sick for days

I sort of doubt I will be posting again before next year, just because my head is not with it.

So Happy new year!  and if I do post,  well sucks to this post

I really don't want to say too much, or too little.

I have been sick for the past few days, like christmas eve till now, or something... a sort of cold/flu  not sure what the difference is anymore kind of thing.   I'm mostly achy, sometimes have a mild fever and the occasional cough.  Been taking heavy regiments of the quil.

That being said, between the ill, and the quil. I have had many strange moments that almost seem like i am high.  incredible body sensations, and moments where my mind was just so single fire...
I am used to being able to multitask, and that has not been going well, but I am not working so its fine.  I just sort of have a constant nagging feeling like i am behind on everything.. which I probably am but I am sick so fuck it.

Anyway some examples...   the other day I just sat for like an hour in my bathrobe in a slight feverish stoop and it just felt like melted heaven or something...  It feels like the tingles I get from watching asmr videos.
It doesn't always feel like that. I have been having a really hard time sleeping because i get so achy that I wake up like every 20 minutes and can't get comfortable... but sometimes it just feels weirdly nice. I don't know anything other than medication and  intoxication that makes you that aware of your body...  illness is weird. So when I can relax and still feel all the little sensations its nice.
thats the body part
the mental/emotional part is weirder. I have my normal fantasies, my normal day dreams, my normal thought patterns... only because they are so single focused I get really lost on them. I was at a movie today (my attempt to be normal and pretend like I wasn't sick)  and i started thinking about something for like 10 minutes, and then when the previews started I snapped out of it, but I felt a deep feeling of loss because I had been attached to that reality, but also a feeling of relief because I am pretty sure it wasn't a positive reality. 
At the book store I saw a book about being a new dad and it almost made me cry, because I had this glimpse of that reality and then it wasn't real.

which brings me to the last piece...
I always enjoy dreams, and this in and out confused state I have been in has been particularly interesting at times... I spend 40-50 minutes in bed not quite asleep (due to the aches) but not quite awake, lost in these pseudo dream states... but a few days ago I woke up after a longer spell of sleep, and I was very conscious of the perspectives in the dream,  it was weird though, it was like

lots of different spirits talking, and there was a collective decision to wake up, (which my body responded to), but before the spirits had acted upon their decision... so they continued the conversation for a second... and basically it was one spirit asking the other ones  well which body should I wake up as?   and the spirits were kind of saying   whichever you want?   my body opened its eyes and said this one!   before the spirit chose.

It was a very surreal dream, and made me think of something I had thought of after another dream a few weeks or months ago,  but about the fact that maybe our consciousness actually isn't dependent upon these bodies... and maybe it chooses to come back when you are waking.

Anyway... I woke up struck with that idea... that my body chose before the consciousness had... it had more options.
I would like to sort this out more... maybe I will have some more interesting dreams tonight.

in reality land.
I got to see a bunch of friends last week and it made me feel accomplished and good and loved.
I will probably see some more in the next week, but I don't feel like i am in such a rush.

At the movie theater and the restauarant and the bookstore today, I was suprised by how small my voice felt, like a character, a child asking for help...

My body feels week and my mind feels like racing when it isn't entirely vacant.

yuckers

11:42, trying to get to sleep. Listening to the same video I have been playing on repeat for weeks now. Pretty telling when you go through it.
My mom said I was repressing my anger, she suggested two remedies. First she suggested I chop down a tree... we later joked that that might be putting more violent and angry energy into the world, but my response at the time was I already lack the motivation to do anything.  Grant quoted something about how the energy we use to repress often keeps us from having the energy to move forward.  Secondly she suggested crying.  I told her I wish I could, but haven't in months. 

I'm trying to go with this method.

Jess asked me to do something today that was at the exact right moment, and made me feel really nice. She asked me to get her groceries, sick baby at home.  I was already out of the house and already in a fairly ok mood due to a large amount of coffee, food and somewhat intense conversation about religion, politics and psychology.  
It was really nice, because it involved almost no emotional energy (minus a tiny amount of anxiety about getting the wrong thing).  I am beating myself up tonight for abandoning people. For not feeling strong enough, for not being compassionate enough, for not being able to care take more people... for not having any desire to reach out to people who I think probably need someone to reach out.   I am thinking about them, because I am pitying myself, I am thinking about how my situation is really not so bad and yet feels so debilitating while other people are dealing with much more, and I can't even pick up a phone, or apologize... and yet more than likely I am holding those same inabilities against others.

None of these emotions are very helpful,  they don't make me want to get up and do things. They make me want to shut down and shut out the world. 

Today I find myself reliving my life, new thoughts and feelings all expressed in old poems. Religious poems, emotional poems.  

simple truths and a little late night zen

Its 2 AM, or will be.
I fell asleep around 9:30 and woke up around 12:00. I find this pattern is repeated nightly. Perhaps this is Mike falling into the very human pattern of the two sleeps night, but I find it irritating. I find many things irritating lately, and try my best to laugh at that.
Starbucks has the best mint tea of all the chain stores. I take my tea with an unreasonable amount of sweet.
I can't sleep so instead of playing computer games or watching youtube videos I thought I would read a little. I bought like 7 books recently, two on urban shamanism, 2 on zen buddhism, 1 on hinduism and 2 that are non directly spiritual.
The first book I started reading was about seeing things before drawing them. A meditation on seeing.  Seeing something as a living loving, beautiful thing, and then creating. I like this idea because it resonates well with a technique I was using a lot during the summer and fall, where I would look at something,  a scene, and then sort of enhance the scene by using a different part of my brain. Now the part of my brain I was using may not have been the lovey-side, but after using this technique everything seemed so much more beautiful and lovely, so I think it counts.  I find it harder to do this right now. I think it is my seasonal depression, stress, grief etc that is keeping me from seeing, still I try now and then and it works.
The second book I started reading is about urban shamanism, and pieces of it are nice, but I also find it a bit vague when the author is generalizing, and too new age-y or co-opting of other traditions when she is being specific. I am trying to figure out the role of ritual in my life.
I find it very hard to take on traditional rituals. There are certain mantras, prayers and songs I like, but I don't tend to use them in traditional ways. I like idols and icons as art but not as meditation focuses. I don't have the space to meditate that I would need (it would be easier at work where there are open rooms, but of course I have work stress). I have a strong aversion to group rituals *one of the aspects of SoT that gets to me. Anyway, I like the book in that it reminds me of larger concepts, and I would like to see myself as a healer in a larger way... but I have a lot to learn, and a lot to shed.
The third book I just picked up tonight after reading some Carl Sandburg poems (my step grandmother gave me two of his books, at first I was reluctant but I actually really enjoy them).
This book is about Zen, and I haven't even gotten to the specific teachings but reading the introduction made me ooze with thoughts of the attachments of the day... so I decided to write. (creating another attachment I guess).

I woke up this morning with a poem on my brain about cycles, about pulses, about mathrock. I attempted to write it out, and I don't think I succeeded at getting what I actually wanted on paper... but I almost never edit, so who knows.
 The poem was about my belief that meaningful things, meaningful relationships, meaningful connections cycle in and out of your life... but they do cycle.

I have been waiting for a dream.
I have been waiting for a call.

I have received neither and wonder why.  Does it mean the connection has worn thin? Does it mean the distance is too great. Does it mean doors are shut.  Does it mean I should put my heart in other hands.  Yes, probably all of that.   But in my head, my ego says no.  Some things aren't permanent. Some waste away, but some come back, they check in from time to time, because they mattered.
In this universe I see patterns, I see waves, I see different directions, but all of these things cycle back.  What looks like left eventually cycles around to being right, what goes up, comes down, what goes forward, comes back etc.   I see us all fluctuating at different vibrations, different frequencies, but these things occasionally meet up. My 3/4s meets your 7/8s meets my 5/7s meets your 3/5s  sometimes.... sometimes.

