I never really know what any of this is supposed to mean.... what I'm doing, or why.
Sometimes I tell people it's important to be aware of the things that motivate us to act... but to be honest, most of the time I never know where it comes from. I feel a compulsion, and it's so hard to explain that tears come to my eyes if I even think of attempting to.
Chris was telling me about a compulsion he had at work the other day. His boss seemed so troubled that morning, when he handed her some coffee. All day he felt compelled to tell her what he thought of her... about the respect he had for her and what she does for the people around her, and her passion for the work she does. He couldn't stop thinking about it all day, so before leaving he sat down and wrote her a letter, and gave it to her. The next day she took him aside in an effort to explain how much it meant to her, that she was moved to tears. There are no words for these things.
I was listening to him tell me this and I myself felt very moved. It's something I think about all the time, and try to put words to when there are none. It's so beautiful when people are honest with each other. We hold back so much, for fear of standing there naked, vulnerable to the world.
We think we don't know who we are, or how to represent ourselves. We think we are so alone. We think we cannot describe ourselves to each other in a way that could be understood. We think when we 'say', we don't say what we mean, and when we paint, it's never as beautiful as the image in our heads. We struggle to birth reflections of ourselves into this world all the time, and we feel pain when our meticulous efforts fail to reflect the true beauty of this thing inside us.
And all this time, here we are standing, naked under it all. Beautiful. Always. To Everyone.
We are not hidden. We shine through, marvelous accidental.
Listen: these compulsions? Listen and see yourself shine through. I know that if I stay here, eyes open, ears open- I will hear and I will see the difference between Everything Else, and my soul singing to be heard.
But this isn't a task, or a quest, or a journey to overcome obstacles. Even if you don't hear it, even if you don't see it, even if you don't think you know it.... you shine through, anyway. Marvelous accidental.
Someone once said, "Existence does not exist for others. It is of itself, for itself, by itself."
Alan Watts once said, "Contradictory as it may sound, it seems to me that the deepest spiritual experience can arise only in moments of selfishness so complete that it transcends itself."
Damian once said, "Any autobiography is an act of vanity."
And I once thought that compulsion, selfishness, self- consciousness and vanity were things to be frowned upon. Negatives to which surely there existed positive alternatives.
But what is compulsion, if not an act driven by a force that seems larger and more overwhelming than your own notions of logic, reason and etiquette? I thought it was something that had to do with lack of self-control, or of acting without thinking or consideration. But this is only one element of a very multi-faceted relationship. If you look at Chris's story, you realize that someties acting without thought or consideration can manifest itself in ways so thoughtful and considerate that we did not know we were capable of it.
Along the same lines, selflessness is in itself an act of pure selfishness. This is how much language serves its purpose in manners such as these.
Self-consciousness could be described as a condition of ceaseless fascination with who "I am". It is self-consciousness which is often crippling and misleading, often a circus house of distorted mirrors and illusions. But how much would we know, how much would we laugh and understand if we just really tried to look at ourselves? We are constant reflections of each other.
And vanity. The other thing that causes us to think twice before showing ourselves to the world.The other thing that makes us ask 'Well, who am I to say?' or, 'Well, who would really care to look at me?'
For one reason or another I am thinking to myself, whether or not a diamond is hidden will not change its shape, form, beauty or flawlessness. But it can only be brilliant in the sun.
For one reason or another I keep thinking about these things, and about how I thought they meant one thing, and were to be avoided....
... but now I'm starting to realize that things like this: compulsion, selfishness, self-conciousness and vanity... are completely unavoidable, and I have been struggling to overcome them when they themselves are part of who I am.
And not only that, but that these things, while they can be negative, can also be very positive, too. That there is no opposite, and no alternative, because these conditions are balanced within their own true meanings (whatever they are) to help us play this game, bring joy into our lives and others, and to bring a little more brilliance into the world.
Okay then. That is all.
Thursday, July 12, 2007
7/7/07 - Touch and Spill
i feel a little overwhelmed... this is good... it's quite good, actually (amanda, you know)
why does it floor me so to listen to music someone has made that comes from their hearts, and souls, and that perfect, radiant, gorgeous part of them that seems to shine when we just let it go?
oh lord. it floors me so. it moves me like nothing else in this world. every modular swell is like the crest of the wave that my heart is riding on. I feel like spilling all over the place, perfect, melting, water into water. Like salty tears melt into the ocean.
it touches me.
this is what it is with music.... i was ready to go to bed and nick asked me to wait five minutes and sent me the beginnings of a dubstep track he'd started working on tonight.
it's hard to explain, so i'll just say it in the first words that came to me... i told him, 'now you've got me, making such a pretty thing....
... it's like you touched your fingers to the keyboard and to your computer and it went through something intangible to get to my ears... and then from there you reached right into me and touched my soul.
what does it sound like... it sounds like flattery. people hesitate to speak when they are touched like this. me, i can never keep my mouth shut about much, especially when it's overwhelming.
it wasn't just that it was beautiful, though. i felt like the universe-sized complexity of the nature of the relationship between he and i was explained to me in less than five minutes, and without words.
does that make sense?
i heard it and i knew without any words exchanged that he knew me. open ears connect. not just me, Josephine, age 23, lost in her life.... but me... who i am.
i'm having a hard time with words, here. But what I'm trying to say is, every sound, every movement, every rhythm, it moved with me like when two dancers know each other so well they dance effortlessly, beautifully together , pushing pulling. Like my ears were meant to hear it that way. Like i've been waiting all my life to feel that elevated.
I love to see it spill like that.
That's what making things is, to me, I think. Cup Overflow. Honest Gorgeousness into the world, because we can't even help it.
why does it floor me so to listen to music someone has made that comes from their hearts, and souls, and that perfect, radiant, gorgeous part of them that seems to shine when we just let it go?
oh lord. it floors me so. it moves me like nothing else in this world. every modular swell is like the crest of the wave that my heart is riding on. I feel like spilling all over the place, perfect, melting, water into water. Like salty tears melt into the ocean.
it touches me.
this is what it is with music.... i was ready to go to bed and nick asked me to wait five minutes and sent me the beginnings of a dubstep track he'd started working on tonight.
it's hard to explain, so i'll just say it in the first words that came to me... i told him, 'now you've got me, making such a pretty thing....
... it's like you touched your fingers to the keyboard and to your computer and it went through something intangible to get to my ears... and then from there you reached right into me and touched my soul.
what does it sound like... it sounds like flattery. people hesitate to speak when they are touched like this. me, i can never keep my mouth shut about much, especially when it's overwhelming.
it wasn't just that it was beautiful, though. i felt like the universe-sized complexity of the nature of the relationship between he and i was explained to me in less than five minutes, and without words.
does that make sense?
i heard it and i knew without any words exchanged that he knew me. open ears connect. not just me, Josephine, age 23, lost in her life.... but me... who i am.
i'm having a hard time with words, here. But what I'm trying to say is, every sound, every movement, every rhythm, it moved with me like when two dancers know each other so well they dance effortlessly, beautifully together , pushing pulling. Like my ears were meant to hear it that way. Like i've been waiting all my life to feel that elevated.
I love to see it spill like that.
That's what making things is, to me, I think. Cup Overflow. Honest Gorgeousness into the world, because we can't even help it.
7/1/07 - A DJ Progress Report
oh boy...
... so I've been playing records almost four months now, and I'm definitely much more comfortable with it and still loving it (more than ever, actually)
... I mean, who can resist diving into a setup this beautiful?
Chris came over Friday night to play some dubstep and it was really the first time I've played with anybody...
...it's not hard for me to throw together something decent when Rachel and Winnie are around, in fact, I think I do my best when Winnie's around. It really gets me going when someone comes into the room and starts dancing.
When Courtney and I got together last weekend to make T-shirts for Bassic, I got to try my hand at explaining exactly what turntables and mixing are about- she said even though I may not be the most experienced, she preferred to hear it from me because it's not as intimidating as hearing it from the guys. I even got to play some and explain at the same time, no problem.
I really enjoyed playing when CJB was around- it's that whole 'Teaching is the best way to learn' thing, not to mention I just like hanging out with her. I hope we get to do it more often.
Oddly enough, even though Nick is teaching me a lot I still don't play too often around him. When I first started, I actually even got angry because I would feel like I was making progress and totally fuck it up while he was around!
Now it's not so bad. Often times he listens from another room just to track my progress sans-nervousness. At this point I can play pretty comfortably even when he's in the room, although sometimes if I'm on a roll and he comes in a-nodding his head it's like two trains come out of nowhere all of a sudden. Silly me.
Why so hard when Nick's around, you ask?
Well- because he is a DJ. The same goes for Chris, Dan, Damian, and pretty much almost everyone I know here in Boston...
... they're the most intimidating audience, because even if a person that's dancing can't tell, a DJ can automatically hear if I'm off beat even by a fraction of a second. That's pretty intimidating to me for some reason. I know how I feel when I hear a bad mix, and I don't want anybody to feel that way about my mixes.
But that's a silly way to go about it, because of course I won't be 100% accurate right away. In fact, I don't think I ever will be... because no DJ is. So basically I need to get over it.
It really helped to have Chris come over and play with me. Before we started he asked, 'Do you want to go two and two?' (he plays two records, then we switch off and I play two records) and I just shrugged because I'd never even tag-teamed with anyone before. I'd never tried to mix with another person's records and I hoped I could pull it together.
I almost chickened out. I kept shaking my head as I was throwing the first record on and Chris says, 'You nervous?'
'Quite.', I say.
'Well get over it. If you can't play in front of another person you're never gonna play out.'
I'm thinking, Very Good Point. I told myself I wasn't going to cut off my dreads until I played out for the first time. And I really want to cut off my dreads.
So I play. And fuck up, a lot. My hands are shaking like crazy, and half the time I can't mix the record in time before the one playing runs out. That's a problem I have when people are around, I'd rather just cut it in last minute and risk a second of silence than train-wreck (have two tracks playing terribly off-beat from each other).
But eventually my hands stop shaking and I calm down some. It still doesn't sound as good as when I'm alone, but I manage to pull together a few times that didn't sound too terribly bad. I get to watch Chris do his thing and realize that no matter how good of a DJ you are (and Chris is a great DJ), sometimes it's just hard with the time constraint, or one record is just confusing, or the two are off-key and it's too late to switch out.
That was a good thing to learn, that I shouldn't have impossible standards and shouldn't forget that it's fun. You could say that about a lot of the things I do, and expect of myself.
So I'm not going to wait until I'm a perfect DJ before recording a mix, or playing out because that time will never come. Therefore, my DJ progress report is this:
I've made some progress. And I think I'm comfortable enough to record a mix, so that's what I've been practicing for, and will be doing on Tuesday afternoon.
Pandai'a's First Mix :)
I feel ready, and I hope it goes well.
I'll post a link when it's done, for better or worse.
... so I've been playing records almost four months now, and I'm definitely much more comfortable with it and still loving it (more than ever, actually)
... I mean, who can resist diving into a setup this beautiful?
Chris came over Friday night to play some dubstep and it was really the first time I've played with anybody...
...it's not hard for me to throw together something decent when Rachel and Winnie are around, in fact, I think I do my best when Winnie's around. It really gets me going when someone comes into the room and starts dancing.
When Courtney and I got together last weekend to make T-shirts for Bassic, I got to try my hand at explaining exactly what turntables and mixing are about- she said even though I may not be the most experienced, she preferred to hear it from me because it's not as intimidating as hearing it from the guys. I even got to play some and explain at the same time, no problem.
I really enjoyed playing when CJB was around- it's that whole 'Teaching is the best way to learn' thing, not to mention I just like hanging out with her. I hope we get to do it more often.
Oddly enough, even though Nick is teaching me a lot I still don't play too often around him. When I first started, I actually even got angry because I would feel like I was making progress and totally fuck it up while he was around!
Now it's not so bad. Often times he listens from another room just to track my progress sans-nervousness. At this point I can play pretty comfortably even when he's in the room, although sometimes if I'm on a roll and he comes in a-nodding his head it's like two trains come out of nowhere all of a sudden. Silly me.
Why so hard when Nick's around, you ask?
Well- because he is a DJ. The same goes for Chris, Dan, Damian, and pretty much almost everyone I know here in Boston...
... they're the most intimidating audience, because even if a person that's dancing can't tell, a DJ can automatically hear if I'm off beat even by a fraction of a second. That's pretty intimidating to me for some reason. I know how I feel when I hear a bad mix, and I don't want anybody to feel that way about my mixes.
