Sandy Forehead

Today was yucky. I hate yucky days.
Yesterday was not yucky, the day before that was also not yucky. But Tuesday, the day before the day before, was yucky.

I'm feeling listless and flighty and reluctant to work. It feels like I've got grit in my brain, like I can't quite focus and my thoughts are all itchy and squirmy. Reality doesn't quite match up with living today, I feel foggy and not all there. Today didn't feel right, whatever that means.

I didn't really sleep last night, and I guess I got up too early this morning, but really, I couldn't sleep in any more, bleah. At least I didn't blow up at anyone today, that's saying something. I noticed that the last time I got up early, I was rather irritable and apt to blow up. But I didn't have that problem today.

Actually, now that I think about it, I didn't quite "get out of bed" or really "wake up" until just before I went to walk the Chocolate Chip dog. I hadn't really gotten ready for the day until then, at about three in the afternoon. And now I'm sitting here in my pajama pants, typing. I'm tired and cold and ready for this day to be over.
Maybe tomorrow will be not yucky. What day is it tomorrow?... Saturday, tomorrow's Saturday. The weeks and days have become a blur since school got out. 

In

"The environmental movement needs to stop saying, "Step out of the SUV, and keep your hands where I can see them," and instead say, "Here, taste this tomato. Taste this cheese. Taste this microbrew. It's delicious. What do you have that's good?" It's not just that we need to become a more diverse movement; it's that we want diversity. We want to throw a better party. We want to have more music, more food, more people."

~ John Elder, "The Undiscovered Country: John Elder On The Wild Places Close To Home", by Leath Tonino in the SUN Magazine June 2013

Some Old Photos of Ice and Greenery

Raising Our Standards Of Living

"It's hard to change, to sacrifice, to move forward and leave some things behind. But it's not just about sacrifice. The Canadian environmental writer and TV personality David Suzuki gave a talk at Middlebury College some years back a out sustainability. At the end somebody in the audience asked if he really thought the prosperous citizens of North America would be willing to lower their standard of living and he said, "I'm talking about raising our standards of living!" If we live together in multigenerational households and grow more of our own food and make more of our own entertainment; if me move across the land by our own muscle power; if we live closer to where we work  — these changes significantly elevate our standard of living." 

~John Elder, "The Undiscovered Country: John Elder On The Wild Places Close To Home", by Leath Tonino in the SUN Magazine June 2013

An Experiment

I'm growing a garden down the street from my house. The guy I work for gave me a patch in his field.
I haven't even planted the whole thing yet, I've done maybe 3/8s of it so far. I've planted three rows of turnips, five rows of beets, one of cauliflower, three of bok choi,  and this morning I planted two rows of bloomsdale spinach, whatever that is. (My mom gave me most of my seeds.) My sister is helping me with it, and she's planted four rows of broccoli and one row of cilantro.

It's all rather exciting for me; a way to gain some sort of independence and bring in vegetables and maybe some money for my family.
I really like gardening, I like growing things and working and getting my hands dirty. I think I've mentioned that people have a place in nature, in and of the ecosystem, not with or against nature. Having my own garden is a way of practicing that belief. I'm not creating wildspace or independent ecosystems, unfortunately, but I'm experimenting and learning and nurturing life.
It's amazing to witness the tiny leaves sprouting from the ground, and I can feel a response in my heart, a response to life and growth and greenery, like seedlings within my veins.
I'm still not sure it's all going to work out, and  I shan't be terribly disappointed if it doesn't, but I'm growing more and more hopeful as Spring progresses and heads towards summer. 

Final Part, Draft One, Bacterium Story

Incredible, that is was. Worlds and creatures previously unknown to him crowded into his mind, their names and words somehow accompanying their images.

            “You wish to know the meaning of life,” I am disclosed the bacterium's aspiration, “But first I will tell you this: every creature’s purpose is different, though they all follow the same pathway; striving towards higher consciousness. This is something that goes on and on, forever and ever, and is once again different from one being to the next.”

            Throughout I am’s short speech, different images, sounds, and feelings flashed through the bacterium’s mind; first the touch of fur, feathers, skin, and scales accompanied by thousands of three-dimensional pictures of all creatures known and unknown throughout all of creation; then a bright point of light, and a feeling of great warmth and yearning; and finally, an image of a great, winding staircase, a snow-capped green mountain, and the darkness of space, stars twinkling and streaking by as if the bacterium were traveling at a great speed. He had never seen or felt any of these things, but he knew what they were.

            “What is my purpose, I am?” The bacterium asked, his mind straining to take everything in.