I'm reading buddhism, and of course this is my attachment. My ego's desire for something lasting, in a world of impermanence, but what is impermanent about us? Do I not shed this skin, to wrap myself in the cloak of another one?  Do I not shed these atoms to be fused into the combination that makes up you? Did we not dine on the same molecules that will inevitably become us, for a time, be released and then perhaps at some time, rejoin us again? Am I missing something?
I find familiarity, and comfort in certain rooms, with certain people.
It takes my will to keep it from happening, it requires my ego to brace against it... you're telling me this isn't a homecoming? You're telling me this isn't a meeting point in our cycles?

I believe in impermanence, my body will shed, my creations crumble, my thoughts vanish from second to the next, but there is something beyond the me that calls, that longs, that pulls and pushes.  I've called it chemicals, I've called it fate, I've called it bonds and bondage chosen or embraced, I've pushed it from the nest, I've held it back, but my choice in response, my ego's response is to an attachment beyond me.

I want to look at people, at trees, at this computer, at my loving cat, at the book, at the sun, and see the energy that makes it... the vibrations, the impermanent setting, embrace both the present and eternal aspects of it.  But the balance between these is difficult without believing in cycles, repeated patterns, dynamic creative complex comings together.

In the last bit of the poem I wanted to write, that I may be traveling the x axis, while another travels the third (z) Axis,  which seems like a pushing away, a distance... or at least a separation in paths... and that we would have to rely on the 4th dimension to bring us back together.

I remember struggling with these same concepts last year when I was reading all that Sufi stuff.
Its funny how my mind wanders to certain topics at certain times of year... again cycles.

To get beyond the theoretical and spiritual.
I am deeply lonely. I feel neglected by someone and its causing me a lot of frustration.  I think about other people regularly with a very warm heart, but I don't know how to span the gaps in the cycle... I think everything is probably in its right place, and so I am moving forward, but its a fight to stay positive.  I am very exhausted with the effort of trying to stay positive, motivated.  I guess this is a good lesson for when I am out of the country... like -hey you made it through home without any friends, you can make it through travel (which is exciting, and new) without some too.

Most of the day today I spent trying to prepare myself for one social event with my family. It took a lot of will, it went well, I felt good coming home and then I passed out exhausted.

I was initially supposed to go to two events today.  The second one ended up overlapping too much with the first but I had already decided I couldn't go because of the enormous amount of effort it would have taken me.  It sounds like the event was incredible and would have made my day, but the heavy thought of going almost kept me in bed all day.

These winter depressions aren't all that different each year... I ought to have learned something.
Lack of motivation, irregular sleep patterns, irritability, extreme introversion, desire for deep topics, strange fantasies, cynicism, distaste for faking shallow surface level bullshit...  lowered motivation, longing for escape and release. Incredibly strong emotions that present themselves in a very drone numbing fashion.  
The first time it really took me down, I worried I was schizophrenic. 

When I use my happy light, and get enough sleep, and have my day planned out, or have a good conversation, or eat healthy... it all vanishes for a few hours and I am almost my normal self.  I laugh and enjoy the little things... and this is how I know now (what I didn't know that first time), that this too shall pass.  That this is part of the cycle.

It does make me wonder if my parents always remarking that I was moody around the holidays was my anxiety around social/familial gatherings, or my seasonal depression... I suppose Easter freaks me out too. 

I woke up a few days ago with an ache in my heart. A dread. 
My depressions lately, mixed with this ache, created an overwhelming crabbiness that wouldn't lift.
I couldn't quite place the source of the ache... I just knew that it had to do with the lack of friends around, and the idea of people coming home.

over the course of the day, a little bit of clarity came as I wrote this poem.
Every few hours I would sneak back into the office to write another line.
The spacing will be slightly screwed up... but  this was my plea.


My Heart

Oh my little heart,

You’re clever, you find ways to meander through rocks, through hard places, 

Oh but you’re tough You’ve won a thousand strong man contests, with no prizes 

The wise men say the experience is the prize, my heart you have become so wise 

Oh my heart, 

filled with vacant rooms you’ve kept the place warm and tidy. 

Some other, in their haste left the door open, the pipes have frozen, 

And you, you’ve stoically kept the furnace fuming. 

Oh my little heart,

Pushed a thousand times to heal in a moment, you make doctor’s believe in miracles. 

For each healing ten times that –the stretch to accommodate, you’re an olympic gymnast 

-training since you were an innocent. 

Oh my heart,

you’ve kept some, some of that pureness, despite madness, despite venom, despite betrayal,

my little heart,

you are a warrior, a magician, a sage, how have you bared it 

the branch breaking winds, the moments lost at sea, the questioning always questioning confusion. 

Oh my little heart, 

how have you clarified the madness, how calmly chose, calmly hidden away 

when poison rippled, when torrents of passion, when breathless and abandoned 

Oh my heart, 

I’ve asked you so much, every time to reach, reach just beyond infinity,

But will you, just one time more 

try

incredibly weird dreams

So I am sitting around, and really I am watching this process take place. I see the visuals both of what happens in the room, and also the things being described... but primarily I am aware that there is a bar, or a dark room where a group of men are sitting around a table. The men are drinking out of small cups, what appears to be a powerful drink, but it is not alcohol. It is a type of "tea" called (of course)  Soma. 

One or possibly two of the men are not from the region and are tourists or seeking information. The first has the process explained to him, and during this time he seems to become much more aware of the processes of life, of the way the universe works etc.The second man is not able to pay attention. It is possible the whole "explanation" is really just a few seconds long and that the tea itself offers the realization (this is how my double experience occurs)... I am either drinking the tea, or I am possibly even one of the men watching myself be told, and experiencing it. 

So the other man is a bit impatient. He can't really wait to have the experience which he expects to be like a powerful drug, not a life changing, spiritual connection and a new way of perceiving the universe. 

The men who offer him the tea are not put off by this, they are there to share and though it is obviously a holy drink, they trust the experience they are part of. 
The man is offered the tea, through the process. The top part of the plant is removed, a small animal is inserted into the bowl of the plant, the top is put back on. Clearly a chemical or digestive-like process takes place... and the remnants of the juice is poured out into the cups. The man is not all that impressed. The other men explain that the plant has two parts (this is where the dual experience shapes, instead of seeing the process which is happening, I also watch the cycle of the plant life, envision it on a farm etc) -the plant has two parts. The parts are grown together, and it is not necessarily clear that they are related. One is the bowl-like base of the plant, and the other a small seed that is fairly conscious and looks more like an insect. The insect-seed either grows into a new base or is consumed by the plant to grow the plant. These insect seeds are sort of hatched and within about 16 seconds the process of either growing, or becoming a new plant takes place. I know this, because while I am learning about it, the one I am holding (a very old specimen) hatches and a small spider like "plant" starts walking around. 
If the plant doesn't recycle the seeds, it will never grow. The way it recycles them, is by eating them in the same way it ate the animal. It creates a top part a "SCOBY"  kind of like a kombucha skoby that traps the animal in, and the bacteria and toxins and what not that are released during this process become the drugs within the "tea" which is really just the digestive juices of the plant.  A plant that is old enough begins to be able to eat other things. They are a carnivorous species, but this is another place the men who are serving wish to be clear... the plant is conscious of the entire life cycle and what takes place around it. So if the animal it is eating hasn't had a good life, the "trip" won't be as positive... if the plant has been mistreated or malnourished the "trip" wont be as good, or as potent... so the men assure us that these plants (the ones being used) and the animals are grown side by side in a very healthy and positive garden, strictly for the purpose of being used for Soma... which the plant and animal have both accepted and is why the men aren't worried about shallow people drinking it... they trust the plant to tell the difference. The plant will share its life cycle with who it chooses... the plant controls the conscious trip. 

So near as I can tell this is a "plant" that has within its life cycle both an animal and a fungus like stage... According to the men, the plant used to be grown in Central Asia (where Soma is from), but has died out and is no longer able to grow there. Simultaneously and today it is still grown in South America (highlands and high altitude tropical areas), and is being exported for consumption to humans around the globe. 

I found this dream to be extremely challenging to my ideas of separation.  I know it was highly influenced by the reading I am doing right now... but I think the various aspects of consciousness, of different levels of choice, of different levels of biological construction... I don't know... it was crazy... and part of me wonders if there is something like this.   And now that I am typing, part of me wonders if this would actually be a native species or of something beyond.