But that's a silly way to go about it, because of course I won't be 100% accurate right away. In fact, I don't think I ever will be... because no DJ is. So basically I need to get over it.
It really helped to have Chris come over and play with me. Before we started he asked, 'Do you want to go two and two?' (he plays two records, then we switch off and I play two records) and I just shrugged because I'd never even tag-teamed with anyone before. I'd never tried to mix with another person's records and I hoped I could pull it together.
I almost chickened out. I kept shaking my head as I was throwing the first record on and Chris says, 'You nervous?'
'Quite.', I say.
'Well get over it. If you can't play in front of another person you're never gonna play out.'
I'm thinking, Very Good Point. I told myself I wasn't going to cut off my dreads until I played out for the first time. And I really want to cut off my dreads.
So I play. And fuck up, a lot. My hands are shaking like crazy, and half the time I can't mix the record in time before the one playing runs out. That's a problem I have when people are around, I'd rather just cut it in last minute and risk a second of silence than train-wreck (have two tracks playing terribly off-beat from each other).
But eventually my hands stop shaking and I calm down some. It still doesn't sound as good as when I'm alone, but I manage to pull together a few times that didn't sound too terribly bad. I get to watch Chris do his thing and realize that no matter how good of a DJ you are (and Chris is a great DJ), sometimes it's just hard with the time constraint, or one record is just confusing, or the two are off-key and it's too late to switch out.
That was a good thing to learn, that I shouldn't have impossible standards and shouldn't forget that it's fun. You could say that about a lot of the things I do, and expect of myself.
So I'm not going to wait until I'm a perfect DJ before recording a mix, or playing out because that time will never come. Therefore, my DJ progress report is this:
I've made some progress. And I think I'm comfortable enough to record a mix, so that's what I've been practicing for, and will be doing on Tuesday afternoon.
Pandai'a's First Mix :)
I feel ready, and I hope it goes well.
I'll post a link when it's done, for better or worse.
7/1/07 - Restless
2:30am.
Everything is beautiful. I am in love, and someday I'll be a Real DJ. But I still can't sleep.
I feel restless as hell, and I'm not sure what to do.... restless isn't even the word, really.
I quit my job in February. It's almost July now, and I'm still unemployed. Am I looking for a job? Sort of. Why am I not trying as hard as I should be? I don't know.
It's mostly because I don't really want one, to be honest. Chris asked me what I do with all of the time on my hands, when we got together on Friday to tag team some dubstep.
"Honestly?" I said, "I have no fucking clue."
I play records. Lately, I've been playing a lot of Guitar Hero at Nick's. I spend a lot of my energy constantly battling a lingering feeling of worthlessness/ usefulness. I feel left behind in the wake of the adventure that was my life for a while.
I don't know why I feel this way. You could say I'm not looking at it the right way, and you're probably right. It's confusing, because I'm learning how to DJ and I am spending a lot of my time with someone I love and respect, and feel truly happy with... but at the same time I can honestly say I don't know if I feel that way about myself, most of the time.
And I always said, how can you love someone else if you don't love yourself. So what does it mean. It means I'm confused.
I feel like I have to do something drastic. I think about cutting all my hair off sometimes, but to be honest, I want to do something more drastic. I think about Maui more than I think about cutting my hair off. I miss it so much but you can only go forward, you can't go back. I know going to Maui won't change how I feel about myself, or fix anything.
I need to be shaken, is all. At least, that's what I think I need.
I don't know what it is in my head that makes me think the world is like quicksand, and if I stay still long enough, I start to sink. But that's how I feel anyway. Gosh, I have so much to learn.
I thought I was ready to learn about staying still but now I'm not so sure. I'm not even sure if running off is the answer, either. So what do you call the space in between staying still and running off?
It's excruciating and tense. It's full of anxiety and indecisiveness, and ultimately insecurity and it makes me so frustrated with myself. But something's gotta give. I've either got to get past this phase and shape up, get a job and get comfortable with staying still here in Boston...
... or I need to get the hell out... and I just don't know what to do. I've spent the past nine months trying to be comfortable staying still. But it just doesn't seem to be working. I feel so much that I'm not interacting with the world out there. I know it doesn't have to be that way, and that my level of interaction is in my hands to wield... I know I could do it...
... but it's like I'm paralyzed. At the end of the night I have very few answers... but a few things I'm sure of....
... on the mornings when I wake up and see this person sleeping next to me, it really makes me smile inside and out. I love him so much.
... and... although I still don't know whether or not to stay still or go, I need to go temporarily. I need to get out of myself and this place and I need a break. I need more than just cutting all my hair off, although that might help too. This I know.
Maybe you can understand why I can't sleep, who ever's reading this. I know it has to do with a very special love, an uncertainty in direction, and a reluctance to let go of my tendency to wander.
I don't want to break his heart. I love him so much. I want him to know that if I go, I want to come back to him, but I couldn't expect him to understand that. I guess it boils down to fear, as usual.
This one doesn't have a point, or a moral. I just thought I would try and be honest about things to myself, and see what comes up. No answers. Just truth.
Everything is beautiful. I am in love, and someday I'll be a Real DJ. But I still can't sleep.
I feel restless as hell, and I'm not sure what to do.... restless isn't even the word, really.
I quit my job in February. It's almost July now, and I'm still unemployed. Am I looking for a job? Sort of. Why am I not trying as hard as I should be? I don't know.
It's mostly because I don't really want one, to be honest. Chris asked me what I do with all of the time on my hands, when we got together on Friday to tag team some dubstep.
"Honestly?" I said, "I have no fucking clue."
I play records. Lately, I've been playing a lot of Guitar Hero at Nick's. I spend a lot of my energy constantly battling a lingering feeling of worthlessness/ usefulness. I feel left behind in the wake of the adventure that was my life for a while.
I don't know why I feel this way. You could say I'm not looking at it the right way, and you're probably right. It's confusing, because I'm learning how to DJ and I am spending a lot of my time with someone I love and respect, and feel truly happy with... but at the same time I can honestly say I don't know if I feel that way about myself, most of the time.
And I always said, how can you love someone else if you don't love yourself. So what does it mean. It means I'm confused.
I feel like I have to do something drastic. I think about cutting all my hair off sometimes, but to be honest, I want to do something more drastic. I think about Maui more than I think about cutting my hair off. I miss it so much but you can only go forward, you can't go back. I know going to Maui won't change how I feel about myself, or fix anything.
I need to be shaken, is all. At least, that's what I think I need.
I don't know what it is in my head that makes me think the world is like quicksand, and if I stay still long enough, I start to sink. But that's how I feel anyway. Gosh, I have so much to learn.
I thought I was ready to learn about staying still but now I'm not so sure. I'm not even sure if running off is the answer, either. So what do you call the space in between staying still and running off?
It's excruciating and tense. It's full of anxiety and indecisiveness, and ultimately insecurity and it makes me so frustrated with myself. But something's gotta give. I've either got to get past this phase and shape up, get a job and get comfortable with staying still here in Boston...
... or I need to get the hell out... and I just don't know what to do. I've spent the past nine months trying to be comfortable staying still. But it just doesn't seem to be working. I feel so much that I'm not interacting with the world out there. I know it doesn't have to be that way, and that my level of interaction is in my hands to wield... I know I could do it...
... but it's like I'm paralyzed. At the end of the night I have very few answers... but a few things I'm sure of....
... on the mornings when I wake up and see this person sleeping next to me, it really makes me smile inside and out. I love him so much.
... and... although I still don't know whether or not to stay still or go, I need to go temporarily. I need to get out of myself and this place and I need a break. I need more than just cutting all my hair off, although that might help too. This I know.
Maybe you can understand why I can't sleep, who ever's reading this. I know it has to do with a very special love, an uncertainty in direction, and a reluctance to let go of my tendency to wander.
I don't want to break his heart. I love him so much. I want him to know that if I go, I want to come back to him, but I couldn't expect him to understand that. I guess it boils down to fear, as usual.
This one doesn't have a point, or a moral. I just thought I would try and be honest about things to myself, and see what comes up. No answers. Just truth.
6/22/07 - Get By With a Little Help
I was pretty bummed last night for some inexplicable reason [read: PMS] so I did what I always do because it always makes me feel better: I called my friends.
Talked to Carl briefly and realized I've been virtually unemployed for most of this year. Of course he gently reminded me that everything would be okay in Carl-speak, and while he always makes me feel better, it also makes me really, really miss him. I miss my Carl.
I got to talk to Bjorn last night while she was driving around in Hollywood, and she had a lot of good advice and reminded me that I'm not lame. I love to hear advice from friends who know me so well. they know my virtues and weaknesses and they really help to guide me in the right direction, which has no set destination. They really help me to just do what I do best.... which is just make things, all the time, in every medium.... and that I shouldn't worry about where I'm going with all of this, but to just keep doing it.
Why? I was telling her I like what I do, painting, and music-ing, and Inter-web documenting... but how am I going to make a living out of it? She said, 'Well Jo, you already are. This is your living. You are living it. This is your life.'
I forgot that taken another way, 'making a living' doesn't directly refer to paying my rent. She reminded me that jobs are just jobs, they come and go. It's your life that's important. She's reminded me of that for years, and I love her for that.
God I love my friends so much. They teach me so much through their love, and without even trying. I remember when Mike was in town, and we drew while my lovely DJ friends played records and blessed my house with their presence.
I was having such a hard time. Then he told me, 'When I feel like I can't draw, I just try to draw things I liked to draw when I was really little. It helps me loosen up.' So we just scribbled like three-year-olds. He gave me five seconds to draw a face with only scribble lines. I kept saying 'I can't do it! I'm so out of practice.' But he just kept saying 'See? You did it! You do perfectly fine without even thinking about it.'
Did I mention I love my friends?
One of Bjorn's suggestions was mapping out a geographical space based on my experiences, creating an interactive map where you click on a location and you get access to writings about my experiences there and links to relevent articles and profiles I've written about the characters I've met there. She said above all, I'm a traveller and a documenter, and it would be a great way of creating a tangible memory network on the Interweb that is also a record of my memories and experience in cyberspace, mapped out over geographical space. I think it's a great idea. I'm going to build on it, bit by bit... I guess I already have been.
Talked to Carl briefly and realized I've been virtually unemployed for most of this year. Of course he gently reminded me that everything would be okay in Carl-speak, and while he always makes me feel better, it also makes me really, really miss him. I miss my Carl.
I got to talk to Bjorn last night while she was driving around in Hollywood, and she had a lot of good advice and reminded me that I'm not lame. I love to hear advice from friends who know me so well. they know my virtues and weaknesses and they really help to guide me in the right direction, which has no set destination. They really help me to just do what I do best.... which is just make things, all the time, in every medium.... and that I shouldn't worry about where I'm going with all of this, but to just keep doing it.
Why? I was telling her I like what I do, painting, and music-ing, and Inter-web documenting... but how am I going to make a living out of it? She said, 'Well Jo, you already are. This is your living. You are living it. This is your life.'
I forgot that taken another way, 'making a living' doesn't directly refer to paying my rent. She reminded me that jobs are just jobs, they come and go. It's your life that's important. She's reminded me of that for years, and I love her for that.
God I love my friends so much. They teach me so much through their love, and without even trying. I remember when Mike was in town, and we drew while my lovely DJ friends played records and blessed my house with their presence.
I was having such a hard time. Then he told me, 'When I feel like I can't draw, I just try to draw things I liked to draw when I was really little. It helps me loosen up.' So we just scribbled like three-year-olds. He gave me five seconds to draw a face with only scribble lines. I kept saying 'I can't do it! I'm so out of practice.' But he just kept saying 'See? You did it! You do perfectly fine without even thinking about it.'
Did I mention I love my friends?
One of Bjorn's suggestions was mapping out a geographical space based on my experiences, creating an interactive map where you click on a location and you get access to writings about my experiences there and links to relevent articles and profiles I've written about the characters I've met there. She said above all, I'm a traveller and a documenter, and it would be a great way of creating a tangible memory network on the Interweb that is also a record of my memories and experience in cyberspace, mapped out over geographical space. I think it's a great idea. I'm going to build on it, bit by bit... I guess I already have been.
6/20/07 - Under Breath Laugh-Rant
I woke up and I felt really riled up for some reason, which is strange, because I hate it when people are riled up around me.
I can see the pressure building, they get all huffed and puffed and I'm thinking "Oh my god, dude, man... chill." A bead of sweat rolls down my forehead.