            “Your purpose, dear one, is whatever you choose. The general purpose of your kind is to grow and reproduce and digest, as it is the general purpose of my kind to consume your kind. This is the purpose that creatures are often lost in, passing over the universal purpose of walking the path of higher consciousness, but that does not mean that both purposes can’t coexist peacefully in every creature’s life.”

            “Does that mean I can deviate from the general purpose to pursue the higher purpose?”

“Of course,” I am answered, “Your life is what you choose.”

“How can I do that? I have no idea where to begin, though I’ve been feeling around for the path all of my life.”

“You are already on that path.” I am kindly said, and the bacterium experienced the sensation of a hand on his shoulder (he had none), lips on his forehead (he didn’t have one), and compassionate eyes peering into his (he hadn’t any).

“You always have been, that is what led you here, to us. You must remember that you’ve always known all of this; that was why you had that wish in your core, to know the meaning of life.”

“Will I ever achieve this 'higher consciousness', I am?”

“Of course you will; you are and you already have many times already. Higher consciousness isn’t something to achieve and forget. It is the journey of ages, progressed over many lifetimes.

“Now is the time for parting; albeit not the kind you are thinking of. It is the time for you to become Yourself, though not separate, bacterium.”

The bacterium found his shape again, he was once more himself, and he saw I am before him, his shape rippling, and faintly glowing.

To his surprise, he found that he also glowed, and his heart (though he didn’t really have one) leaped with a new feeling; joy. So many emotions all at once; he had also discovered love after his strange and enlightening encounter with the being I am.

The bacterium set forth once again, with new eyes, new tranquility, the new found feeling of love, and a great eagerness for life, the unknown, and the journey that lay behind him and stretched on ahead of him forever.

 (Truly, I do not have the experience required by this undertaking, but it was fun to try, and I intend to revise it, and perhaps someday far in the future, I will have what is required, and this story will be exactly what it is supposed to be. Revise it I shall, experience or no, for this whole story is quite the garbled mess, despite the editing I have already done.)

And So It Goes With God: a quote from Life of Pi, a poem woven around it

(And so it
goes with
     God.)
   We tell
ourselves
stories so we
may make
sense of Life,
the universe,
everything,
     (42)
which by
no means
excludes
God. Maybe
neither story
makes true
sense of
Pi's experience,
simply because
by telling it,
he alters it,
omits things,
elaborates on
things, exemplifies
things. (The
story flows
through the
teller's
experience,
and is
translated by
the hearer's
mindset,
personality.)
The story
is never quite
just itself
by itself.
(And so it
goes with
     God)

First Draft, Second Part to Bacterium story (Confused yet?)

"I am" the thing simply emanated, and drew closer, alarming the bacterium. Before he had time to flee, he had been absorbed into I am.

            And yet he still was. Still aware, still alive, even though now he knew what it was he had confronted. An Eater; something that consumed bacteria, something he had known from other bacterium’s experiences, but never actually met before.

            But why hadn’t his consciousness snuffed out after he’d been consumed by the Eater? The bacterium was still conscious, still himself, but now, somehow, he knew that he was part of something much bigger and grander than just himself separate from everything else.

            He became aware of new things tickling the edge of his consciousness, concepts and memories he had never thought up or experienced himself, communication from the I am. (As he decided he would call it, it wasn’t like any Eater he’d ever heard of, though it bore a striking resemblance to the stories he did know.)

            Even though he had been “eaten”, the bacterium was still very calm. This was a strange feeling to him, after having been terrified of everything new and unknown for most of his life.

            I am came again into his consciousness, “ I am and you are,” it communicated, “But we no longer have the illusion of separateness; we are one. You are correct in naming us “Eater”, but also correct in setting us apart from that predatory creature.”

            The bacterium became aware of a warm glow, not really around him or within him, for though he was still himself, he was no longer anywhere. The glow just was.

            The bacterium was still calm, albeit a little bewildered by everything that demanded his attention, and the I am’s talk of “us” and “we”.

            Through the glow, images began to appear, much to the bacterium’s further disconcertion, for he had no sight, and had never experienced life through sight before. But suddenly he could see.

            “We would like to show you our world,” I am softly conveyed, “There are many senses available to forms of life in the entirety of creation, you have not experienced many of them, but to truly understand the answer to the question you seek, you must experience all viewpoints.”

            And with the images came sound, and smell, along with the bacterium’s familiar taste and feeling; even that sixth sense of inner knowing sometimes called “intuition”. The human “third eye” is not a sense like sight so much as a better-developed touch that envelopes and knows the whole of the thing perceived.
            Still more senses ricocheted around the bacterium’s awareness.

            He began to understand the things shown to him by I am, even without a sense of self.
(Sorry, my part endings stink.)

Sunsets, Sunrises, and Cool Clouds

Selection of Sunbeams from SUN Magazine March 2007

"War is a racket. It always has been. It is possibly the oldest, easily the most profitable, surely the most vicious."