Victoria & Family Dream

Victoria has given me a weird constructiony-farmy machine. Its sort of like a tractor mixed with a bulldozer... and it is old. It really has very few options... and for the most part I am not even using it.  I am admiring how everyone has on some sort of nerdy costume... lots of robot helmets and devices from various science fiction shows... they appear to have built these to help people sleep. Like its a breathing device that looks like a storm trooper.  People go to sleep in their masks, and I have one too but it isn't as elaborate as other peoples... just like my machine is a little old and doesn't have great options. Their machines are better, and their masks are better. 
I am playing around with some of the parts of the inside of my machine... there is this one hole for a key, I stick the key in an unlock the compartment... there is nothing on the inside (to my ignorant self).  Almost immediately Victoria is there. 
She hasn't seen me check out the compartment, but she is annoyed that I don't understand the machine, its uses, its dangers. I am not taking it seriously. I don't understand the mechanics and she wants me to. She says she needs to check something under the hood and I need to release the mechanism so that she can open it up, but I don't understand what she is asking... 
She is really irritated with me, and tries to slow down to say I need to put the key in the hole, but I try to explain that there is nothing in that compartment, and then she is really irritated because I don't realize that that is the unlocking mechanism, and I am a dumb oaf, who shouldn't be trusted with such an important and dangerous device. She checks the thing under the hood,  and comes back to the driving compartment and shoves me over... 
She now thinks it is important for me to understand the device I am dealing with and starts to explain while turning on the engine and putting the thing into gear to start moving... at this point I realize she has been drinking and feel incredibly unsafe in the vehicle. She senses my nervousness and believes that the message she is trying to send me is getting through, but I start questioning whether this is the best way to show me something, or the best time... and she decides she needs to really show me. The machine is drifting forward slowly, but it is clear that within about 20 feet we are going to ram a small house and probably demolish ourselves and the house. She is trying desperately to get me to see that if I wasn't taking this mechanics seriously, I would probably kill somebody... but in the process I am worried we are about to be killed. The machine miraculously stops just at the wall. This is not because drunken victoria has such great driving skills, but because the forward motion has slowed due to an incline or some other variable... and Victoria excitedly and with a lot of irriation is trying to say "SEE?!? SEE?!? what could happen?"  and I ask about her about her family.
She is caught off guard about this, but with irritation (possibly rightfully placed), says they are all back home drinking, and she needed to get away for awhile (hence the lesson). 
She also says something like "Oh and my brother took over your room"  and I started thinking about the room, and how it  had 6 beds, and how it was conncected to another room with 4 beds, and a bathroom... and I said "the whole thing?"  and she said YES, and then stumbled out.

I went to the house. Upon entering I realized I wasn't just dealing with Victoria's family, I was dealing with my family, and my cousins were now VIctoria's brothers, and my aunts and uncles and everyone was there... and it started to make sense why there wasn't any room at the inn, especially for someone like me, an outsider a distant relative who didn't even come to the funeral. Who was the funeral for? Grandpa of course... this is his house (his actual house in Sioux Falls) only it has been doubled or tripled and oddly, so the rooms dont make sense. (this is often the case when I dream of this house now). I see my aunts and mumble hellos, but am overwhelmed by emotions... grieving, guilt, shame, embarrassment for not fulfilling the family roles, anger for having to.  I stumble from room to room in tears, picturing how they once were while my cousins (all older than me) explain to their children the same things I am thinking about the rooms... this staging area used to be the dining room. This set of bedrooms used to be for this_______.   The bedrooms lead off to other bedrooms (which is how it actually was), only now there are more... I stumble into my cousin (Still aware this is the person Victoria called her brother -though it isn't)  and he is drunk and demanding that he gets to keep the rooms all to himself, only he is both this version of himself and the older version with a family, and he is simply and soberly saying he needed the beds for his kids. 

and I stumble into the giant douchebag guy from northern mn, who I try to be friends with.  He is like a macho man, but insecure, but also just a guy... not in any way a bad guy, just not me... and he is complaining about how every date he goes on the girls are too dumb or don't have any class... and he realizes he isn't always able to play the role either... but I assure him I know exactly where he can find a date (and I am thinking of downtown Minneapolis girls who go to Spill the Wine and other trendy places... but have class and are smart, and are looking for douchebag boys who aren't really bad, just not me)... and he I are going through the airport... and he points out that the Arab man is a millionaire who runs some sort of harmless company, but the airport security are arresting him... and we walk past in a hurry and I am swept out the door, where I walk down a forested hill to find Morgan and some other friends... and I tell them about Soma... and they don't really understand that it isn't just a drug. 
And while they are imagining the possibilities of being superhuman on powerful alien drugs... a plane is flying toward us... and I feel like all we need to do is step aside, an easy thing to do for a superhuman on Soma. 

Perspective, you ASS!

crashing and creating my

confusion parties

yuck

I had many dreams last night, some of them melted together.
In one I was helping some famous band take pictures. They were posing about 100 yards away, with many obstacles in the way, but these were to help frame the shot... and somehow I was supposed to use this really big camera, focus it perfectly, reflect the shot off a few mirrors and windows and end up with the band looking ultra cool.  I kept screwing up, and asking for more time. Each series of pictures was time consuming, and probably really wasteful. We were losing the day light, and tension was rising. I was so obsessed with trying to be a part of the project, that I was ignoring the person to my left. Turns out, it was my mother. After trying to get my attention for quite awhile, she just started talking. She said "I can't feel my neck anymore."  Which somewhere in my subconscious I knew meant she was close to dying. Cancer had spread to the point, that her body wasn't able to sense itself anymore. She continued talking, about the different symptoms, and I continued to ignore her, my frustration deepening, this time totally immersed in what she was saying but trying with all my will power to pretend as if none of it were true. The project seemed like such a waste of time, almost everything did. I started begging her to stop, I was crying, but pretending I wasn't. Anything to have her take those words back, and she said something like "I can't stop it" and I said she had to. This wasn't right, there wasn't enough time, this wasn't the way it was supposed to be. She laughed at my desire to control the situation, even though she too was feeling it... she was trying to stay strong and accept the reality, that very soon she would not be around. She was scared, and hurt, and needed her son to comfort her. But he was too self absorbed, too locked into his own denial, his own pain.


 I woke up with a list of things to do today. It included avoiding my family so that I could do other things.

It feels odd to know that I am making my dreams come true. I wonder if I will be able to turn all of this around. I'm focusing on me, because I feel like anything else would be the death of me. But perhaps I am wrong in all of this. Maybe I shouldn't leave. 

Laundry, Spanish, Civics lesson, Lunch with Lacey, email work, board game at home. 

oh another

I have been thinking about the importance of partners lately. 
Maybe because it is fall and I am thinking about nesting, or because I see my roommates scold and comfort and entertain each other. 

Or because my views on life are being reconsidered -like how landscapes call to me now, when it used to be only abstract ideas... and it makes me think of all the ignorance of my youth and how I squandered those relationships in my haste to be recognized as knowing something.

Or of course its also because my caretakers have left or are leaving. 
Where do I go for comfort? for scolding? for entertainments?
For validation and amusement. For someone to push me just a little further in the middle of the night because even though I am stressed, I am passionate.  Or forgiving, soothing enough to say, "hey, youre gonna be fine, give yourself the break you deserve." 

I play around with this concept at work, a game, I know I have written about it before... but that my age is somehow not a stable concept... I am at all times a million years old and at all times barely seconds.  This is how I feel in so many places in my life right now.  Old enough that others look to me for support, young enough that I don't know how to get what I want. Old enough that I am cynical and jaded, young enough that I am ambitious and ignorant. Old enough that I have experiences to share, a wealth of knowledge, young enough that I am learning the right questions for the first time. etc

You know.
I am at times so sure... like rants on facebook... and also so aware of the complexities. 
I feel so unprofessional.  Yet the professors at the universities smile a little extra at my sharing. 

I need to pray more.  These types of thinking and feeling I have had lately make me so disengaged from my own spirituality. 

Afro-peruvian music fueled this.