But here I am, anyway. I'm shrugging off the rest of the world like it's snow noise and I'm trying to hear what my brain is saying.
You might not know this, but I hate talking about spirituality. I hate talking about buddhism and consciousness and the New Human and 2012. I hate everything I say about it, and everything I read about it, because it's all language to me, it's all just words.
It's like I just realized where all this damn pain is coming from. Since the moment I started writing the way that I do now- I was in so much pain because I couldn't say, because I couldn't speak, I was talking about the importance of connection, and saying what we mean- but it's like I just figured it out-
- it will never happen. We will NEVER say what we mean because 'saying' and 'meaning' are two completely, completely different things.
I hate Eckhart Tolle. Someone put an audiobook of his onto my iPod and I cringe every time it comes on. Some sort of new age chime goes off and I know that chapter 1200 of the Power of Now is about to be 'fa-fa'-ed into my ears by the most self-righteous voice I've ever heard. I hate it when people talk like that. It makes me think of that Ian guy in High Fidelity.
I know I'm using the word 'hate' a lot. You might even logically conclude that I am being curiously 'hateful'. Don't worry. 'Hate' is not the right word. I am just lazy.
I hate talking about buddhism, or higher-powers, or the power within. I know this seems really backwards. If you read any of my blogs this is what I'm talking about, right? It's okay. You can call me a hypocrite, it will only make me feel more human.
Here's the thing I'm getting at, and you know, I know I am right, but my words are most likely wrong- is that whatever these people have to tell you about being ego-less isn't something they have to teach you that you don't already know.
We are each others' golden calves, and that's dangerous...
.... and I think people that write about being without ego have created a whole mass of people who secretly hate themselves for not being enlightened enough. That is silly as shit.
It's all just language, you see me? Someone at some point said 'you are not your ego', and found it to be true, but then people's ears and brains decided that the ego was a bad thing and wrote about it in such a way. Just because you are not your ego does not mean it isn't a part of you, though, right? And it's simplistic and retarded to call a human good or bad. We are not storybook characters or allegorical figures. We are humans... of course you have an ego, or you wouldn't be you. How does the saying go? 'Who is it who knows there is no ego?'
I know but I won't [can't] say. All of this is just play.
Eckhart Tolle speaks for cavemen everywhere when he says the flower was the first thing cavemen found valuable without needing it to survive-
For me, it was the George Foreman lean-mean-fat-reducing-grilling-machine. Mine was blue.
And I'm not even saying 'I'm right and they're wrong.' We're not talking about right and wrong.... that is completely irrelevent. What I am saying is, how about this. And this is just a game...
... how about you are the George Foreman lean-mean-fat-reducing-grilling-machine? How about, you are totally pointless, but pretty neat anyway, like a flower or an electric grill with a drip tray?
Anyway sorry about dissing on Eckhart Tolle. I'm sure he was pretty cool guy, and I'm sure 2012 will be super exciting too. But It's strange, I may be riled up, and I may come off as jaded and disbelieving, but-
- and I say this with honesty, which is undeniably shiny- I have never been happier. I feel so full.
'Full''s not the word. But you know. If I start saying shit like 'I feel so ___' then you might as well just replace every letter in this blog with ______________.
6/12/07 - Patience in Playing the Game
How does it work in chess?
I am a very impatient chess player. I tend to spend the time the other player is deliberating mapping out all possible moves and counter-moves so that when my time comes, it takes me less than a few seconds to turn the tables.
About 80% of the time this works for me, the other 20% of the time, something happens that I didn't quite see... because I'm not perfect, and I miss that kind of stuff sometimes.
Other times, I'm so focused on some intended strategy that my impatience turns into anxiety, and then into complete distraction. I am so preoccupied that I accidentally overlook the trap that my opponent has laid out. That's when I get my ass kicked. That happens sometimes, too.
Patience isn't just a virtue. It's a calmness, and a tranquility. It's the stillness in the eye of the storm and what makes the dancing beautiful when you let go of all inhibition.
It's realizing you could save yourself a whole lot of cuts and bruises if you just move with current and let it take you right where you're supposed to be. It's less like gravity, and more like magic- and it will drop the pieces right into place when you least expect it, because it's always happening whether you can see it or not.
Anyone who's played the game, or put their hands on something with the intention of reflecting this beautiful thing inside has gone through the frustration of trying to say what we mean, or show what we see, or make the 'right' decisions.
The thing is, we inherently understand the nature of things, whether you want to call them rules, or laws, constants or truths. We already know that we know the right moves, instinctively, and without thought.
But if you're anything like me, you often get impatient with yourself and your relationship with time, and you start to second-guess yourself, and get distracted.
What I mean to say is, here I am writing about how things are a matter of time, and I know this, but I'm still tapping my foot and looking at my watch. My heart rate is going up, and my anxiety, and I feel held back, if anything by a self-imposed, imaginary standard or deadline.
But waiting isn't just sitting there and expecting something to happen. It's a wonderful time! It's a chance to reflect and look forward, and to calm yourself and know that whatever happens, you'll know how to get through it. It's an opportunity to think, and more importantly, an opportunity to not think at all, and to just 'be'.
I had no idea how important that was. I always think it's so pointless and unimportant, and that I'm not being productive. But when the ball is in the world's court, what could be more productive than tapping into the part of you that is omniscient and happy, because it is in its nature? That part of you ir more than intelligent. That part of you knows.
And here's the game I've been playing-
- my intentions were set. I would do as much preparation as would be necessary to get into HASTES, the humanities program at MIT that seems like it was designed for me. There I would find the resources to put together the project ideas I have outlined with notes and research in my journals, that are footnoted with references to the pieces of papers lodged in my favorite books to outline striking passages. I know what I want to bring into this world. I know where I can find the resources to make these ideas a reality. And now I'm going to gain access to them.
I know if I stay genuine to what I have always been fundamentally passionate about and fascinated with, the pieces will fall into place around me. All I have to do is move with it, and into it. I also know it's not as easy as it sounds to do so... it takes a tremendous amount of discipline and perserverence to be true to yourself.
I must remember: I will not shape myself for this world. There is a metaphorical lock on a metaphorical door to which I am the metaphorical key. An enzyme for which I am a catalyst. In other words, there is somewhere that I fit perfectly, as I am, and without contortion. And if there isn't, I will make that place. I will make it around me.
It is as in the laws of biology and nature, and physics and human perserverence. It is in my nature.
I should not take things so seriously. I should have fun, yes? It's just a game, after all. This life is just an improvisational play with no rehearsal.
So game. Set. And Match.
- Studying for GREs. This isn't as bad as it sounds, it's actually a lot like filling out myspace surveys, only more useful.
- Going to L.A. in August to reconnect with Dr. McClure my neuroscience advisor, and to speak with Alexia's father in hopes that he would like to write my second recommendation. (And not only that, but have lots of fun seeing my friends again, of course!)
- The big Kahuna: getting my foot in the door at MIT. What does it take to get in? I'm not sure yet, but I will- with Patience- and I know there is absolutely NO hurry. But I have to make the first move.
Step 1: Get a job at MIT. This is what I've been trying to do for the past two months. Any job really, I don't care. I just want to familiarize myself with the environment.
I've been sending out countless applications every day to no avail. I knew it wouldn't be easy, but I was getting a little impatient, and subsequently more and more discouraged. I began second-guessing myself, which in any game is the worst thing you can do.
Fortunately today, I just got my first interview: as a research assistant for the Tsai Lab in the Picower Institute for Learning and Memory. At MIT.
I am trying to be calm. Possible counter-moves:
- I don't get the job. That's okay! I got an interview, and that means I can get more! No matter what, I know what feel right at the right time. Endless opportunities will come along as long as I have the patience to stay calm and keep my eyes and ears open and focused.
- I do get the job. Great! It will look nice on my visitor's form when I tour the HASTES PhD program and fill in "I work for YOU." under 'current employment'.
A million other things might happen. I could be steered in a completely different direction. That's okay too, I am ready, because I always have been! I was born to play this game.
And now that I've said all these matter-of-fact-type things, please, wish me luck on this interview... because if I've learned anything at all, it is this: that these intentions have a way of moving molecules. (It's real magic!)
I am a very impatient chess player. I tend to spend the time the other player is deliberating mapping out all possible moves and counter-moves so that when my time comes, it takes me less than a few seconds to turn the tables.
About 80% of the time this works for me, the other 20% of the time, something happens that I didn't quite see... because I'm not perfect, and I miss that kind of stuff sometimes.
Other times, I'm so focused on some intended strategy that my impatience turns into anxiety, and then into complete distraction. I am so preoccupied that I accidentally overlook the trap that my opponent has laid out. That's when I get my ass kicked. That happens sometimes, too.
Patience isn't just a virtue. It's a calmness, and a tranquility. It's the stillness in the eye of the storm and what makes the dancing beautiful when you let go of all inhibition.
It's realizing you could save yourself a whole lot of cuts and bruises if you just move with current and let it take you right where you're supposed to be. It's less like gravity, and more like magic- and it will drop the pieces right into place when you least expect it, because it's always happening whether you can see it or not.
Anyone who's played the game, or put their hands on something with the intention of reflecting this beautiful thing inside has gone through the frustration of trying to say what we mean, or show what we see, or make the 'right' decisions.
The thing is, we inherently understand the nature of things, whether you want to call them rules, or laws, constants or truths. We already know that we know the right moves, instinctively, and without thought.
But if you're anything like me, you often get impatient with yourself and your relationship with time, and you start to second-guess yourself, and get distracted.
What I mean to say is, here I am writing about how things are a matter of time, and I know this, but I'm still tapping my foot and looking at my watch. My heart rate is going up, and my anxiety, and I feel held back, if anything by a self-imposed, imaginary standard or deadline.
But waiting isn't just sitting there and expecting something to happen. It's a wonderful time! It's a chance to reflect and look forward, and to calm yourself and know that whatever happens, you'll know how to get through it. It's an opportunity to think, and more importantly, an opportunity to not think at all, and to just 'be'.
I had no idea how important that was. I always think it's so pointless and unimportant, and that I'm not being productive. But when the ball is in the world's court, what could be more productive than tapping into the part of you that is omniscient and happy, because it is in its nature? That part of you ir more than intelligent. That part of you knows.
And here's the game I've been playing-
- my intentions were set. I would do as much preparation as would be necessary to get into HASTES, the humanities program at MIT that seems like it was designed for me. There I would find the resources to put together the project ideas I have outlined with notes and research in my journals, that are footnoted with references to the pieces of papers lodged in my favorite books to outline striking passages. I know what I want to bring into this world. I know where I can find the resources to make these ideas a reality. And now I'm going to gain access to them.
I know if I stay genuine to what I have always been fundamentally passionate about and fascinated with, the pieces will fall into place around me. All I have to do is move with it, and into it. I also know it's not as easy as it sounds to do so... it takes a tremendous amount of discipline and perserverence to be true to yourself.
I must remember: I will not shape myself for this world. There is a metaphorical lock on a metaphorical door to which I am the metaphorical key. An enzyme for which I am a catalyst. In other words, there is somewhere that I fit perfectly, as I am, and without contortion. And if there isn't, I will make that place. I will make it around me.
It is as in the laws of biology and nature, and physics and human perserverence. It is in my nature.
I should not take things so seriously. I should have fun, yes? It's just a game, after all. This life is just an improvisational play with no rehearsal.
So game. Set. And Match.
- Studying for GREs. This isn't as bad as it sounds, it's actually a lot like filling out myspace surveys, only more useful.
- Going to L.A. in August to reconnect with Dr. McClure my neuroscience advisor, and to speak with Alexia's father in hopes that he would like to write my second recommendation. (And not only that, but have lots of fun seeing my friends again, of course!)
- The big Kahuna: getting my foot in the door at MIT. What does it take to get in? I'm not sure yet, but I will- with Patience- and I know there is absolutely NO hurry. But I have to make the first move.
Step 1: Get a job at MIT. This is what I've been trying to do for the past two months. Any job really, I don't care. I just want to familiarize myself with the environment.
I've been sending out countless applications every day to no avail. I knew it wouldn't be easy, but I was getting a little impatient, and subsequently more and more discouraged. I began second-guessing myself, which in any game is the worst thing you can do.
Fortunately today, I just got my first interview: as a research assistant for the Tsai Lab in the Picower Institute for Learning and Memory. At MIT.
