullshit in the world, for being fear driven and hypocritical, and victim blaming, and claiming martyrdom and yet I value the peace...

Material and Non-material Goals and Desires

Not that I believe in "the secret" or anything, but this year has helped me to recognize some of the goals I have for the future... So rather than assuming I'm gonna get in a car accident now that I've put a ton of money into my car, I figured I should do this. 

I would like my car to last three to four more years, after which I should be in a relatively good place to make payments on a new one (assuming I find employment after grad school).

Employment at a place where I can have some work life balance, but also feel useful and enjoy my job.

An apartment after gradschool, honestly it would be nice to own, but even being able to afford an apartment that is relatively decent would be good. It is looking likely that I will be living with roommates throughout gradschool because I just can't justify living alone when it costs me an extra 2-3 hundred a month, that's three grand a year I could be saving or paying school debt with.

-so in the meantime a decent low rent place with some peeps maybe a little closer to the river.

Some new pairs of pants, even used without holes or ink stains. Gonna need it for work anyway. 

Gradschool- friends, maybe a girl friend. Some assignments and lessons that make me think. An internship where I get to interact with fun people at a good location.

Hobbies:

-Finish volume 1 before the end of gradschool and publish. That's two years  to write three and a half parts and edit the whole thing. 

Once it is done, I'll feel like I accomplished something, and can take my time on the sequel because already I can tell no one is interested... Existential science fiction is not a popular genre. 

-Start painting again. Maybe make a graphic novel of one of the stories.

-Do some work on the computer editing videos. 

-find a creative group of some sort... So that I don't feel on my own with these sorts of projects.

-have a desk/creative space. 

-practice Spanish occasionally- maybe internship will help. 

Consider Southeast Asia as a honeymoon spot if I ever find anyone. 

Old goals to keep around:

Gramps video

Poetry book

Cd

Clay sculptures

Painting in a gallery

6/7 continents ain't bad.

Been one of those weeks

It hasn't been brutal or anything but a gradual chipping away. Some how I misplaced or lost my iPod and headphones... Don't know where they went.  My car has been in the ship all weekend and the total is over a grand. Between school and rent another thousand. No luck on a new place so far. Cleaned the bathroom for over an hour, it's already dirty. Humid and hot out, flies and stickiness. 

Car

Hi, my car might die, either way it sounds like it's going to be expensive. Thanks 2016, you're the best. 

On a lighter note, Russ is writing a giantess/vore dark comedy. 

And I am basically ready to print rough draft #2. And send it to people.