A few days ago I deleted the silly app Settlers of Oregon, or whatever. This wasn't necessarily in the interest of saving time from playing games. It took some time up, but most of that time was multitasking.  Actually it probably took up less time than the reason I deleted it.   You see I bought a game months ago before I went on my trip... thinking it would be a good thing to keep me busy with after the trip. But I have been pretty busy with naps, and new silly creations, and spanish (a little)... and so much stress.  So I actually deleted the app game, so that I might start playing the more time consuming game -weird I know. 

I had a really good day today. I spent it at a social justice in education conference.  I went to 4 workshops, the first was on  discretion in teaching social justice... and I think my take away was that a lot of people wish I had my job. Also that teachers need to be tricksters both in the classroom (tricking students into learning) and also in the larger context, dealing with admin and  society. We can't always be blunt in our approach because we know it is right... sometimes we have to play the game while privately undermining them. 

The second workshop I went to was so excellent!  It was these two math teachers at South who basically have rewritten their entire curriculum so that students are applying math to social justice research in their community. Looking at actual issues in the school and in the city, analyzing them with stats data and using algebra and what not to come to their conclusions.  They are letting the students come to their own place with it... which I like, but clearly the agenda is still there.  Really they aren't doing anything that wouldn't be done in a sociology class or a human geography class but they are giving the students the tools to do it. Teaching through that process. And because its math being transformed, its beautiful. 

The third session I went to was a little underwhelming which is sad, because the people who put it on put on the whole conference. The small session just wasn't as easy as I think they would have liked it to be.   I found myself in a small room working with a few people (I was the only teacher)  and one of the other participants was a student of mine... which made it more interesting. I had to juggle all these competing ideas and pulls. I ended up trying to help the organizers and they validated my student's experience. So there was a nice trade off. 

The final session I went to was lead by a leader of the St Paul Federation of Teachers... and discussed some of the ways the St Paul Union is pushing for social justice changes. Using their power to unite teachers and community and parents. There were some good push back questions from the audience about specific markers to address racial inequity, but overall it seemed like they had an agenda that was a push for everyone and great for the schools.  Doing the work of a union... and we applaud.

In-between I had a bunch of good experiences networking with colleagues who may not be in my same position. A lot of people seemed jazzed to hear my opinion and thought I had helpful comments and questions... which surprised me because one of the really enjoyable things about today was the level of professionalism and real desire for higher outcomes. I also had a lot of comforting and enjoyable conversations with random folks, like some college students over breakfast who as sophomores knew they wanted to work with youth... seemed fired up and inspired.  Anyway... it felt great to be surrounded by people who were passionate about the right things. I avoided areas in which I might normally have too much of a heads up (so I wasn't personally frustrated), and felt challenged to think about new possibilities and new opportunities the whole day.

That being said... it was a little overwhelming, and made me question why I would give up the safety of my stressful job, for something so unknown.  The Minneapolis school district is a mess and no one knows how to address that. The Minneapolis Union is also a mess and people seemed genuinely surprised by how active st paul was.   To top it off, will there be jobs for someone like me?  Will there be jobs in which I can express myself and be creative and dynamic and meet the needs of my students? There are entire new systems to get to know and understand, there is the possibility that I will get to know one place and then be moved to another or have to start over.
These are the things to consider.   Yet I don't think I should live into my fear... at worst, I sub?  At worst I get a different job for awhile?  A worst I travel and see the world a little and then come home to a similar situation? None of these are awful.

Oddly enough I came home and passed out.  Yeah habits die hard. 
I woke up hungry, for food, for comfort, for passion. 
It felt good to have a purpose for the day, to be surrounded by like minded all day. To have a room full of new people to look at.  To feel part of something larger and to struggle together. To be accepted for having ideas and vision and experience even when I don't necessarily see myself as the one who has much to offer.

on a lighter note

I've been listening to a lot of Soweto Gospel Choir in my car. I find it to be incredibly fun and soothing... the spiritual aspects are nice, but I don't think they are as consciously present as other things... anyway sometimes I get into it and start dancing and clapping in the car. 
Its pretty funny.  
Today some older black gentlemen pulled up along side me and gave me the funniest look. I kind of wanted to explain that I was listening to a gospel choir and this is pretty normal. I think they might have understood that, but part of me wanted to just let it go and have them be amused  like "this white boy is crazy"   cuz that would be accurate too.

wholeness

I keep falling asleep early. Tonight I ate dinner, bought a cup of coffee to go, came home checked out some things on the internet and passed out. This seems typical lately.  I woke up a few hours later and had trouble getting back to sleep. I had the coffee because I haven't been practicing spanish like I would like to be... well not as my goals would dictate. So I thought if I didn't have anything else going on I would naturally find myself fulfilling my goals... but that doesn't seem to be the case.
I tried to get back to sleep after an hour of watching more stuff on youtube and checking out the news and whatnot.  I started thinking of all the areas in my life that I have been arrogant. 
Working around young people it is easy to be aware of arrogance. I think about these times when I was a teen, or a young adult. Sometimes in relationships, sometimes exploring my own head and heart space. So sure of myself, or so desirous for some sense of truth that the moment I had something I claimed it. I suppose I still do this, but its harder now, because things seem more muddy, more mixed up.  Like it is ___________ and simultaneously not ____________... it is blank's opposite and its essence, its counterpart, its companion, it's an illusion and a truth all wrapped up in one... and I am not sure how to pursue that really.
Seeking happiness does one find happiness?  Seeking contentment, does one find contentment?  Seeking fulfillment and wholeness, are these the end result?

I find my language to be stifled, I can't think in the words I want to use, can't find the examples.  I don't know if that is a product of my working around teens with limited vocabulary or if I am just too stressed to be taking in new information. I am dissatisfied. Deeply dissatisfied, but so comfortable with that -that it is almost more of a nagging nuisance than a real presence in my life.  
I am not really happy with any of the areas of my life right now, but I don't dwell on that... its just a gnat. These things fly in and fly out. 

My attempt to sleep was eventually pushed out entirely because I was lesson planning for civics class... thinking about all the things I actually want to teach but because I can't even get through the basics - I am apt to neglect.  The current topic is the constitution.  I am trying to go over the framework of how that is supposed to work, so that we can get to how things actually work... but I want to stop, break it down, give them issues to solve and force them to do it in the congressional way.  But what issues do they know about? What issues could they solve? What issues could they pass?  What would they be willing to work towards?   practically nothing... The complexities of anything that actually affects them - are usually so beyond their understanding, that they run from any situation presented... the staff often laments they will be eaten alive by the world. 

Years ago a former student/former staff member/former vice presidential nominee   walked out of a class shocked at the students responses to some of the scenarios she presented.  What would you do if they threatened to shut down the school? she asked the class... the students said "find another school."  There was no suggestion of fighting back, or probing or questioning the power structure... these were defeated kids, moving on defeated... passed around to defeated do-gooders who would be squashed again and again. 

My coworker ended one of her classes early today, frustrated that the students wouldn't even attempt to have a discussion in class(I have ended several this year for the same reason, or switched to independent study). They were too tired, too apathetic. They'd played video games all night, or were high, or were so used to being entertained that they couldn't fathom taking charge of their own lives, or they hadn't eaten in days, or they hadn't ever formed their own opinions, or they hadn't ever learned how to be in community, to have a discussion, to play a role... and she asked me is this what it has come to?  and I said yes, because I am a cynic and because I see catastrophe everywhere, and because I am stressed and because I want more opportunities that are easy paths to truth, and right now the only truth is that I feel like we are fucked. 

But I also asked what we should do about it... because I haven't given up either.  because this is a very big gnat, but it will fly away too... or I will, and in either case that makes things temporary. 

I feel like I might be coming up on one of those big transitions though, where you maybe choose the wrong path. Where maybe you make mistakes, where maybe things get harder before they get okay. Where maybe you have to grow a lot overnight, or spend a lot of time exhausted.

I spend a lot of time wondering how to avoid this misery that I know will come with the possibilities of something better.   The unknown is a rather scary thing for a person with an imagination like mine.   
Part of me wants to learn healing arts, part of me wants to learn to entertain, part of me wants to leave, part of me wants to be more extreme, part of me wants to have a family and settle down, part of me wants to make money and buy security, part of me wants to be creative, part of me wants to slow down and be less stressed, part of me wants to invite disaster, part of me wants punishment, part of me wants newness, and most of me just wants to be validated regardless. 