I am trying to be calm. Possible counter-moves:
- I don't get the job. That's okay! I got an interview, and that means I can get more! No matter what, I know what feel right at the right time. Endless opportunities will come along as long as I have the patience to stay calm and keep my eyes and ears open and focused.
- I do get the job. Great! It will look nice on my visitor's form when I tour the HASTES PhD program and fill in "I work for YOU." under 'current employment'.
A million other things might happen. I could be steered in a completely different direction. That's okay too, I am ready, because I always have been! I was born to play this game.
And now that I've said all these matter-of-fact-type things, please, wish me luck on this interview... because if I've learned anything at all, it is this: that these intentions have a way of moving molecules. (It's real magic!)
6/6/07 - This Tether Life
Oh, this time in my life. In our lives.
I feel like a ball at the end of a tether cord, back and forth and all around. Some days I wake up and I can't stop myself, I'm moving so fast. I'm a whirlwind of productivity; here I'll paint my mural now, and then ten feet away to my turntables, and now I'll read a book and edit my writing.
Now I am going to go for a walk to look at records and pretty things while trying not to buy them, and then I go home to revise my resume, have three friends review it, write and edit several cover letter templates, and apply to five jobs a day. I feel un-fuckin-stoppable. And then.
Down, down and back again. One day, then two, then five. No responses. And then I wonder what I did wrong, was I not qualified enough? Was I not proactive enough? Is my old boss right, am I really unemployable? These things really get me down... these rejection things.
I sit in my home and I feel kicked around, and deflated. Like my intentions were stated boldly into the dark, but the Magic didn't work, and now someone is laughing back at me far away where I can't hear them.
My mural sits unpainted because I am sick with worry about my dwindling bank account. Nick asks me what I did today and I say 'Nothing', but that's never really true... I played records... I didn't do my laundry, or edit my book for more than half an hour, or paint my mural... I just checked my email every once in a while in case someone responded and played records all day and all night. I suppose that's something.
I tried to look for new jobs but I would look at the job descriptions and my chest would hurt, because I knew I would just get excited about it and hear nothing back.
I know that there are other ways of doing it, networking and such, but right now I just feel so deflated. I've got to blow some life into my ego, before I start to think I'm clever enough to be clever about it.
I've got to push.
"I'm proud of you," Nick said.
"Why so?"
"Because you never give up."
I could work as a waitress, or at the record store. Just to tide myself over... but it just doesn't feel right. I quit working at the coffee shop because I wanted to take the time to focus the proverbial crosshairs, and hit the bullseye. To find myself right where I intend to be. Chris and anyone feeling more buddhist than I do at the moment would remind me that I should be here, now. I say things like that to people all the time.
But there's some piece of the puzzle that I haven't quite wrapped my head around yet, which is how to Be Here Now, and also to move... and not forward, or towards something, but to just move.... to dance.
I want to dance. That's what this is about. I feel paralyzed, like someone is teaching me the two-step when I just want to shake my body the way it wants to shake, and to move my feet, and make my body sweat enraptured by the sheer passion of the Movement
They taught us at Kahua to Be Total, and to be present in every moment and the way it feels, its taste, its texture. It comes so naturally, and feels so right.
But how is it to be in your nature in such an unnatural world? It feels like sandpaper against my soul.
I wanted to see if the magic I saw in myself in Maui could work here... and the optimistic part of me thinks it does
the rest of me, it just can't see. Any of it. At all.
I feel so naive, all over again. Like a caged animal wanting to be free. I have been a caged animal, and I have been free. What I want, is to just be that animal existing, having shed the illusion of the cage.
I watched Breakfast at Tiffany's the other week and there was some sort of noble speech at the end when the main character is being accosted for running away from her problems.
Her co-star had said something like, 'You keep running because you don't want to be in a cage, but no matter where you go, that cage will be there, because that cage is your own insecurities, and fears. It doesn't matter where you are, or who you are, you will always be in a cage.'
That probably wasn't how it went. I probably made all that up. But you get the point.
I have tethered myself in place, to my insecurities and fears. But I know what it's like to fly. And I can cut this cord.
Earlier today Nick held me by the shoulders and said "Remember what you told me about setting intentions? You can make this happen, all you have to do is set your intention."
I was crying then, not so much because I was discouraged, but just because I felt so much love for him for reminding me. All of you lovely humans, reminding me.
I can do this. I can get the job that I am passing up all other jobs to get, because I can see it, and it is mine. I am not unintelligent, or incapable. All I have to do is show myself, my real self, and I will find a way.
5/21/07 - Self-Teachings
Things seem like they're pretty hard lately.
I know they're not that bad, and that everything isn't falling apart, all over my head. It may not be that bad, but it still feels like it.
I guess I'm just having one of those times. I feel so lost.
But I was browsing through my blog earlier and found this entry, entitled, "Weren't You Afraid?", and a tear rolled down my cheek, because I was learning a lesson from myself, which is one of the blessings of having a written record of my thoughts.
It's a wonder to learn something from yourself. I think it has something to do with wisdom, which I hope to have some time when I'm old, and my parts don't work.
Part of me feels so far away from the person who wrote that. Slow, can't think thoughts or write words. I hope I come back to myself.
I know they're not that bad, and that everything isn't falling apart, all over my head. It may not be that bad, but it still feels like it.
I guess I'm just having one of those times. I feel so lost.
But I was browsing through my blog earlier and found this entry, entitled, "Weren't You Afraid?", and a tear rolled down my cheek, because I was learning a lesson from myself, which is one of the blessings of having a written record of my thoughts.
It's a wonder to learn something from yourself. I think it has something to do with wisdom, which I hope to have some time when I'm old, and my parts don't work.
Part of me feels so far away from the person who wrote that. Slow, can't think thoughts or write words. I hope I come back to myself.
5/16/07 - Response Letter
A response letter to a friend who wrote me in response to the last blog. I took out names for now out of respect, since I haven't asked his permission to publicize our conversation. I'll stick them back in if he has no problem with it:
______________________________________________
hey _____, thanks so much for your insight, i'm very excited to eventually get a chance to talk to you about such things.
I definitely fluctuate between defining my own identity and disassociating from it. I've come to think of it as a game, but just like winning and losing in games, if I feel like the story I'm unfolding has hit a wall, I start to get frustrated. I am a sore loser.
It's really, really helpful to be reminded to focus on the things I know, but have turned a blind eye to (again). I thank you for that.
As far as conclusions go, I've come to the conclusion that there is no such thing. I have an intuition that there's no answer to our most provoking questions, and the pursuit of such only reveals more questions. So it must be about the inquiry, and the joy and sorrow of it.
I'm okay with that. I just forget I'm okay with that, sometimes.
I empathize with what you went through with _______. The last person I was with (for most of college) lied to me several times about some seriously painful things before I literally couldn't bear to speak to him anymore.
It was a terrible time, my heart was completely broken, I felt my trust for other humans desintegrating, and with every new chance I gave him thrown in my face, I felt more and more like a fool.
Those kinds of things force you to question every little thing about yourself, whether it's reasonable or not. You wonder what was not good enough about you for the other person, what you might have done better, why the person they're with now is so superior to you in quality. You question the nature of human interaction, and whether or not it's meaningful at all. And so on.
Most importantly though, relationship aside, it forces you to look at yourself, and really try and see who it is you really are- the truth of it. Heartbreak might have been the most illuminating thing that has ever happened to me.
Here's a little thing that my life has brought to my attention recently, that I feel compelled to share with you for whatever reason-
- I thought for the better part of the last year and a half, when I was mostly solitary and healing, that I might never be able to trust or love again, or that past events had damaged my ability to do so. Since I've been in this city, I realized that things like that are never beyond our reach or lost to us.
The broken-hearted have had to peel away layers, and have become wiser for it. They realize that love and trust are not for everybody, and everything.
They are gifts that we give to this world, to those who bring it out in us. When we meet those people, no matter how much we've been hurt, there's no way in the world we will be able to help it. We can't help the loving, and the trusting.
I didn't know, but it pours out of you when you find someone worthy of it. I've been quite surprised, actually... it happens when you least expect it... and I know that sounds cliche, but there's truth to it, that's how it becomes cliche in the first place.
I understand what you mean about being comfortable floating in limbo. I have been quite comfortable, and happy-
- I know that I'm on the brink of something, though. Like I'm on the edge of a waterfall, and the floating is about to be pulled out from under me and something wild is about to happen. It's excitement and nervousness, is what it is. The other side to the floating, if I were to be taoist about it.
And yes, your words were a great aid. They came just at the right time. (namaste)
Josephine
______________________________________________
hey _____, thanks so much for your insight, i'm very excited to eventually get a chance to talk to you about such things.
I definitely fluctuate between defining my own identity and disassociating from it. I've come to think of it as a game, but just like winning and losing in games, if I feel like the story I'm unfolding has hit a wall, I start to get frustrated. I am a sore loser.
It's really, really helpful to be reminded to focus on the things I know, but have turned a blind eye to (again). I thank you for that.
As far as conclusions go, I've come to the conclusion that there is no such thing. I have an intuition that there's no answer to our most provoking questions, and the pursuit of such only reveals more questions. So it must be about the inquiry, and the joy and sorrow of it.
I'm okay with that. I just forget I'm okay with that, sometimes.
I empathize with what you went through with _______. The last person I was with (for most of college) lied to me several times about some seriously painful things before I literally couldn't bear to speak to him anymore.
It was a terrible time, my heart was completely broken, I felt my trust for other humans desintegrating, and with every new chance I gave him thrown in my face, I felt more and more like a fool.
Those kinds of things force you to question every little thing about yourself, whether it's reasonable or not. You wonder what was not good enough about you for the other person, what you might have done better, why the person they're with now is so superior to you in quality. You question the nature of human interaction, and whether or not it's meaningful at all. And so on.
Most importantly though, relationship aside, it forces you to look at yourself, and really try and see who it is you really are- the truth of it. Heartbreak might have been the most illuminating thing that has ever happened to me.
Here's a little thing that my life has brought to my attention recently, that I feel compelled to share with you for whatever reason-
- I thought for the better part of the last year and a half, when I was mostly solitary and healing, that I might never be able to trust or love again, or that past events had damaged my ability to do so. Since I've been in this city, I realized that things like that are never beyond our reach or lost to us.
The broken-hearted have had to peel away layers, and have become wiser for it. They realize that love and trust are not for everybody, and everything.
They are gifts that we give to this world, to those who bring it out in us. When we meet those people, no matter how much we've been hurt, there's no way in the world we will be able to help it. We can't help the loving, and the trusting.
I didn't know, but it pours out of you when you find someone worthy of it. I've been quite surprised, actually... it happens when you least expect it... and I know that sounds cliche, but there's truth to it, that's how it becomes cliche in the first place.
I understand what you mean about being comfortable floating in limbo. I have been quite comfortable, and happy-
- I know that I'm on the brink of something, though. Like I'm on the edge of a waterfall, and the floating is about to be pulled out from under me and something wild is about to happen. It's excitement and nervousness, is what it is. The other side to the floating, if I were to be taoist about it.
And yes, your words were a great aid. They came just at the right time. (namaste)
Josephine
5/14/07 - Running
I've been thinking all day about what it means to run. To go. To move toward somewhere other than here, now.
I'd told myself when I moved into this apartment in Boston that I was going to put my roots into this urban garden, soak it all up and become a part of it before moving onward. The half-finished mural in my room was meant to be a testament to my semi-permanent commitment to this city.
Things are so different now than when I first laid paint on that wall.
I had a steady job, and good income. I felt like I was making progress. I was learning new things every day, and even though I was scared and nervous, it was an exhilarating sort of nervousness, without the heavy burden of worrying about how I was going to pay my rent, or what would happen next, at least for a few years. In that sense, it was like Maui.
Then, it seemed like everything fell apart. I quit my job because of awkward circumstances and suddenly the one reason I'd come to Boston had suddenly disappeared from the agenda. But I felt optimistic... the severence gave me time to think, and I'd fallen in love again and the excitement of a new relationship completely consumed me. I became infatuated with DJing, and I felt like I's successfully turned every unfortunate circumstance on its head; revealing a multitude of new opportunities.
And I guess that's where I am now... only my severence has run out, and there really never is enough time in this life to get your act together, at least, I feel like that time has flown by... and here I am... still as lost as I ever was.
I want to say optimistic things, but I don't feel that way. Things are good, I have good friends and a good roommate, a wonderful boyfriend and a new skill that I am learning... but sometimes, especially when I am washing dishes at the coffee shop or making someone a sandwich, I feel a deep sense of sorrow, because I don't know where I'm going with all of this.
