Listening to pop music at Spyhouse,
it is Friday and my car was hit and run again last night. Another $500 down the drain.
It is the beginning of summer, I have a few months off. I am going to practice Spanish and get in better shape. I will do some writing and editing, and probably not make a real dent, but progress none the less. I will probably see people, and also probably isolate a bit. I will do a lot more reading, and a lot more netflixing.
Jesse said something about meeting again next summer. It made me wonder about second chances, and if I've been wasting my time all this time. One never knows what direction life will go... should go...

I thought I saw that women today, the one who occasionally struck the breath from chest. I dreamed of her. But soon enough she was gone. She was definitely pregnant. While walking around the lake, I kept hoping she'd be around the corner. I couldn't think of anything else. It is amazing what a smile can do. I don't even know her a little bit. We were never even able to talk, and I always found her voice didn't match her face, a subtle disappointment every time. But those eyes, I dreamed of her. In an alternate universe we fell in love. In a past life we shared a home. In the future she saved my life. It is amazing how a crush can make your day worth it, or not worth it at all. Sometimes when I am super attracted to a person I make the conscious choice not to ruin it by getting to know them. Sometimes I need to dream people.

1:40 I should be asleep

I haven't had anything to do all week, but I've had a lot of homework to keep me busy. In fact, I don't think I will get it all done but I've been prioritizing the things that seemed the most important to get done first... so it might be some readings that fall by the wayside, but the papers and assignments and presentation will be ok. Ok?

I've been trying to exercise more and eat less. I spent a few minutes feeling really good about myself while walking around Lake of the Isles, and in the moment I told myself "Hey, this is you, don't let all that other bullshit take you away from this." about 15 minutes later my stomach hurt, and I spent the rest of the day very aware that I am not happy with my body, nor is it happy with me.

I've been listening to the Punch Brothers a lot. I've been thinking about how I'd rather be painting but I haven't even gotten out a watercolor set. I feel like after this weekend (my last week of classes for the first year of grad school), I will have plenty of time for pleasurable pursuits. I can write more, read more, draw and paint, learn some Spanish, exercise, plan a trip, meet people. But I am also worried that I will spent all my time watching Netflix or playing computer games. Avoiding people because I am not sure who I like, and how much... It's difficult to figure out.

Some of my new friends from grad school seem great, I enjoy their company, but I don't want to feel like they depend on me. I am afraid of commitment I guess. Same with everything else.
I don't even know how to say hi to people I have loved in the past, don't know how to say happy birthday, or thinking about you... without overly thinking and then doing nothing.

Take a breath, say hi, leave it at that. Don't overanalyze.

I have this paper due. I decided to write about food support (mostly SNAP) but a little on the conglomeration of programs that are mostly good, but not enough. They don't do anything to change the situation, but they keep people from sinking further (when they are used properly). Its weird to pick a random topic and then suddenly feel like you are really learning something new. -that is not how I have felt about most of the stuff this year.  A couple of the projects this summer session though-have got me researching. But thats weird too right? the Hmong thing, and a couple things this semester -all were things I researched on my own because of an assignment, but not necessarily topics that were assigned...  I dunno its weird. Also I need an editor.

But the point of this writing was to say, life is ok. It's not amazing, but it has the potential for moments of positivity. It also contains the seeds for moments of negativity. I have to a better job of choosing to eat healthily.

mah

What is the difference between fantasy desires and real ones when neither is acted upon?
How do you tell? And when something is part of you, does it necessarily need to be reinforced and supported, or just recognized and understood to be part of you. When connecting, at what point do you explore the discomfort, and if that exploration is self-negated for want of  stable support, is that living a lie or merely a half truth? and to who do you owe the explanation. And if the exploration is denied by the other person, is that grounds for moving on? Is it grounds for not starting in the first place.

the beginning of a june

Because it is summer and the sun is so welcoming, and the people are unraveled, and my eyes are pried wide, delightfully reveling, unbridled by morality, for a second I thought gladly, the world had become heavenly, spied I, so readily, humanity unsaddled, and bear of transgressions or sins of the form, but the thought became maddening, the presence unsatisfying, denied embrace or connection, and even the promise of an ongoing norm, o transitory flesh, a blemish  not imperfection, but the simple projection, of lasting satisfaction, a fleeting sensation, longed for once tasted, and scalded now, still waiting, for the intimate enveloping, implicitly understood to be summer's boast.