The issue with a slow life, the humble life, isn't that it wouldn't be fulfilling... the issue is that I would be depressed and anxious. 
The issue with the entertaining, or creative life is that I don't know that I can sustain it, the muse leaves me often, and I become very self conscious and depressed. 
The issue with an adventurous life isn't that it wouldn't be fulfilling... the issue is that I would be scared and anxious (and if I didn't find the right support -depressed). 
The issue with staying the course, is that if things don't get better, this current path is soul crushing and I'll lose myself in it. 
Ups and downs of every path... I see my own self as the biggest of enemies. 
 I've learned to fight off the extremes I suppose but I don't know that the middle path if on a decline is actually better. 

I need to spend more time outside this room. 

Well its october.

The weather is fall-ish, rainy cold gray.
The coffee shop is relatively full.
The work is never finished.

There is a picture of a white/gray raccoon on the wall. The painter is doing these animal portraits that on some level are kind of abstract and at some level are really clear.  So its like a gold background with a white and gray crane impressed upon it. Or a blue and black background with a blue and black crow brush stroked to formation, just a hint of an outline makes the picture clear and beautiful.

I haven't been doing much art, that was one of the goals, or activities to take up. This week I have a class on henna design and practice, but that isn't necessarily the type of art I want to do. The trouble is I haven't felt very creative. 
I have been really stressed with work since I started, so like 6 weeks now. The first few weeks it was lots of staffing issues, then it was student and activity issues, then staffing again.  No breaks, no rest, and sometimes it feels like no progress. There are a handful of students that need to be exit-ed from the program because they just aren't contributing the "right" way. Unfortunately for some of them, I don't know that they would do better elsewhere. The maturity level is just so low, the distraction and need to move around just too high. The academic skills are low, but many of my students right now have incredibly low academic skill levels, way below what they should be... I could work with that if they would pay attention. But I can't repeat directions four times and then be rudely interrupted and asked for those directions repeated because they weren't paying attention the first 4 times. That becomes too much, too much perpetual delay, distraction, disrespect.  These students are actually adults, who don't listen.  Adults who will probably lose jobs, lose their freedom because they don't recognize boundaries.  Its sad, its frustrating. The other students feel the frustration too, and it develops into a sort of us vs them mentality... but in both cases people aren't building community to work through it. Everyone is so individualistic.  I don't know, maybe I am just a very cynical animal right now. I generally see very few signs that the world is getting "better". That being said, I also don't care very much that it is getting worse, I feel like we deserve what we are getting because people are being stupid. We need to wake up, get off the couch, stop taking things for granted and start working towards solving problems, not just blaming them on others... and in that, I too am stuck.

I think in an individual way, I feel sort of stuck. I am trying to make progress on writing more, reading more, practicing and learning spanish more. I am hoping to use up my art supplies by the end of the school year and haven't even got them out yet. I am hoping to watch some tv shows other people keep talking about. I am hoping to make new friends or find a girl friend... but am making no progress with that.   I have been hanging out with some people a little, a few of my "see them now and then" friends, trying to push through the weirdness and establish trust and intimacy... but I don't long to see them. So that is hard.
The friends I do long to see, aren't available, or soon wont be.  Some are working really really hard, some have families, some live elsewhere.  I hung out with Jess V last night and had a wonderful time, but it didn't feel like I could just show up at her house and hang out, not yet, maybe not ever.  She has a family. She has other more important obligations.
She did take me to Cirque du Soleil,which is like the best gift ever.  I genuinely think in many ways that actually was one of the best gifts I have ever gotten...  and she didn't even know how much I would like it... didn't know I had been a fan since I was 12. She just didn't want to take her daughter because she was worried she would want to leave early.  So I lucked out there.
Lacey has started the inevitable search for a love. I kind of figured that would happen, we joked about it before she left and maybe she has found someone. Hopefully someone good, but I can't really protect her from here.
We are all actually the kind of people who desire closeness, we will accept no less.

 Maybe a first step would be being a little less me -with my weird hair and tendency towards awkwardness.

Everyone has a battle

Its 11 PM and I am starting to lose steam, but this is a post about an element of that so why not get it started yall.

I was anxious for the parent dinner tonight so I walked around the lake to get calm... and it did calm me, and kind of exhausted me... but while I was walking I kept thinking about my class last night.

I am taking two spanish classes. One started last night, another next week. They are each about 8 weeks long, but the deal is that they are at different levels. Last nights' class was the harder of the two, but I don't know that Monday's class will be my level either.
I guess I didn't want to take the spanish basics class because I was worried it would be all "me llamo Mike, uno dos tres"  stuff I already know... So I assume level 2 is where I should be, but level 2 doesn't promise conversational practice... which is what I really want to learn. So I take the level 2 on Monday and the level 3 on Wednesday.  But the problem is that as far as speaking, I probably am a level 1 beginner. I never got higher than level 1 or 2 in high school or college. I have traveled in Spanish speaking countries, but spoke English there.  I have used a lot of Rosetta Stone in the past, but I just started over a few weeks ago... so I don't remember a lot of my words yet. I know I have known them... but I don't know them right now... and that is the trick with conversation. You can't look stuff up, or get context clues if you are already lost... and last night I was lost.  I'm in over my head, some of the other speakers were at one point clearly fluent. They don't have the same hang ups as I do with language it seems... and that is the rub. It doesn't come easy to me. It never has. I can get by just fine traveling, I feel like a fucking champ... but speaking the language makes me feel like a 2 year old... and that is embarrassing.   I was so embarrassed. I felt ashamed of my inability, even though the reality is that I knew I was entering a level higher than I should be. But I guess its been a long time since I was in a class that I sucked at.  I guess its been even longer since I was the worst person in class.  and I am not used to feeling stupid.  I rarely feel truly stupid, but learning languages (and music) make me feel that way... and the problem is I respect them SOOOOO MUCH that it pains me to be bad... I am ashamed, I want to hide, I want to run away.
So I'm  feeling that in class last night for 1.5 hours, and then all day today I am wound up and anxious and I realize my ego has been horribly shaken. I just don't feel as confident about who I am and what I am capable of -because I can't express it.  I am so used to being able to express myself at will, that I am deeply humbled, brought down, by this 1.5 hours of not being able to.   And I spend my hour on the lake reciting Hindu Mantras to calm myself, and trying to find the ways to recognize that being the worst in class is OK. It's ok because it provides others the opportunity to teach me (which helps them). It's ok because it provides others the confidence because at least they aren't as bad as me. It's ok because inevitably someone has to be the worst. It's ok because no one actually cares. It's ok because my real issue is the ego, not the words... I can do fine getting by in other countries, I find ways to express myself and help others to express themselves... I will have to slow down in conversations and THINK and that is a good challenge for my brain. I will have to work harder and concentrate on learning and that is good for me as a person. I will have to get over my fear of being a fuck up, stupid head and that is good for my soul.  I will have to immerse myself in another language for 1.5 hours a week (plus the other class) and that will be good for my comprehension.   I paid less than 100 for all of this, and that is a brilliant fucking deal... but still I am rocked.

My boss/coworker is struggling... we all are... with school. It needs to end, and yet the value and function is still so needed. How can we close down the school when the school is so important?   and yet it will kill us.  Its a death trap... and I am a little worried it will kill us.  Because its so hard to recognize what is and isn't our battle to fight, when the battle needs to be fought and there isn't anyone else stepping up.

My coworker has her own issues, and she was really open about how vulnerable some of these situations make her feel and I realized that that is what happened in spanish class to me.
Caring and knowing you can't keep up, and feeling like at any moment you will be exposed and blamed and humiliated... but even if that happens    its like    were still us...

Past the shame and the humiliation and the fear and the pride being shattered... I'm still me.
and they are just feelings... not reality.

The things we do

I'm going through pictures, trying to prepare a suitable number to print all at once. Like 500-1000 pictures from the last few years.  So far I have about 200 from 2012 and random things. Its hard to know what to print from my trips. Do I grab a few well angled beauties? Do I print the pictures that bring back memories, or the tourist things?
I sort of knew this would be an issue so I did the puppybear photo series... but after that?