I mean, what am I doing with myself. Where am I going.
Sometimes that kind of uncertainty feels good. That's when I feel good about writing about it, when it's exciting like that. I feel a little guilty right now because I don't feel good about it. I just feel really sad. It sits on my shoulder and it will sit there until this- whatever it is- passes.
I'm trying to remember who I was. Amanda had called me last night and we had an impromptu brainstorming session about an underwater fashion show. She calls every once in a while to let me know what is going on in Maui, and how I should be there for it, and that she is thinking of me.
Every once in a while I yearn to go back, and to feel what I felt then. I felt a sense of relief I'd never felt before or after- a great weight was lifted, and I thought, now that I know these things, I will never have to feel worry or anxiety again. I was wrong, because I forgot. Which is as natural as remembering again.
But it got me thinking, about running.
Going back to Maui, or to some other place, some island, or some other place I'd never been to. Late last night, eyes wide open, I said out loud what I'd said on the phone to Carl last week, and what I think to myself every once in a while lately, which is, "I don't know who I am anymore."
Nick was listening, and I think it worried him. I think he thought it might have something to do with him, but it really has everything to do with me and myself, as is the nature of self-conscious ramblings.
I felt the pull I'd felt before, when I left L.A. and ran off to Texas, and when I left Texas, and ran off to Maui. The same pull I felt every time I'd had it with school, and run off to the desert. The same pull I felt when I ran off to the jungle in Mexico, when I had fears that my life had become too mundane. And every time I've run, I've had the adventure of a lifetime.
I've had adventures enough for many lifetimes over, and there will be more to come... because I can't get enough of it. It's just a matter of time, is what I'm told.
Last night I was looking at the ceiling. I'd said what I said: "I don't know who I am anymore."
Suddenly I felt this intense need to run. To just go. Then I looked to my left and saw laying next to me this man, who I love and I felt confused, and for a moment I paused to ask myself 'why'.
Why run? Where am I going? What am I running from? And how many times have I asked myself this same question, over and over again. I thought about it a lot in Maui.
Oh gosh- I remember now. Why I left paradise.
I remember sitting on the grass lawn of the tantra school and staring at the ocean. The sun was perfect warm, and the cool breeze chased all the mosquitoes away and it was.... almost... the most perfect moment.
I remember thinking, I am running. I have run from my problems. They will all be there when I come back. This is why I can't be completely satisfied. It was like I'd gone to heaven too early.
So I came back, and things have become complicated again like they always are, and there is no relief in sight, because I'm not on an island thousands of miles away from the things in this world that reveal to me my own shortcomings.
I wanted to ask myself whether or not I was running away from a problem, or toward something I was meant to experience- but I already know the answer to that. I have this fear that I am not so clever and brilliant as I always thought I would be some day, in the future, when I wasn't quite so fucked up, or lost, or immature.
I do miss seeing the beauty in myself, though. That's what I saw in Maui. The beauty in myself. I'd like to see that again. I know it's there, somewhere.
At work today Tara saw the look on my face and said, "Quarter-life crisis?"
I guess so. She reminded me that everyone goes through this period of depression and feeling lost and having no direction. I thought to myself, I never intended to win the award for originality on this one. I know we're all going through the same things, and when we're old or dead, we all will have survived it. It's not that.
Alexia told me too, this will pass. Nick told me too, these things take time. I am nodding. I know. And then I realize that Tara told me everybody goes through these things so that maybe I will not feel so lonely about it. I think to myself, we are all alone together.
At work today Arie told me about his quarter-life crisis, in the form of a story. It really made me feel better. I really like stories, especially when people tell me about their lives, and what they were thinking and how they felt about it. For some reason I find it incredibly educational, even though when it comes to these things we are all equally lost and wondering.
At the end of this day I still don't know about running, or whether or not I will. I hunger so much for that relief, but I know it just delays the inevitable. Everyone at work said what a city person would say when I mentioned that I was thinking of going back to Maui: "I can see why you would want to go back there, but it's so far away from everything, and from the rest of the world. I mean, it's an island."
I think about meditation, and about focusing on nothing, instead of everything. In a way it's like running. But you always come back, and you come back more whole, somehow. That's how I always felt about it. Running, I mean.
I guess I'm just wondering if there's something to sweating it out, standing your ground, and staying in one place, too. I wish I had an answer so that I could come full circle, but that's not where I'm at-
- I'm somewhere out there instead, walking the scrawling line, wondering what kind of picture I'm painting.
I'd told myself when I moved into this apartment in Boston that I was going to put my roots into this urban garden, soak it all up and become a part of it before moving onward. The half-finished mural in my room was meant to be a testament to my semi-permanent commitment to this city.
Things are so different now than when I first laid paint on that wall.
I had a steady job, and good income. I felt like I was making progress. I was learning new things every day, and even though I was scared and nervous, it was an exhilarating sort of nervousness, without the heavy burden of worrying about how I was going to pay my rent, or what would happen next, at least for a few years. In that sense, it was like Maui.
Then, it seemed like everything fell apart. I quit my job because of awkward circumstances and suddenly the one reason I'd come to Boston had suddenly disappeared from the agenda. But I felt optimistic... the severence gave me time to think, and I'd fallen in love again and the excitement of a new relationship completely consumed me. I became infatuated with DJing, and I felt like I's successfully turned every unfortunate circumstance on its head; revealing a multitude of new opportunities.
And I guess that's where I am now... only my severence has run out, and there really never is enough time in this life to get your act together, at least, I feel like that time has flown by... and here I am... still as lost as I ever was.
I want to say optimistic things, but I don't feel that way. Things are good, I have good friends and a good roommate, a wonderful boyfriend and a new skill that I am learning... but sometimes, especially when I am washing dishes at the coffee shop or making someone a sandwich, I feel a deep sense of sorrow, because I don't know where I'm going with all of this.
I mean, what am I doing with myself. Where am I going.
Sometimes that kind of uncertainty feels good. That's when I feel good about writing about it, when it's exciting like that. I feel a little guilty right now because I don't feel good about it. I just feel really sad. It sits on my shoulder and it will sit there until this- whatever it is- passes.
I'm trying to remember who I was. Amanda had called me last night and we had an impromptu brainstorming session about an underwater fashion show. She calls every once in a while to let me know what is going on in Maui, and how I should be there for it, and that she is thinking of me.
Every once in a while I yearn to go back, and to feel what I felt then. I felt a sense of relief I'd never felt before or after- a great weight was lifted, and I thought, now that I know these things, I will never have to feel worry or anxiety again. I was wrong, because I forgot. Which is as natural as remembering again.
But it got me thinking, about running.
Going back to Maui, or to some other place, some island, or some other place I'd never been to. Late last night, eyes wide open, I said out loud what I'd said on the phone to Carl last week, and what I think to myself every once in a while lately, which is, "I don't know who I am anymore."
Nick was listening, and I think it worried him. I think he thought it might have something to do with him, but it really has everything to do with me and myself, as is the nature of self-conscious ramblings.
I felt the pull I'd felt before, when I left L.A. and ran off to Texas, and when I left Texas, and ran off to Maui. The same pull I felt every time I'd had it with school, and run off to the desert. The same pull I felt when I ran off to the jungle in Mexico, when I had fears that my life had become too mundane. And every time I've run, I've had the adventure of a lifetime.
I've had adventures enough for many lifetimes over, and there will be more to come... because I can't get enough of it. It's just a matter of time, is what I'm told.
Last night I was looking at the ceiling. I'd said what I said: "I don't know who I am anymore."
Suddenly I felt this intense need to run. To just go. Then I looked to my left and saw laying next to me this man, who I love and I felt confused, and for a moment I paused to ask myself 'why'.
Why run? Where am I going? What am I running from? And how many times have I asked myself this same question, over and over again. I thought about it a lot in Maui.
Oh gosh- I remember now. Why I left paradise.
I remember sitting on the grass lawn of the tantra school and staring at the ocean. The sun was perfect warm, and the cool breeze chased all the mosquitoes away and it was.... almost... the most perfect moment.
I remember thinking, I am running. I have run from my problems. They will all be there when I come back. This is why I can't be completely satisfied. It was like I'd gone to heaven too early.
So I came back, and things have become complicated again like they always are, and there is no relief in sight, because I'm not on an island thousands of miles away from the things in this world that reveal to me my own shortcomings.
I wanted to ask myself whether or not I was running away from a problem, or toward something I was meant to experience- but I already know the answer to that. I have this fear that I am not so clever and brilliant as I always thought I would be some day, in the future, when I wasn't quite so fucked up, or lost, or immature.
I do miss seeing the beauty in myself, though. That's what I saw in Maui. The beauty in myself. I'd like to see that again. I know it's there, somewhere.
At work today Tara saw the look on my face and said, "Quarter-life crisis?"
I guess so. She reminded me that everyone goes through this period of depression and feeling lost and having no direction. I thought to myself, I never intended to win the award for originality on this one. I know we're all going through the same things, and when we're old or dead, we all will have survived it. It's not that.
Alexia told me too, this will pass. Nick told me too, these things take time. I am nodding. I know. And then I realize that Tara told me everybody goes through these things so that maybe I will not feel so lonely about it. I think to myself, we are all alone together.
At work today Arie told me about his quarter-life crisis, in the form of a story. It really made me feel better. I really like stories, especially when people tell me about their lives, and what they were thinking and how they felt about it. For some reason I find it incredibly educational, even though when it comes to these things we are all equally lost and wondering.
At the end of this day I still don't know about running, or whether or not I will. I hunger so much for that relief, but I know it just delays the inevitable. Everyone at work said what a city person would say when I mentioned that I was thinking of going back to Maui: "I can see why you would want to go back there, but it's so far away from everything, and from the rest of the world. I mean, it's an island."
I think about meditation, and about focusing on nothing, instead of everything. In a way it's like running. But you always come back, and you come back more whole, somehow. That's how I always felt about it. Running, I mean.
I guess I'm just wondering if there's something to sweating it out, standing your ground, and staying in one place, too. I wish I had an answer so that I could come full circle, but that's not where I'm at-
- I'm somewhere out there instead, walking the scrawling line, wondering what kind of picture I'm painting.
5/4/07 - Loch ness Monster, You're the Greatest!
I am very sick.
Poor Nick's car is totalled.
I'm in Texas.
My brother is moving into a house in the suburbs and becoming a high school calculus teacher.
My severence pay is about to run out tomorrow. AND my health insurance.
I need to find a new job.
My consciousness seems to have found itself suspended after swimming at the bottom of a bowl of gelatin for too long. My head feels cloudy, somebody eat me out.
That came out wrong. But you know what I mean.
The good news: Still 37 pounds lighter than my highest weight and maintaining an average of 25 pounds under my average weight for most of my adolescent and adult life. Why do I care? Because I've been watching TV all day.
The good news: I'm totally in love. There, I said it. And I mean it, whether or not that is a stupid thing to say. What prompted this? Well, two things: matter of fact and watching television.
The good news: There is a brighter side to all of those things that seem bad, and something to be learned from all of those things that seem confusing. And, if all there is to be learned is that life is neither good nor bad but just full of confusion- well, at least that's interesting.
I have a light blue kleenex stuffed up my left nostril. That's hot.
It's hot in my mom's house. Which isn't very cool.
I might have a fever. Or: I might have taken too much cold medicine today.
Either way.. things are a little crazy these days. I am excited about the new sets of opportunities that will present themselves when the dust settles. It's frustrating when something that should be there but isn't, or something that's going away isn't coming back, or when things will never be the way they were before.
But I guess, when something isn't there anymore, there's always another thing in its place, and it's never really nothing. Even if it looks and feels like it.
This is an optimistic way of saying I have a headache.
4/17/07 - (Really) Random Thoughts
I'm not exactly sure why I decided to write a blog.
I remember something though. I wrote something, right after I quit my job at the lab, about a feeling I had, driving down the street and it's coming back to me right this moment
I suppose it doesn't make sense for me to recount it now so I'll just post a link. You can read the blog I'm talking about HERE, if you feel the need to.
What made me think of it just now... I've been walking around with my head half in the sand, and it's because I'm afraid. I was thinking, what will happen if I don't find a job in time? What will happen if things get hard, and I don't know how I will pay my rent?
My heart gets heavy and bitter when I think about expectations, and disappointment. Yesterday Nick and I drove to Providence and it was the first time I'd driven by my old work, and my old home since I quit my job.