Hostel Dream

I have this dream repeatedly about arriving in a city, staying at this one hostel (recognizing that I won't be able to stay more than a night or two) and then getting stuck seeking out a hostel in the city.
I just had it.  But it had changed too.

Normally I am alone when I arrive. Normally I am alone in my struggle to find a place. It always works out and I enjoy the city (which I have come to enjoy more and more with each dream)...

This time I arrived with a group, but recognized that they were already staying somewhere else... I went to my normal place. (It didn't look the same as it does in other dreams), but I still felt the familiarity of knowing it. Knowing the guy who owns it. Knowing he is a bit miserly, very opinionated, but also just loving the atmosphere. I stayed there soaking it in. Conversation were struck up about travel and the state of the world.
It came time to leave and I knew I still needed to find something. The guy wanted to help me. He didn't know me from the next traveler, but as I talked things out with him, he came to understand that this was like the 4th of 5th time I'd come to his place and to this city (which isn't a real place or a real city as far as I know). It was a series of interactions with him giving me advice on where to stay, then walking away to attend something, then me tracking him down to get more information or a phone number. One time I used the number he gave me and got Chipotle rather than his friend who works a different hostel. He had all these opinions of hostels and how they were run, and what they looked like, but he kept suggesting the next one.
Eventually it came down to the same old thing, there is no space, go out and find something.
For some reason my Dad was briefly there and handed me 10 Euros (which I somehow knew wasn't enough).
I was getting up to leave and the guy said something about backpackers being unprepared, and I just jumped into his conversation and said without the people I'd met, I'd never have come back repeatedly. I wouldn't have continued to travel alone, and sometimes the adventure and trusting people is what makes it.
As I was leaving (all my bags on me) headed for the door, he gave me a 100 american bill. My eyes widened and he said something like "yeah" and nodded his head, but slapped me on my back and let me continue on in my journey.

I find this dream really fascinating because -A) once again it is in this city and this space that is unknown -but becoming more known. B) a space I return to despite the anxiety and survival struggle that occurs every time. C) In this particular version, I was already surrounded by fellow passengers on the journey and I made the choice to leave them to pursue my own reality. D) I was rewarded for it with money and recognition, but not with relief.  They were saying "keep going, heres something to help, but only because I know you'll keep going."

A classmate told me her dream today and it seemed visionary and left me thinking a lot about purpose and our role in the larger whole. We had been talking about feelings of social differentness- not necessarily isolation, but recognition of differences and our responses, and our theories on how we became that way.

I think this dream I just had is a rather perfect description of the way I feel in the world.  That I am recognized for my efforts, but my journey is lonely. It is self chosen. I return again and again to the same spots -determined to learn or thrive... It has moments of connection but not ongoing.

Makes me wonder where this city is and this hostel that is so familiar yet changes shape.




(((((((((((

Her dream had to do with sex -intimacy with a particular orange politician -but the feeling of both desire and subduing his terrible urges by distraction.   She talked about the sacred feminine acting upon the worst of the masculine traits... it is really a powerful association.

I was singing this song in the shower this morning. 

I should have said something, but couldn't find something to say, so I just said nothing...

thats twice today that I couldn't find the words to make a connection. 

A man approached, we were too alarmed to be sensitive, he shared a story that was too intense, and when he asked for advice we couldn't find something to say. Three social workers, too caught up in our human fear,  to connect to human frailty. 

He said it didn't hit him until he saw the urn, it was smaller than his hand. 

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.