A few selfies and a waterfall?

My little brother is confusing. He says he is building his confidence by working out. But he doesn't have a job or hobbies or a future planned.

I suppose minus the job I am in the same boat. My future is pretty unsure, but I think I have lots of plans and just don't know which one I will put into action. Maybe I will go into organizing schools, or being a motivational speaker for teachers... as someone suggested I should do yesterday.
Maybe I will be a street performer, or after I take this henna class in a couple weeks... maybe I can just go around and do that for a living... ha. 

I got really sick last week and I am not fully recovered. Perhaps I will have to quit my job and become a recluse not by choice. Maybe I will become a youtube sensation out of desperation on bedrest. 

I noticed in my 2012 photos, that towards the beginning of the year I took lots and lots of pictures and then as Illy sank deeper into her illness, I took less and less. My own interests and isolation... it was not until this summer that I truly got out of it. Though I think I spent a lot of time earlier this year working on my own mental well being. 

I think right now, this reflecting is making me sad.  I should go back to being productive.

I have been sleeping and dreaming a lot  and it is beautiful and I never want to wake up... but i dont think its depression... i think its loving my own imagination.

in-between

Tomorrow is the first day of the 6th full school year. Technically I already started my 6th year because I originally started during summer, but tomorrow is the first day of classes.
This year I am trying to teach a more traditional curriculum but with the insights and adaptations I have been learning through teaching other classes.
For instance I am hoping to have more story telling, scenarios and student lead exercises in traditional classes like world history or civics. I don't know how successful I will be at this, but I imagine it won't be easy to get a job teaching non traditional classes at another school... so I'd like to hown my skills as it were.
School has been a rocky start... I think it is settling out now... but basically in mid July we found out we didn't have a science teacher/5th staff member for this year. In mid August we found out that we didn't have any candidates for the position. Today and tomorrow we are still interviewing people... and we came up with a back up plan that will work... but its just a rough start.
We have about 35 students and need about 55. We have very little hope for the future at this point... and today when my coworker was reading the "reasons I have moved on letter" from my coworker who left... I realized we might be putting a lot of these students in a tough position at the end of the year. Its sad... but we can't be their home forever I guess. 

Today I felt sick most of the day. Achy and dizzy and having a hard time concentrating. It started last night, right around the time the temperature dropped to 45 degrees (MN is crazy).  It was 80 today by the end of the day, but last night it was extremely cold. I was shivering and shaking in my bed under the covers and I started wondering if it was perhaps more than the cold... then I tried to get up and realized I basically felt that weird feeling you have when you are drunk and don't have complete control over your limbs and muscles and what not.
That lasted through the day, but I am feeling better now and hoping it doesn't come back.

School is in some ways the only real pillar I have going right now.
I moved into this new house and am encouraged to recognize there are opportunities for community building here. We are having a game night on Friday, in a couple week an art night. We already had a progressive dinner. But most of the time I am in my room, and I feel like I live in someone elses house... regardless of how open and welcoming they are.
My room is mostly packed with a large bed in the center. Half of the bed is covered by the things I do. Books, art supplies, computer and ipad, candy, a large dry erase calendar. But I have not quite figured out a way to make the rest of the room accessible. It is so packed that you can't use things...

I have been taking lots of photos lately, and trying to remain in my tourist (everything is new and beautiful) mode. It is going well for the most part. Even taking a few walks around the lakes, though I haven't walked to work yet, which was a goal.

My other goals are turning out to be more complicated than I had assumed as well.
Spanish classes have been sort of let down in that I couldn't find a cheap regular one that worked for me... so I think I will take two community education Spanish classes and work on Rosetta Stone (which I need to start asap).  I am thinking about taking the Spanish 2 course, and a Spanish 3 conversation course.  In both cases I don't think I am ready.
This learning Spanish idea, is in the hopes that I follow through with my plan to either travel to South America and be a tourist or go teach there. Its weird to be thinking 9 or so months ahead, especially when my thoughts and plans should be for this place... but I guess I just don't have much going for me here.
That is a gross over generalization of course. I have many friends who I am really glad to have in my life, but they aren't the intimate friendships I have had in the past.  They aren't as easy, they will take time to grow... and we are all so busy.  These are the friends I schedule 2 weeks out with instead of the ones I keep room in my weekly calendar for... if that makes sense. 
 Other goals:  Art classes don't seem to be as easy either... especially considering that I want to take Spanish two days a week.. so I am trying to do more on my own, and started a club on facebook hopefully to get people together every few weeks.  the art stuff I have done  recently isn't great, but Ive enjoyed it. 
Voice or instrument lessons, seem to be taking a back seat to getting everything else settled. I played around on our house piano and I was awful. Its like I have lost all ability I have ever had.  Its weird how much it seems creative expression is a thing of the muse. There were times when I could know where the next note should be without trying... there are times now where every note comes out wrong.
We might get a cat. That would be nice.
I might need to make more space and throw things away, maybe these art club days can exhaust my materials.  If I could just lose my attachment to all of my cds... oh wow would that create some space. emotional investment in stuff... ick.

Speaking of emotional investment, what do I do about the German girl?
its not that I think it will ever work, but I want to be in love. So I read into her words and try to find the paths to make beauty of them. I wait on her responses, and enjoy that she asks questions.... but for what?  Its nice to have a crush. It gets you through the day easier.   Knowing someone in the world is interesting, and perhaps interested.  But if it goes no where... why invest so much?
And she is working again, so her responses will be less frequent... and perhaps she is stressed now, so her effort to translate will be less indulgent. and I am not learning German, because that would be one of those leaps of ridiculousness. But if nothing else looks like a pleasing path, why can't I like a girl who has light up eyes?

Pilot

I've been listening to this band for years. I heard then randomly playing at the depot coffee shop while I was in high school.  They a very heavy sort of metal or something.  Anyway I have always enjoyed the lyrics which are very philosophical but whole listening today (and reading). I realized the thing I like about this style of music is that the monotone repeated notes of bass and guitar create not only a rhythm but a second level of percussion. Yes they vary it up a bit and some of the riffs are great. But the majority of the songs are:

One guitarist playing rhythm guitar and occasionally nice accents screeching noises.  He also sings, but it's not singing it's yelling. Not screaming, he is yelling, almost like an angry speech.  This another rhythm. Percussive accents on words.

Then a bass player playing repeated patterns. Sometimes plays the same note or two for a long period of time.

Then drums.

It's a band playing patterns. Overlapping. So that the spaces start to matter at times more than the notes.   Math in movement. Speech in music. The human heartbeat layered with breath, and surges of hormones. 

A day

I woke up feeling groggy. Tried to clean up just a little bit around the house. Showered. Drove down to Shakopee. Got lost. Got found. Went to the casino. Ate at the brunch buffet with family discussing travel, schools, the grocery business, dogs.  Went to ax man.  Met Alicia for coffee. Chatted for a few hours. Ate Leeann chin. Drove to Caitlin's. heard an almost perfect set of acoustic music and beautiful singing. Sat with twenty others in sauna like conditions.   Drove home. Talked to new roommate. Had company over. Talked to Emily and Kristi most of the night.  Met some of the neighbors.  Also talked to terry for a while.  Also met an artist. Also saw the girl that kind f looks like a mix between Becky and her sister.  Also saw a great acoustic set by mabbot's roommate.  Went to mabbot's house. Watched some karaoke.   Got tired and walked home in the new neighborhood and was a little intimidated.  Drove to t bell.  Counted possible prostitutes along lake street(7).

Came home ate and cleaned up a little.  Going to bed. 

Boys and backwards conversations

I am listening to two guys who speak Spanish, one may be basque, the other I am not sure... But they are speaking English because they are trying to practice their English.  They are talking about how it is impossible to get a basque girl to have "fuck" with you.   The one is disagreeing, but it sounds like he half agrees he just wants to make the point.  