We got lost in Quincy, near my old workplace. We'd gotten off the highway to get gas, and it was very difficult to find the onramp so that we could get back on track and it took us a long time to find it.
During that time, I had a flood of memories come back to me from the first parts of my life in Massachusetts. My heart feels heavy when I think of quitting my job. The closest thing I can think of to this feeling is the last time I had a broken heart.
I'd put so much of myself into that job. I'd decided to give it everything that was in me, and in a way it was my first relationship in a long while. And it broke my heart to have to quit. It's easy for me to look at my current uncertainties, in the face of change, and let my mind wander back to the reason why I am in this situation at all, and the unfairness of it all. I think of my old boss, and I get angry with him, like I used to get angry when I would think of my ex-boyfriend.
Angry about what? They are only human. Our lives just so happened to intersect in such a way.
Everything feels so heavy when I think of it that way. My head hurts. My heart hurts.
But-
- I don't know what made me think of it just then.... the drive home when I quit my job in Texas, and the uncertainty, and the kind of knowing that came with it. I didn't know what would happen. I bought a one way ticket to L.A. then without knowing where I was going, or what I was doing. I could have been scared, no, I was terrified.... just like I am right now.
But it's crazy. Tears welling behind my eyes. They threaten to break the surface tension and overflow in all directions. I wrote that about something else once. I wrote it about something that I thought was completely different. It wasn't about tragedy, or fear, or uncertainty. I wrote it about that feeling of being overwhelmed by the beauty of this life.
I know I've tried to say it a number of different ways, but let me try and say again...
... and I think this is something that happens when you feel not only Joy in it's purest form, but Sorrow as well-
because you need both to realize it feels exactly the same... cup overflowing, heart elevated and pushing against your chest, making it ache so much it brings tears to your eyes...
.. and then I guess you realize it feels the same for a reason. To me, it was as if suddenly I understood the sameness of it. Why joy and sorrow are feelings at all. Because you can feel it. It's about feeling. Looking into people's eyes and letting them see you, and you them. It's about opening the door- not only so things can get in, but so you can get out- and be part of this world.
And then I think to myself, who said that joy was good, and sorrow not, or that there is a line between pleasure and pain? It's all just things. Moving through a door.
Now I am thinking about the conversation I had with Nick, about love that has no words, and the difference between that love, and romance and passion. The love with no words is deep, resonating and consistent. It is the thing that ties us all together.
The romance and the passion is the dance between pleasure and pain. It's the fluctuating and unpredictable, and the kind of thing that adds flavor and distinction.
And then I think, it all comes together like the basslines of two songs when you're mixing, listening and learning to listen to the thing that ties those two things together, and pushing and pulling until they're in perfect synchronization.
It takes so much work to do that.
But once it's done, that's when you can start playing. And when you play, that's when you listen to the melodies and the words, the variations and the vocals, the drops and crescendos.
Even though it's all happening, all the time, the synchrony comes with listening and gentle reactions of the fingers pushing and pulling into place until it all lines up. The playing manifests intself through the listening and shifting some sort of 'sonic' focus... listen now to this bassline... listen now to these beautiful bell sounds, or now don't listen to this at all and hear this completely different thing that somehow sounds like it is part of the other by virtue of the things they have in common... it's all so beautifully, perfectly metaphorical.
Have you ever heard someone say something terribly general, like 'It's not about the answer, it's about the question?'
What am I getting at.
I guess I am just happy to have experienced so many different things. To have had a life (thus far) of infinite variety. I feel like that's what it must have taken for me to see what I see at this moment, which is that it's all the same, and in a way that once you can see it that way, allows you to be an artist of your life.
It's as if I can finally see that I'v been provided with this generous palette for my soul to paint its completely unpredictable, infinitely complex and truly beautiful signature... somewhere... if anything, upon the palettes of other people's souls...
... and it makes the question of 'what is the meaning of life' seem laughable. That's like asking what the point of playing is.
I forget a lot about these sorts of things. (I guess I remember a lot about them too...) These are the times that I feel scared, I guess. I really must watch myself. Always watching, always learning and unlearning. Sometimes talking in circles.
Sometimes forgetting. Always being reminded. It's a whirlwind of a game.
My mind is a-flutter but I'm not too worried because it always seems to sort itself out, eventually. As usual I'd sat myself down to write about something completely different.
I wanted to write about how I was afraid to be in love but falling in love, anyway. About how movies about romance are only an hour and half long, and the pessimistic people are always the ones running in slow-motion toward each other in the end. It's never as complicated as in real life, not because it's just a story (we're really all just stories, anyway) but because it's only an hour and a half long, and not a lifetime, or two.
I am so scared of romantic love. I know that any pain I might experience in the future is one in the same with the unparalleled pleasure you get from the butterflies, and the longing, and the indulgent serendipity of two souls intersecting, briefly or otherwise.
I guess I'm thinking about how I'm scared, anyway. And also realizing how little I know myself, or anything about anything really.
I'm semi-aware of the fact that I'm rambling, and about nothing in particular. I feel very much like I don't know what I'm talking about. And then something in my mind echoed the words of my tantra teacher just now. "Feel Your Feet."
Feet on the ground. Eyes to the infinite sky. The soles of my feet firmly planted, I'm thinking of, and my mind expanding infinitely, as far as it can fathom. It's about balance, right? I remember now.
I'm thinking about sand in the ocean when the waves crash, all tumbled up, and the water is foggy and you can't see. That's how I feel right now. Everything is changing.
I remember something though. I wrote something, right after I quit my job at the lab, about a feeling I had, driving down the street and it's coming back to me right this moment
I suppose it doesn't make sense for me to recount it now so I'll just post a link. You can read the blog I'm talking about HERE, if you feel the need to.
What made me think of it just now... I've been walking around with my head half in the sand, and it's because I'm afraid. I was thinking, what will happen if I don't find a job in time? What will happen if things get hard, and I don't know how I will pay my rent?
My heart gets heavy and bitter when I think about expectations, and disappointment. Yesterday Nick and I drove to Providence and it was the first time I'd driven by my old work, and my old home since I quit my job.
We got lost in Quincy, near my old workplace. We'd gotten off the highway to get gas, and it was very difficult to find the onramp so that we could get back on track and it took us a long time to find it.
During that time, I had a flood of memories come back to me from the first parts of my life in Massachusetts. My heart feels heavy when I think of quitting my job. The closest thing I can think of to this feeling is the last time I had a broken heart.
I'd put so much of myself into that job. I'd decided to give it everything that was in me, and in a way it was my first relationship in a long while. And it broke my heart to have to quit. It's easy for me to look at my current uncertainties, in the face of change, and let my mind wander back to the reason why I am in this situation at all, and the unfairness of it all. I think of my old boss, and I get angry with him, like I used to get angry when I would think of my ex-boyfriend.
Angry about what? They are only human. Our lives just so happened to intersect in such a way.
Everything feels so heavy when I think of it that way. My head hurts. My heart hurts.
But-
- I don't know what made me think of it just then.... the drive home when I quit my job in Texas, and the uncertainty, and the kind of knowing that came with it. I didn't know what would happen. I bought a one way ticket to L.A. then without knowing where I was going, or what I was doing. I could have been scared, no, I was terrified.... just like I am right now.
But it's crazy. Tears welling behind my eyes. They threaten to break the surface tension and overflow in all directions. I wrote that about something else once. I wrote it about something that I thought was completely different. It wasn't about tragedy, or fear, or uncertainty. I wrote it about that feeling of being overwhelmed by the beauty of this life.
I know I've tried to say it a number of different ways, but let me try and say again...
... and I think this is something that happens when you feel not only Joy in it's purest form, but Sorrow as well-
because you need both to realize it feels exactly the same... cup overflowing, heart elevated and pushing against your chest, making it ache so much it brings tears to your eyes...
.. and then I guess you realize it feels the same for a reason. To me, it was as if suddenly I understood the sameness of it. Why joy and sorrow are feelings at all. Because you can feel it. It's about feeling. Looking into people's eyes and letting them see you, and you them. It's about opening the door- not only so things can get in, but so you can get out- and be part of this world.
And then I think to myself, who said that joy was good, and sorrow not, or that there is a line between pleasure and pain? It's all just things. Moving through a door.
Now I am thinking about the conversation I had with Nick, about love that has no words, and the difference between that love, and romance and passion. The love with no words is deep, resonating and consistent. It is the thing that ties us all together.
The romance and the passion is the dance between pleasure and pain. It's the fluctuating and unpredictable, and the kind of thing that adds flavor and distinction.
And then I think, it all comes together like the basslines of two songs when you're mixing, listening and learning to listen to the thing that ties those two things together, and pushing and pulling until they're in perfect synchronization.
It takes so much work to do that.
But once it's done, that's when you can start playing. And when you play, that's when you listen to the melodies and the words, the variations and the vocals, the drops and crescendos.
Even though it's all happening, all the time, the synchrony comes with listening and gentle reactions of the fingers pushing and pulling into place until it all lines up. The playing manifests intself through the listening and shifting some sort of 'sonic' focus... listen now to this bassline... listen now to these beautiful bell sounds, or now don't listen to this at all and hear this completely different thing that somehow sounds like it is part of the other by virtue of the things they have in common... it's all so beautifully, perfectly metaphorical.
Have you ever heard someone say something terribly general, like 'It's not about the answer, it's about the question?'
What am I getting at.
I guess I am just happy to have experienced so many different things. To have had a life (thus far) of infinite variety. I feel like that's what it must have taken for me to see what I see at this moment, which is that it's all the same, and in a way that once you can see it that way, allows you to be an artist of your life.
It's as if I can finally see that I'v been provided with this generous palette for my soul to paint its completely unpredictable, infinitely complex and truly beautiful signature... somewhere... if anything, upon the palettes of other people's souls...
... and it makes the question of 'what is the meaning of life' seem laughable. That's like asking what the point of playing is.
I forget a lot about these sorts of things. (I guess I remember a lot about them too...) These are the times that I feel scared, I guess. I really must watch myself. Always watching, always learning and unlearning. Sometimes talking in circles.
Sometimes forgetting. Always being reminded. It's a whirlwind of a game.
My mind is a-flutter but I'm not too worried because it always seems to sort itself out, eventually. As usual I'd sat myself down to write about something completely different.
I wanted to write about how I was afraid to be in love but falling in love, anyway. About how movies about romance are only an hour and half long, and the pessimistic people are always the ones running in slow-motion toward each other in the end. It's never as complicated as in real life, not because it's just a story (we're really all just stories, anyway) but because it's only an hour and a half long, and not a lifetime, or two.
I am so scared of romantic love. I know that any pain I might experience in the future is one in the same with the unparalleled pleasure you get from the butterflies, and the longing, and the indulgent serendipity of two souls intersecting, briefly or otherwise.
I guess I'm thinking about how I'm scared, anyway. And also realizing how little I know myself, or anything about anything really.
I'm semi-aware of the fact that I'm rambling, and about nothing in particular. I feel very much like I don't know what I'm talking about. And then something in my mind echoed the words of my tantra teacher just now. "Feel Your Feet."
Feet on the ground. Eyes to the infinite sky. The soles of my feet firmly planted, I'm thinking of, and my mind expanding infinitely, as far as it can fathom. It's about balance, right? I remember now.
I'm thinking about sand in the ocean when the waves crash, all tumbled up, and the water is foggy and you can't see. That's how I feel right now. Everything is changing.
4/9/07 - Re-
I feel this huge sense of relief, even though it's just from myself, and my thoughts.
I haven't been writing much and that was bothering me, and also not really playing guitar or thinking too much about what to do with myself. I worry a lot about whether or not I'm making progress, or moving in any direction in my life. If there's anything I have a fear of, it's stagnation.
It's a silly thing to worry about especially since I'm aware that my life has changed so drastically in every direction in the past few years... just like it's about to change again, and really soon when my severence runs out and I am burped back out into the 'cold, harsh real world'.
But there it is. I'd been thinking about when I left Maui and the intentions I'd set- which I realize now I've never written about, but have faithfully kept in the back of my head since the moment I stepped on the plane and waved 'Aloha' to the island that set my heart free.
They were as follows:
1) There was a sense of clarity and knowingness that I had only caught glimpses of before... which I felt so consistently that I believed it to be a part of me that was timeless, and would never go away.
I came to Kahua and every beautiful thing reflected it back into my retinas and ears and fingers and mouth in such a way that I could see it with my eyes closed, or open, or full of tears.