-Major General Smedley Butler

"Here's what I think the truth is: We are all addicts of fossil fuels in a state of denial. And like so many addicts about to face cold turkey, our leaders are now committing violent crimes to get what little us left of what we're hooked on."

-Kurt Vonnegut

"If everyone demanded peace instead of another television set, then there'd be peace."

-John Lennon

"In war, there are no unwounded soldiers."

-José Narosky

Happy box thoughts

Subject: The smell, sound, feel of rain. Utter bliss with siblings.
4/1/13
Running around the block, bare feet and socks slapping on the wet asphalt. Jesse took his shoes off at the start of the third block, barely in the faint orange light of a lamppost. Jm, Torthadiel, TE  and me.

Subject: Wet cloth and fur under gray skies.
Running through the rain with the Chocolate Chip dog, her leash in one hand, my umbrella flapping in the air in the other. Elation, wet, wonderful happiness.
5/7/13

Subject: Easter
Mar/31/13
Hiding eggs around the yard with B and the big kids and then watching the little kids dart to and fro, spotting the eggs in the high places, seizing the ones in the low.

Six Photos From My Happy Place and a Bonus Sunset From a Drive Home One Day

The Key to the Universe (Imagination and Seeds)

(A sort of game I played with my little friend while we walked her dog.)

What if everything had a magical key that unlocked extraordinary powers?;

A key to a dog that allows it to be understood.

A key to a tree that causes all of the branches to draw up into a protective bubble, a living treehouse. Or a key that would unlock its original Entish nature, roots would pull from the ground as a long-forgotten face would bloom into a slow smile and very un-hastily, the newly woken Ent would greet you.

A key to the sidewalk that would make it sink into the ground and be swallowed up by grass and flowers, or turn it into stairs that would spiral up, on and on into the clouds.

A key to a butterfly that would cause it to follow you around, your own small companion.


The key to the universe in a beautiful, entirely significant, scaly pine-cone.

Ramblings

I wish to create a place of complete understanding and balance within myself.
Or maybe I should say; I wish to be completely understanding and balanced as a whole.
I do not wish to be influenced by fear, but by truth and compassion, and by clarity of sight.

This world is terrifying. This make-believe society and human world-view are terrifying and destructive.
I do not wish to be a part of it, but I do not see a way out. I am not really a part of society right now, but I depend upon people who are, and this is not fair to them, nor is it going to change anything. How can I ask for change, hope for change, dearly, dearly want change if I do nothing to oppose the thing that disturbs me?
I've hoped all along to create world of beauty and kindness around my family and myself in safety and cooperation, but as I grow older, this hope seems more and more unrealistic, though I find  that much of what human beings call "reality" is entirely made up by them anyway. Why should I accept and integrate into a world I do not agree on or even like?
I'm finding myself torn between this God I pray to and speak with, and a hopelessness in my heart that is a response to the hopelessness I see in this world and whispers "How could any god exist and allow all of this pain and hardship to be imposed upon people deemed weak by the arrogant, delusional "strong"?"

This adulthood, this "growing up" has created a strange duality within my being, a push and pull of high, heart-felt ideals and new, incredibly disillusioning glimpses of the world I live in.
I crave quiet from my constant thinking, and balance in the wild pendulum of my heart.
I keep thinking over and over; we must have a place in nature, in ecosystem and earth and the balance of life. And I keep thinking; Why have we lost it?

(An article I read this morning that contributed to things already on my mind and heart: activist post.com "Civil disobedience or death by design" . Not terrifying as some things are, for it is not actually an exclamation of "oh no we're all going to die", but a call to action and empowerment, and brings attention to the things that people in power are imposing upon this world.)

Sorry, Don't Have My Journal To Vent In

Things I left up at the cabin and probably won't see again until the end of the week:
1) iPod
2) Camera
3) Journal
4) School Notebook (the very same that contains the latest part to my story project)
5) Colored pencil case

Things I really miss and badly need:
1) iPod
2) Journal
3) School Notebook

Things I could do to get them back:
1) Make my mom or dad drive me up there since I'm lame and don't have a license
2) Walk up to the cabin
3) Bike to the cabin
4) Wait until the next time we all go up there together

What I will probably do:
4) Wait until the next time we all go up there together

a selection of sunbeams from The SUN Magazine October 2007 with Society lyrics played by Eddie Vedder

"The most striking contradiction of our civilization is the fundamental reverence for truth that we profess, and the thoroughgoing disregard for it that we practice."
-Vilhjalmur Stefansson

"In order to live with integrity, we must stop fragmenting and compartementalizing our lives. Telling lies at work and then expecting great truths in meditation os nonsensical"
-Sharon Salzburg

"You don't see things are they are. You see things as you are."
-Talmud

"The experience is there, the reality is there, but how to get at it? Everything I type turns into a lie simply because it is not the truth."
-Joyce Carol Oates

"Could anything be absurder than a man? The animal who knows everything about himself -- except why he was born and the meaning of his unique life?"
-Margaret Storm Jameson
(The meaning of life?... We fit into nature someplace, why don't we seem to anymore? How do we remember again?)