Dublin is not a great city for meeting people if you are me.  I go out all day and do tourist things, or shop, or sit around in the hostel, and regardless I can't find anyone to talk to.  And then this lady started talking to me, and didn't stop... And I wondered if she was having the same problem.  I wouldn't say it was much of  a conversation, because I barely got to speak, or ask questions of comment on what she said... But I did hear a lot from her. About her childhood, about her job, about the states she was from... About the state of things.  I was trying to figure out her accent the whole time. Her son also had a difficult accent to place.  She spoke of living all over the states, and spoke German, but part of me felt like she was just making things up the whole time. I think it's just that reality is sometimes stranger than made up stories.

One of these guys seems to have no respect for other people, meanwhile demanding respect from them. Maybe it's an odd sense of humor. 

Tomorrow more tourist stuff... Book of Kells and what not.   The next day a day trip... Then I leave.

I don't really know what to say beyond that.  Looking forward to seeing homies at home...

Looking forward to dinners and coffee without having to worry even in the slightest about money.  Looking forward to work.

Not looking forward to the same problems at home that I am facing here.   Liking people who are far away, and not liking anyone in the way I want, where I want, with the time and energy and exuberance or whatever that I want.

And.   I'm. Out. 

Update from the airport. I am at Dublin airport with a few hours till my flight.  Yesterday was a lot of fun, I made a sort of last minute decision to be a cow. It made people smile. 

Hung out with a Texan who had just started backpacking. He asked me for my info last night and I told him I'd write it down and then didn't. He was nice, I just don't imagine I will hang with him ever again. So what's the point. 

I am super tired.    

Lolly gagging

Chillin at Starbucks sipping on gin and juice or my equivalent of hardcore kick ass coffee!   The locals can't make food filter coffee - it is always burnt and Americanos are ok, but not always what in lookin for.  I'm a talkative one today. Full of jokes and wonder.   I couldn't sleep for a long while last night and had all sorts of revelations about myself, Ireland, reasons for my mood and whatnot.   The short of it was that I hadn't actually had a conversation in days.  The long of it was that I fear the crossroads I'm at, I don't like the not knowing - where I should put my time and energy.  I've been writing this German girl for why?   I've been maintaining a relationship with Becky who doesn't need me, I've been abandoning friends at home, and missing friends who have moved on with their lives.   

Where do I go? Naked And confused and questioning "will i ever, discover why i live and die?" and then the intermission (hair).   

So I'm caught  with many opportunities and no clear direction. My life could become something completely different by next year or I could fall back into old patterns.   But where is the someone?

On Ireland, I was thinking about the dramatic differences between the unemployed and under educated Catholics who started fighting for their rights in Derry by throwing bricks and setting up barricades, vs the high security   Fences and militant discipline of the protestant militias.   The police walked away because they knew there wouldn't be trouble, they had already contained it. It wasn't just a crowd of rowdies, it was specifics, it was access points and leaders.   These boys aren't long haired hippies who want votes, these boys go through combat exercises on the weekends. This is their legacy, painted on every wall and written in every history book. The Shankill boys become soldiers, the backbone of britains ulster. In every war they sign up when no other Irish do. Their marches all celebrate battles won,  soldiers fallen, their legacy is war, their neighborhood is practically a fort. High walls, barbed wire, flags everywhere.  This is home base.  So the police can worry about a handful of troublemakers now and then, but they also know these are their men... Maybe once removed, but should trouble arise, they will fight to their deaths for Britain.

loathing in lagan's bed.

Yea.  For tired turning in on ones self

Coco wrote me a nice little German message about why she liked me... It seemed she thought I was honest and caring, and not shallow and all sorts of positive things... And there is something in me that wants to respond.  -you've got it all wrong, I'm scum.   

And there is something in me that wants to prove it in other terrible ways too, as if someone liking me even a little is too much.   

I have a few days left in Ireland, headed to Dublin tomorrow probably until I fly out later this week.   Eagan just wrote me and said he is flying to Ireland on the same day I fly out. 

I don't really hang with him anymore but it'd have been fun to have a night, earlier today. Was thinking I  haven't heard any live versions of finnigans wake. 

Why do I only like people unavailable to me?   And why when someone likes me, do I want to prove them wrong. 

Some things are unexpected at 29

This is one of those things that i shouldn't post but will because of the oddness of the experience. nocturnal emissions: apparently 3 weeks is too long for my body to go without release.   Maybe I shouldn't stay in mixed dorms.   

Natural highs

Well galway is fan fu king tastic.    - I'm leaving that auto corrected because it is funny.  

Tonight I heard some of the best fiddle playin ever... Traditional Irish songs on fiddle guitar and banjo.  A wonderful jam band who plays funk.  A bunch of acoustic rock bands.   Great street performers.   Just a beautiful night of dancing and rocking out.   

Also coco friended me on Facebook and I don't really care that she is taken.  I just like the idea she looked me up.   I am usually the stalker.

Connemara tomorrow. 

Evening in cork

I got into cork a few hours ago, I am occasionally posting here, sometime other blogs. Keeping two journals and making th videos Long the way... So. Forget what I post/write where... So forgive me for overlapping. I am on my own again, backpacking through Ireland instead of touristing. It feels better, despite not having the ever present social dynamics... But on that tour things kind of broke down into a lot of cliques... Which was dumb. 

I love reading things I've typed n iPad or iPhone because they sound like I don't speak English as a first language... The auto correct s wonderful 

Yesterday I spent my time in Kilkenny a small town (though out side of Dublin and Belfast they are all small).  Kilkenny was historically a very important medieval town with a vastly And lots of abbeys and cathedrals and whatnot.   I hung out with a bunch of Spanish speakers and had a good night out.   I have been spoiled on this trip now...  A bunch of nice cats to hang with, and I am up to my third crush already...  Spoiled. I wrote a poem about this last one, or rather about the feeling having a crush when you are supposed to be interested in a country.  It's over on the poetry blog if you're interested. 

But since that blog is mostly poems... I kind of wanted to write down some funny things about the lady...  Just because she keeps coming t mind.    And no I don't think. Will ever hear from her again,  and no I don't really know if she was interested in me, but she did seem to have those light up eyes.

So lets start there.   Light up blue eyes, the kind that melt you, the kind that have too much power, and their absence makes you yearn, and their presence makes you weak-willed to do anything else but stare.   Blonde hair, weird because I don't usually like blondes, but I suppose the cute ones can be exceptions. Small, too small really, she looked fragile, sometimes a little awkward,  which was cute. Especially when she danced or stretched... She looked awkward and cute, like she knew that it didn't look right, but enjoyed being funny.   Funny, she was ridiculously funny, in both a nice and a weird way, and that made me like her more. At one point when we touring blarney castle she made a joke about pushing me down the stairs and then proceeded to carry that joke, all the little ways she would kill me all the rest of the day.   On a similar note, she thought it was funny that I ate a lot of candy and after I taught her how to make balloon animals she accused me of trying to get  children into my van, her and her friends then made jokes about my pet rabbit.   Caring,    When she asked questions, when you were saying something important she listened deeply, asked questions, showed she was interested.  Fun,  she liked the same music and liked to dance.  Good friends, had a lot of fun together. Very affectionate, both with me and her friends,  if I hadn't been from Minnesota I would have made a move. But I am too shy... She was so touchy in a friendly way, like I had known her for years.   A history teacher.   Though we didn't talk about that much. 

Her and her friends were from an area of Germany where people are very cold, stern,   Minnesotan...  But within a few ours of hanging out I realized they were All very warm, fun, happy... I thoug t was sad the other people on the tour didn't see that side f them much... I guess there were language barriers that some people weren't willing t adapt to.  I can't imagine translating that much in loud places when you are drunk. 

For perspectives sake, I don't know this woman at all, she doesn't like long hair on men, I'm pretty sure she thought I was incredibly weird, she smokes, and drinks a lot.  She has an allergy to fructose, s she cant eat candy.  She is determined to kill me. I don't have her contact details and I actually don't even really know her name...   I called her what it sounded like her friends called her. I'm pretty sure her real name was karina... But wh knows.

Anyway the other crushes were a German in Manchester who was too young, and a tour guide in Dublin who was in a relationship.   

But I'd love if this continued.   Maybe I can meet a Galway girl with black hair and blue eyes. 