I could see it in the persistent and unrelenting beauty of every person's radiant face and body, no matter what shape or proportion. I saw it in the majesty of every crashing wave, waterfall, bird, flower and plant that even now leaves me at a loss for words, and that photographs do no justice.
I could hear it in the insects, and the wind in the trees, and the crashing of the waves and the ringing in my ears resonate on one frequency... low... rumbling... it breaks your heart and you fall on your knees and palms and look down into the grass and the ants are singing along with it...
I could feel it when sand fell through my fingers, and when I jumped into the warm ocean under the hot setting sun and it was like diving into liquid gold, luminescent and salty, letting me float. I could feel it when the wind blew my skirt and made me feel like I was flying, and in the soles of my feet on burning hot rocks and icy cool grass.
I could taste it in the tiny yellow pineapples that we watched all summer, waiting for them to ripen. In the papayas that turn yellow and cry for you to pull them off the tree in a way that a person completely in love wants to give every ounce of their being to the soul that holds their heart. I could taste it when Amanda and I scooped a passion fruit out into a papaya and ate the two together, and realized that it didn't matter who was responsible for such perfection... just that it was just that- perfection- put on this planet for us to discover with our tongues.
What was It....
... It was in our fingers touching, and our mouths tasting, and our eyes seeing, and our ears hearing. Everything. All of it. It was realizing that this overwhelming beauty couldn't EXIST without us- us, being TRULY present, and REALLY there, to play the crucial and sacred role of finding it beautiful.
It was a blessed interaction with the world around us. We were so blessed, all the time... and all we had to do was see, and hear, and touch, and taste. It was bigger than winning every prize in the world, because it was like winning every prize that our imaginations could conjure, even when it came to intangible things like the human soul, or the universe.
It was so important for me to know that this could still be a consistent part of me outside of Maui, no matter where I was, or under whatever circumstance. I needed to know that I could do this. That it wasn't a dream. That it wasn't an illusion veiled over my eyes... some sort of inner-beautiful mirage brought on by the overwhelming decadence of living in paradise. In other words, I needed to know that it would still be there, even in a city, surrounded by strangers, in a place I'd never been to, that is cold and dark eight months out of the year.
To tell you the truth, I was afraid I would leave Maui and lose myself in the confusion and complexity of life outside of our little island. That I wouldn't be able to see the sun through the smog, or hear anything over the roar of the city, or feel anything because I have numbed myself to protect myself from things that may hurt me, or taste anything because food is just a thing we put in our bodies to keep us from running out of the energy it takes to survive, both mentally and physically.
I was afraid I would forget how to see, and hear, and touch, and taste.
And now as I've written this, I'm laughing because it seems that I'd forgotten that the 'forgetting' is part of it all. We forget things so we can remember them... to feel this thing that I'm feeling right now, this remembering, which is wonderful.
And I remember it here, in Boston, which is beautiful in a completely New and Different way that adds another dimension of beauty to the way that I experience being alive.
2) I knew I was meant to learn something very important by accepting the job offer and the re-location to Boston, regardless of whether or not the job worked out... and I intended to learn that lesson, whatever it was.
And it's funny, because in a way I knew what was going to happen, even though I never could have predicted it and I had no control over the outcome. I'd told Amanda then, and on the balcony of our hidden surrealist castle which we'd struggled long and hard to find, that this would be El Ano Fuerte, the year of strength. That hard times would come, and many things would be out of our control, but that we would move through it gracefully like water over a cliff-
- water transformed into water. Constantly changing but always, in it's truest essence, just what it is. And strong enough- with the knowledge that anything is possible over a long enough timeline and that life is long- to carve stone and reshape this world. That we could, and we would- no matter what happened to us- and just by Being.
3) After I'd seen Gabriel play for the last time, I realized that I would not hear anything quite like that in Boston, because it just simply wasn't there.
Yet.
I told Amanda that in two years I would be a Ninja - Fairy - DJ: that I would playing in clubs in Boston and enrapturing people the way I was enraptured, and made to dance because I couldn't help it, soul-cleansed, mind-cleared. Gabriel gave me a gift from his ears to mine, and I fully intended to, with enough listening and passion, take something that had given me joy and re-create it through my own ears, and creativity, and perspective, which is wholly unique in a way that everyone else's is, too.
I haven't been writing because the time for me to write was not then, but Now. I had just been doing something other than writing; I have been expressing myself to the people around me in words, and facial expressions, fingertips and smiles, which is what I do when I am meeting new people in a new place.
I haven't been playing guitar because I've been learning to DJ- re-configuring auditory synaptic connections in a way that excites me so much it is electrifying, and you (I mean You) can feel it. I may not have played guitar in a few weeks. But I have never in my life been so immersed in what is happening to my ears, and how I am hearing it than I am now. And that is something worth reckoning.
And I haven't been thinking about so-called progress because it's already happening, and effortlessly... so much so that it feels so fun that the lack of struggle is unfamiliar to me and feels like Play.
I was feeling lost this morning, and worried. There are a lot of things to worry about if you look at it one way.
It's funny, and also okay. I just forgot you could see it other ways... and I see it another way right now, for now.
The perfection all around me. Smell in my nose, beautiful people in my presence, old wood floor full of history under my feet. Inspired fingertips and listening ears. Laughing mouth, gorgeous old city in my eyes. The unparalleled, appreciative look on people's faces after eight months as they gradually realize that soon it will be warm.
Perfection all around me. Nothing like Maui. Everything like me and the world working together to make beauty exist.
I haven't been writing much and that was bothering me, and also not really playing guitar or thinking too much about what to do with myself. I worry a lot about whether or not I'm making progress, or moving in any direction in my life. If there's anything I have a fear of, it's stagnation.
It's a silly thing to worry about especially since I'm aware that my life has changed so drastically in every direction in the past few years... just like it's about to change again, and really soon when my severence runs out and I am burped back out into the 'cold, harsh real world'.
But there it is. I'd been thinking about when I left Maui and the intentions I'd set- which I realize now I've never written about, but have faithfully kept in the back of my head since the moment I stepped on the plane and waved 'Aloha' to the island that set my heart free.
They were as follows:
1) There was a sense of clarity and knowingness that I had only caught glimpses of before... which I felt so consistently that I believed it to be a part of me that was timeless, and would never go away.
I came to Kahua and every beautiful thing reflected it back into my retinas and ears and fingers and mouth in such a way that I could see it with my eyes closed, or open, or full of tears.
I could see it in the persistent and unrelenting beauty of every person's radiant face and body, no matter what shape or proportion. I saw it in the majesty of every crashing wave, waterfall, bird, flower and plant that even now leaves me at a loss for words, and that photographs do no justice.
I could hear it in the insects, and the wind in the trees, and the crashing of the waves and the ringing in my ears resonate on one frequency... low... rumbling... it breaks your heart and you fall on your knees and palms and look down into the grass and the ants are singing along with it...
I could feel it when sand fell through my fingers, and when I jumped into the warm ocean under the hot setting sun and it was like diving into liquid gold, luminescent and salty, letting me float. I could feel it when the wind blew my skirt and made me feel like I was flying, and in the soles of my feet on burning hot rocks and icy cool grass.
I could taste it in the tiny yellow pineapples that we watched all summer, waiting for them to ripen. In the papayas that turn yellow and cry for you to pull them off the tree in a way that a person completely in love wants to give every ounce of their being to the soul that holds their heart. I could taste it when Amanda and I scooped a passion fruit out into a papaya and ate the two together, and realized that it didn't matter who was responsible for such perfection... just that it was just that- perfection- put on this planet for us to discover with our tongues.
What was It....
... It was in our fingers touching, and our mouths tasting, and our eyes seeing, and our ears hearing. Everything. All of it. It was realizing that this overwhelming beauty couldn't EXIST without us- us, being TRULY present, and REALLY there, to play the crucial and sacred role of finding it beautiful.
It was a blessed interaction with the world around us. We were so blessed, all the time... and all we had to do was see, and hear, and touch, and taste. It was bigger than winning every prize in the world, because it was like winning every prize that our imaginations could conjure, even when it came to intangible things like the human soul, or the universe.
It was so important for me to know that this could still be a consistent part of me outside of Maui, no matter where I was, or under whatever circumstance. I needed to know that I could do this. That it wasn't a dream. That it wasn't an illusion veiled over my eyes... some sort of inner-beautiful mirage brought on by the overwhelming decadence of living in paradise. In other words, I needed to know that it would still be there, even in a city, surrounded by strangers, in a place I'd never been to, that is cold and dark eight months out of the year.
To tell you the truth, I was afraid I would leave Maui and lose myself in the confusion and complexity of life outside of our little island. That I wouldn't be able to see the sun through the smog, or hear anything over the roar of the city, or feel anything because I have numbed myself to protect myself from things that may hurt me, or taste anything because food is just a thing we put in our bodies to keep us from running out of the energy it takes to survive, both mentally and physically.
I was afraid I would forget how to see, and hear, and touch, and taste.
And now as I've written this, I'm laughing because it seems that I'd forgotten that the 'forgetting' is part of it all. We forget things so we can remember them... to feel this thing that I'm feeling right now, this remembering, which is wonderful.
And I remember it here, in Boston, which is beautiful in a completely New and Different way that adds another dimension of beauty to the way that I experience being alive.
2) I knew I was meant to learn something very important by accepting the job offer and the re-location to Boston, regardless of whether or not the job worked out... and I intended to learn that lesson, whatever it was.
And it's funny, because in a way I knew what was going to happen, even though I never could have predicted it and I had no control over the outcome. I'd told Amanda then, and on the balcony of our hidden surrealist castle which we'd struggled long and hard to find, that this would be El Ano Fuerte, the year of strength. That hard times would come, and many things would be out of our control, but that we would move through it gracefully like water over a cliff-
- water transformed into water. Constantly changing but always, in it's truest essence, just what it is. And strong enough- with the knowledge that anything is possible over a long enough timeline and that life is long- to carve stone and reshape this world. That we could, and we would- no matter what happened to us- and just by Being.
3) After I'd seen Gabriel play for the last time, I realized that I would not hear anything quite like that in Boston, because it just simply wasn't there.
Yet.
I told Amanda that in two years I would be a Ninja - Fairy - DJ: that I would playing in clubs in Boston and enrapturing people the way I was enraptured, and made to dance because I couldn't help it, soul-cleansed, mind-cleared. Gabriel gave me a gift from his ears to mine, and I fully intended to, with enough listening and passion, take something that had given me joy and re-create it through my own ears, and creativity, and perspective, which is wholly unique in a way that everyone else's is, too.
I haven't been writing because the time for me to write was not then, but Now. I had just been doing something other than writing; I have been expressing myself to the people around me in words, and facial expressions, fingertips and smiles, which is what I do when I am meeting new people in a new place.
I haven't been playing guitar because I've been learning to DJ- re-configuring auditory synaptic connections in a way that excites me so much it is electrifying, and you (I mean You) can feel it. I may not have played guitar in a few weeks. But I have never in my life been so immersed in what is happening to my ears, and how I am hearing it than I am now. And that is something worth reckoning.
And I haven't been thinking about so-called progress because it's already happening, and effortlessly... so much so that it feels so fun that the lack of struggle is unfamiliar to me and feels like Play.
I was feeling lost this morning, and worried. There are a lot of things to worry about if you look at it one way.
It's funny, and also okay. I just forgot you could see it other ways... and I see it another way right now, for now.
The perfection all around me. Smell in my nose, beautiful people in my presence, old wood floor full of history under my feet. Inspired fingertips and listening ears. Laughing mouth, gorgeous old city in my eyes. The unparalleled, appreciative look on people's faces after eight months as they gradually realize that soon it will be warm.
Perfection all around me. Nothing like Maui. Everything like me and the world working together to make beauty exist.
3/30/07 - Morning Musings on Flatulence and Love
Session Start (Hemillsy:mtraceboston): Fri Mar 30 09:23:25 2007
[09:23] mtraceboston: i'm gassy
[09:23] hemillsy: ... I'm sorry?
[09:26] mtraceboston: not as sorry as you'd be if you were sitting in my car right now!
[09:27] hemillsy: gosh nick. your flatulence makes me so hot
[09:27] hemillsy: i'm totally touching myself right now
[09:27] hemillsy: and by touching myself I mean not. touching myself.
[09:27] mtraceboston: oh snap.