"Say not "I have found the truth," but rather, "I have found a truth"."
-Kahlil Gibran


"Society " Written by Jerry Joseph Hannan, performed by Eddie VedderIt's a mystery to meWe have a greed with which we have agreedYou think you have to want more than you needUntil you have it all you won't be free
Society, you're a crazy breedI hope you're not lonely without me
When you want more than you haveYou think you needAnd when you think more than you wantYour thoughts begin to bleed
I think I need to find a bigger place'Cause when you have more than you thinkYou need more space
Society, you're a crazy breedI hope you're not lonely without meSociety, crazy and deepI hope you're not lonely without me
There's those thinking more or less, less is moreBut if less is more how you're keeping score?Means for every point you make your level dropsKinda like it's starting from the top, you can't do that
Society, you're a crazy breedI hope you're not lonely without meSociety, crazy and deepI hope you're not lonely without me
Society, have mercy on meI hope you're not angry if I disagreeSociety, crazy and deepI hope you're not lonely without me

Notes and Musings

I'm not sure if the first true paragraph to my story is scientifically correct...
It's going to be interesting brushing up on my science in researching the microbial world for my story.

Most hero's journeys to higher-being seem to be centered on characters with a background of fierce tribal or communal societies, for example, "Jonathan Livingston Seagull". But these characters break off from their communities to pursue the their interests, often after being cast off by their own kind.
But what if my bacterium had no such problem, being a member of a very loose-knit, tolerant population? What if he pursued his own path due not to derision and alienation, but to his own inner strength and will?
If bacterium aren't really very communal, then I believe that is the path my story will take. I suppose it's already sort of the way I've written it, but it does mention bacteria being "social creatures ". I shall have to clear that up, factually and story-wise. 

An Accidental Quest (Second draft, Pt. 1)

Once there was a bacterium.

            He was set apart from the rest of his kind, by his own choice, which is strange, for bacteria are social creatures who live in constantly growing (or diminishing) colonies.

           

            This bacterium very much wanted to know the purpose of life, and very much questioned the answer he was given every time he asked any of his own kind. He suspected that he might be given a different answer if he ever asked something else besides his own kind, but he had never really come across anything but another bacterium just like him. He was also terrified to venture out of his usual rounds in the small, soupy world he lived and swam in.

            He didn’t know much about what else was or could be out there. Even though this made him terrified, he was also desperately curious about the world outside his own.

            One day, (if you could call it a day, maybe it was more a fraction of the many cycles that dictated our bacterium’s life,) as he was wrestling back and forth between his morbid fear and avid curiosity for the unknown world that lurked the edges of his lonely routine, something much larger than him appeared on the edges of his consciousness. He thoughtlessly fled, uncaring as to whether the thing might be possibly friendly or definitely predatory.

            He was heading straight for the edge of all he knew, and would have stopped, fleeing for his life or not, if he only would have noticed, but he was too busy fleeing the unknown thing behind him to have any thought for the unknown ahead.

            Still unaware, the bacterium quickly overtook his carefully accepted boundary and left it far behind, along with his pursuer, who had stopped stock-still, curiously, at the border of the bacterium’s familiar world.

            But he was once again unaware. Numbed by terror, and a little bit oblivious by nature, he raced onwards still, on and on, everything a blur to his frantic consciousness.

           

Completely spent, he finally directed his attention behind, the good news: he was no longer being chased, and the bad; he had no idea where he was.

            If bacterium could hyperventilate, this one would have at that very moment of realization. Instead, he swam in rapid circles, faster and faster until instead of being small and rod-shaped, he was rather large and oblong and hollow in his middle, like a dog chasing its tail. Eventually, he came to a stop, and returned to his normal size and shape.

            Finally calming down, he noticed a steady, pulsating glow, as if another bacterium was trying to get his attention, but the thing emanating this glow seemed nothing like any bacterium he’d ever encountered, which, granted, hadn’t been very many.

            “Who are you?” The bacterium cautiously communicated with a dim light from his own body. He would have fled, as before with the other unknown entity, but he was too exhausted, and intriguingly, this new thing made him feel calm and peaceful. He had no idea why.

            “I am” The thing simply emanated, and drew closer to the bacterium.