The thing with the German was that it felt like chemistry, where as the others didn't have time to pan out to anything at all. The tour guide was a rockstar crush, the other one was just a cute pretty girl.   

This one was real conversation, too many smiles and prolonged eye contact. 

AM. thoughts

Last day of the tour 

I should be able to slow down and do some writing and drawing After this.  My bag is full of dirty clothes so if I can't find a way to get my laundry done tonight im buying some.  We have just a few stops today and then end the tour back in Dublin. Tomorrow I am going to Kilkenny and  to cork the following day.  Then perhaps Galway again followed by Belfast in essence retracing much of the path I've been on.  I think this tour significantly shortened the amount of time I needed in Ireland and I was even questioning whether I should quick book a flight to some other country for a few days.  

The group dynamics on this trip have really bugged me.  There are 5 sorority girls who mostly stick to themselves or the people they deem cool enough to hang with.  It seems subconscious in how easily they write people off.  There are two Australian couples who everyone gets along with.  There are two Australian sisters that can either be the center of the group dynamics or subtely sabotaging them.  There are 4 older women who mostly do their own thing but occasionally have fun with the rest of us.  And seem to be easy going.  There are two Canadians who we just picked up, they seem alright and then there are three Germans I've been hanging with who I realy enjoy.   Pretty sure I have a crush on one of them but.  Today is the last day so...

Derry exploits

On a six day tour with some nice Aussies a girl from Tennessee and 5 sorority   Girls from Texas.  The Real World,    Every one is nice and yesterday was the first realy drinking.  We went to a place in Derry called the metro.    The entertainment was two older men, maybe  40s. Singing songs hover computer tracks,  all covers, mostly 80s and today pop songs.    The patrons were done up in clubbing outfits and way too much make up.  The hilarity was that they were there sincerely and not for shots and giggles.  I started to get nervous when women started giving me flirtatious looks.   There were like 20 women who danced by themselves to the karaoke style music....   When you can't tell whether they are 18 or 45 because of the caked ok powder and the red red lipstick and they startling to rock out to get lucky.    Someone is in trouble.

Later we accident broke in to someone's apartment building...  Are main clue that we were in the wrong building was a pair for rain boots that no backpacker or tourist would wear.

Greetings from Dublin

 I'm glad I waited to post until today, yesterday I was feeling rather down. I am in Dublin, capital of Ireland, city of about 2 million, the oldest city in Ireland according to the history book I read. I'm sitting at a hostel, resting and charging my phone. It's been a long day already, but its only about 6ish so I guess I have awhile to go. I don't get how people party all nig and then have a reasonable day...  Anyway, yesterday I got into town after a blitz through the leeds airport. I was worried about being late, but it ended up being far to close for comfort. Next time. Thi k I need to just invest a little extra for the convenience.  Leeds was alright, seemed a little white trashy... Anyway, I got in yesterday and walked round for a bit, I had told myself to take the day off from. Site seeing but couldn't help a little when I stumbled  upon one of the museums I wanted to go to. I was in the mood for a rest because I was feeling pretty low. It wasn't just the trip that had me down, though not talking to anyone for a few days does do that to me... I was also a larger sort of recognition that my life has changed a lot in the last few years in ways that I can't really describe.   

If someone asks me "what's new?"  As Becky did when I saw her, I can't really describe new things... Like. No new job, no new major friends, no relationship, no family drama that is especially exciting, no babies, no school, no major projects.... I think I'm rather boring.   But at a certain point I realized there was something very new, that she could help me with, but I didn't know how t ask, and wasn't certain she had the response I wanted.   

"What's new?"   More than ever in my life I think I am fairly isolated and feeling unsupported. 

The difference between now and any time previous is that it isn't just in my head... It's not a feeling of being awkward and outcast, it's recognizing the real limits in your life... and this is an opportunity to make new friends, do cool new things, try something... But I'm not sure what it is I want, beyond friends or a girl friend....

So I went to York to see Becky, and though it was fine, it was fun, it was friendly... It wasn't best friend friendly, and I realized it probably won't be ever again. This in itself was a blow, but it made me wonder what the hell I was doing on a trip, when I couldn't really invest or have anyone really invest in me here... I'm on vacation from real connection ---> which is the only thing I truly desire.  It made me want to go home and made traveling seem so stupid.  

I came to Dublin under those circumstances and wrestled with them.  Is city is beautiful, there are wonderful people here, there is good history and I am looking forward to seeing the country, but a part of me is feeling like my romantic day dreamer fantasy traveler mode has led me astray.

That being said, the tour guide this morning was awesome, and I developed a sort of rockstar crush on her, (unfortunately for me she is in a relationship). And the tour guide in training told me she met her boyfriend on a trip just like this... So maybe I shouldn't give up so quickly.   

That last post was supposed to be on another blog, I will move it later. Also typing on an iPad is ridiculous because it auto corrects as you go and sometimes that is helpful and sometimes they put random periods and commas in and sometimes they are way off on their suggestion.  

 It's 7:40 pm and I am at a coffee shop in downtown Reykjavik.  It is clearing out which makes me a little concerned they will close but its Friday so I don't know why they would close early. 

Maybe it's dinner hour and everyone went home.

So I have been doing pretty well, mentally I go back and forth between really enjoying myself and being frustrated with money.  Physically I am annoyed I can't sleep all night, but its been really helpful for tours and things to wake early.  My right leg has been hurting every day, which is no different than when I'm walking at home, but its super annoying to have to stretch every half hour... And it makes me wonder if I tore something at some point. Other than that I am physically doing well, surprising since I am behind on sleep.

I guess tomorrow I am going to try to do a whale tour. The next day I am going to another peninsula further west on a really expensive tour... I hope is worth it.   Overall I think I will be spending a thousand plus on this one week in iceland... But hopefully I will never need to come back because I have seen it all. 

It hasn't been sunny the whole time I have been here, some days the blue peeks  through but the sun doesn't really.  My feet smell and my clothes probably will soon... Is that combination of walking for hours and getting wet over and over again.  It's not so bad since my pants dry fairly quickly but I don't really want to do Landry here in iceland because its going to cost me 8 bucks and for some reason I imagine I could get it cheaper in England... Which doesn't make an sense because the British pound is not going to be doing me any favors.   I'm going to spend a few days in Manchester than maybe meet up with Becky for a day or two and then head to Dublin.  I'm worried about the flight to Dublin because I think they purposely set it up so  people would be late and they could make more money.  I will probably have to call a taxi and that ain't gonna be cheap.   My goal is always to have a great time and it spend much, but on this trip I think I may just have to bite e bullet. 

Typing on this thing is really hurting my wrists. Like the worst arthritis I have ever had. 

Google maps says my hostel is 10 Kilometers away but I think it's less and I think it's walkable... Unfortunately with my leg being weird I don't think I should try... But it would be fun and give me something to do. 

Personal thoughts?    

I wonder what others think about me... Can they tell I'm a tourist right away? Can they tell how old I am? Do they think I look interesting or attractive? 

Furthermore,  am I?   I don't think I am going through some kind of crisis, but without a source of productivity and without friends or family to guide me, to mold me, to support me... Do I have anything to offer?

It's hard because while traveling you don't really get to know people... These relationships are so shallow and knowing that I will move on very soon, makes me think its more important to check in with Facebook than say hi to someone at a hostel... But I wonder if they are thinking that too... 

Most of e people I have met are on shorter trips... I guess one lady I hung out with a couple days ago was on  a much longer trip, but I didn't find I had that much of a need to impress her, and I wasn't necessarily impressed with her... Not because she wasn't interesting. Just wasn't needy, or drawn in. 

I remember one of the joys of traveling w as finding like minded people and they are here... But not in the same way.   Maybe my bod and my mind have changed. Maybe I shouldn't be doing these trips in is way anymore... Maybe I need to be in a group or go with friends. 

I'm not homesick and I'm not excited to go home. I'm really enjoying the trip other than the slight pains  on the body and the wallet.  But. I guess I thought I would be relaxed and curious... And I am not that yet.    I should give up electronics for a few days.   

Anyway. Maybe I need to take some Tylenol or something, you enjo yourself.