[09:27] mtraceboston: your sarcasm totally turns me on
[09:27] mtraceboston: and that's not a joke
[09:27] hemillsy: hehe
[09:37] mtraceboston: It takes patience to appreciate domestic bliss; volatile spirits prefer unhappiness.
George Santayana
[09:37] mtraceboston: :)
[09:38] hemillsy: that's far-sighted
[09:38] mtraceboston: how so?
[09:38] hemillsy: volatile spirits prefer what 'patient domestic-types' perceive as unhappiness
[09:39] hemillsy: volatile spirits prefer volatility
[09:39] hemillsy: clearly
[09:39] hemillsy: the only constant is change
[09:40] hemillsy: in buddhism, recognizing that and embracing it releases you from samsara, the cycle of pain
[09:41] hemillsy: I just call it 'loving the feeling of the sand as it slips through your fingers, resigning itself to gravity'
[09:42] mtraceboston: volatility=passion. should love be floating on a calm sea or riding the crest of a wave?
[09:43] hemillsy: it would have to do both, don't you think?
[09:43] hemillsy: it's hard to stay balanced with such unpredictability
[09:44] hemillsy: in chemistry and biology, volatile means reactive
[09:47] mtraceboston: hmm i like throwing out literary skeets for you to shoot down :)
[09:47] mtraceboston: i like the way your brain works
[09:48] hemillsy: heh, what do you mean by that
[09:49] mtraceboston: i just think you're a skeptic and you don't take anything at face value. and that is a good trait.
[09:49] mtraceboston: however ... you're also kind of an idealist
[09:49] hemillsy: that is correct
[09:50] mtraceboston: Love is the answer, but while you're waiting for the answer, sex raises some pretty interesting questions.
[09:50] mtraceboston: - Woody Allen
[09:54] hemillsy: woody allen was born on my birthday
[09:54] mtraceboston: really? do you like woody allen?
[09:54] hemillsy: a skeptic and an idealist...
[09:55] mtraceboston: you don't look nearly as old as him ...
[09:55] hemillsy: i like to call myself a realist who knows a little bit about what the Truth looks like
[09:55] hemillsy: not a big fan of woody allen
[09:56] mtraceboston: how bout Jean Baudrillard?
[09:56] mtraceboston: here's another one to take apart ...
[09:56] mtraceboston: If you say, I love you, then you have already fallen in love with language, which is already a form of break up and infidelity.
[10:00] hemillsy: I agree
[10:01] hemillsy: you can fall in love with language
[10:01] hemillsy: and in a way that is a betrayal
[10:02] hemillsy: but language can add richness to a situation just as much as it can add confusion
[10:02] hemillsy: love has no words,
[10:02] hemillsy: but you can't have romance without symbolic gestures and metaphors and other such non-absolute things
[10:03] hemillsy: and we like romance. and to stumble and fall.
[10:03] hemillsy: we can do both. we can love without words, because we can't help that kind of love
[10:03] hemillsy: and we can love with romance and symbolism. that's passion.
[10:10] mtraceboston: :)
[09:23] mtraceboston: i'm gassy
[09:23] hemillsy: ... I'm sorry?
[09:26] mtraceboston: not as sorry as you'd be if you were sitting in my car right now!
[09:27] hemillsy: gosh nick. your flatulence makes me so hot
[09:27] hemillsy: i'm totally touching myself right now
[09:27] hemillsy: and by touching myself I mean not. touching myself.
[09:27] mtraceboston: oh snap.
[09:27] mtraceboston: your sarcasm totally turns me on
[09:27] mtraceboston: and that's not a joke
[09:27] hemillsy: hehe
[09:37] mtraceboston: It takes patience to appreciate domestic bliss; volatile spirits prefer unhappiness.
George Santayana
[09:37] mtraceboston: :)
[09:38] hemillsy: that's far-sighted
[09:38] mtraceboston: how so?
[09:38] hemillsy: volatile spirits prefer what 'patient domestic-types' perceive as unhappiness
[09:39] hemillsy: volatile spirits prefer volatility
[09:39] hemillsy: clearly
[09:39] hemillsy: the only constant is change
[09:40] hemillsy: in buddhism, recognizing that and embracing it releases you from samsara, the cycle of pain
[09:41] hemillsy: I just call it 'loving the feeling of the sand as it slips through your fingers, resigning itself to gravity'
[09:42] mtraceboston: volatility=passion. should love be floating on a calm sea or riding the crest of a wave?
[09:43] hemillsy: it would have to do both, don't you think?
[09:43] hemillsy: it's hard to stay balanced with such unpredictability
[09:44] hemillsy: in chemistry and biology, volatile means reactive
[09:47] mtraceboston: hmm i like throwing out literary skeets for you to shoot down :)
[09:47] mtraceboston: i like the way your brain works
[09:48] hemillsy: heh, what do you mean by that
[09:49] mtraceboston: i just think you're a skeptic and you don't take anything at face value. and that is a good trait.
[09:49] mtraceboston: however ... you're also kind of an idealist
[09:49] hemillsy: that is correct
[09:50] mtraceboston: Love is the answer, but while you're waiting for the answer, sex raises some pretty interesting questions.
[09:50] mtraceboston: - Woody Allen
[09:54] hemillsy: woody allen was born on my birthday
[09:54] mtraceboston: really? do you like woody allen?
[09:54] hemillsy: a skeptic and an idealist...
[09:55] mtraceboston: you don't look nearly as old as him ...
[09:55] hemillsy: i like to call myself a realist who knows a little bit about what the Truth looks like
[09:55] hemillsy: not a big fan of woody allen
[09:56] mtraceboston: how bout Jean Baudrillard?
[09:56] mtraceboston: here's another one to take apart ...
[09:56] mtraceboston: If you say, I love you, then you have already fallen in love with language, which is already a form of break up and infidelity.
[10:00] hemillsy: I agree
[10:01] hemillsy: you can fall in love with language
[10:01] hemillsy: and in a way that is a betrayal
[10:02] hemillsy: but language can add richness to a situation just as much as it can add confusion
[10:02] hemillsy: love has no words,
[10:02] hemillsy: but you can't have romance without symbolic gestures and metaphors and other such non-absolute things
[10:03] hemillsy: and we like romance. and to stumble and fall.
[10:03] hemillsy: we can do both. we can love without words, because we can't help that kind of love
[10:03] hemillsy: and we can love with romance and symbolism. that's passion.
[10:10] mtraceboston: :)
3/27/07 - you Know How You Know You Stepped on Glass?
because it fucking hurts, clearly.
I haven't been too good about blogging with frequency but hey, it comes and goes.
Still waiting on the turntables- (c'mon, Bjoooooorn) and Shannon is hooking me up with the Stanton mixer that he learned to play on... Nick's loaning me speakers and headphones until the time is proper to buy my own... and then we're set. I am quiet with anticipation.
Usually if I haven't gotten around to writing it's because I'm pretty satisfied in general at the moment- I really love my job at ERC and all my co-workers but I'm feeling like it's about time to get a real job- since I decided to spend my travelling money on DJ equipment I've got to 'fess up to the fact that I'm not going anywhere for a while so I may as well find a job that pays better and with health insurance...
... and I'm glad I still have health insurance until May because I've been to the emergency room twice in two weeks; once for the stomach flu and once yesterday to get the biggest fucking shard of glass removed from my foot... a five-hour wait later I'm well on my way to foot relief- still limping but I managed an 8 hour shift on my feet at the coffee shop so things should be fine.
Not much to say except I'm pretty content and confident with the way things are going... my schedule is pleasantly full of fun things to do, my relationship, while still terrifying to me (as relationships should be), is going well, and I'm making (good) friends quickly. I love it.
Creativity-wise, it's all about DJing. This is the quiet before the storm. More later.
I haven't been too good about blogging with frequency but hey, it comes and goes.
Still waiting on the turntables- (c'mon, Bjoooooorn) and Shannon is hooking me up with the Stanton mixer that he learned to play on... Nick's loaning me speakers and headphones until the time is proper to buy my own... and then we're set. I am quiet with anticipation.
Usually if I haven't gotten around to writing it's because I'm pretty satisfied in general at the moment- I really love my job at ERC and all my co-workers but I'm feeling like it's about time to get a real job- since I decided to spend my travelling money on DJ equipment I've got to 'fess up to the fact that I'm not going anywhere for a while so I may as well find a job that pays better and with health insurance...
... and I'm glad I still have health insurance until May because I've been to the emergency room twice in two weeks; once for the stomach flu and once yesterday to get the biggest fucking shard of glass removed from my foot... a five-hour wait later I'm well on my way to foot relief- still limping but I managed an 8 hour shift on my feet at the coffee shop so things should be fine.
Not much to say except I'm pretty content and confident with the way things are going... my schedule is pleasantly full of fun things to do, my relationship, while still terrifying to me (as relationships should be), is going well, and I'm making (good) friends quickly. I love it.
Creativity-wise, it's all about DJing. This is the quiet before the storm. More later.
3/22/07 - (Technics SL1200 MK3D) x2 = shit's about to go DOWN
Now I'm really ushering in a new era.
In the last blog I was debating between buying a set of turntables and going back to Maui and I made the (very difficult) decision the other day to do it:
I talked to Bjorn-san last night and we caught up and it was beautiful. I had flashbacks of endless blissed out nights smoking pot and ingesting cyberpunk media in everyway possible from pulsing Venetian Snares until the house shook to hours-long marathons of Lain: Serial Experiments to covering the whole house in wires, snowed out TVs found on the street while blaring the mix that Bjorn and Mike blew up a lot of equipment to make.
Here's a picture of us dressed like Victorian dolls in petticoats before a noise show. Now imagine both of us slinging sizeable bottles of Jack Daniel's, half-bloody and moshing in them. That's how we rolled.
A while ago, I had mentioned to our friend Christopher Robin that I was learning to DJ. He reminded me that Bjorn (my lovely, amazing roommate from L.A., for those of you who don't know) had been looking to sell her turntables for years.. and a few days later I got a call from her so here's what's going on:
We agreed on $500 for the pair of them, and I am MAD excited. This is huge. I'm so happy to buy them from Bjorn and relocate them from Scarff house in L.A. to Westland ay-pee-tee in Boston. They're like old friends, faithfully busting out Aphex Twin and so on for years.
The model: Technics SL-1200 MK3D
And this is what my new babies look like. I've been trying to think of where they'll go in my tiny apartment and decided I'll just shuffle around my little desk and it'll all work out. They're definitely going under Tara, the goddess painted on my tibetan tangka (on the left of the photograph of my room before bookshelves).
She reminds me every day that I see her to feel it all like 'yum' and the three couples in yabyum above her head remind me that she represents everything I learned in tantra school.
It only makes sense to play something as intense and sexy as dubstep under her watchful eyes (all seven of them).
Sweet fucking turntables: check.
Starter collection of heart-breakingly good dubstep: check.
Best teacher in the world: check.
Next on the list: finding a decent mixer.
Well on my way. This is how serious I am. (note to self: making a serious face does not show up on blog)
3/21/2007 - Stepping In Your Sleep
okay. It's 4:30 in the morning and I can't sleep for how excited I am about dubstep.
Nick gave me my first lesson today and I loved it... I went to sleep replaying what he was teaching me in my head and getting excited about what little more I understand. The bass that was playing won't stop resonating in my memory; it's playing nonstop relentlessly in my head as I type this (trying quietly.. Nick sleeping in the other room)
And usually I find this annoying but here's the part: I fucking love it. It kind of makes me crazy. I can't stop thinking about practicing and getting closer-closer, and more and more en pointe. It makes me wish it wasn't four in the morning and I could do something about it.
It's a little frightening because it's like a new itch that has to be scratched up there with 'hungry', 'thirsty', 'need cigarette' and other such things. I was sitting here earlier debating whether or not I should go to Maui or buy a set of turntables since I do not think I can afford to do both. That's how much I'm excited about the dubstep.
I was worried I would get sick of my favorite tunes, but I don't think I will (of course I don't know this yet). All night the two I was working with have been playing in my brain and making my soul dance, and it's tough because it's really fucking hot music and it doesn't necessarily make me horny per se, but it does make me feel hot and bothered, if that makes any sense. Agitated, but in a good way. The kind of good feeling that makes guys get boners on the massage table... it's not because the massage makes them feel horny, it's just because it feels good... and then you just kind of open into it.
It feels good to play music this way because I get to interact with sound in a whole different way than just listening to it. I get to listen for things I heard before, but that I can change now with slight finger pressures. I love that you move the sound back and forth in time with the flick of a wrist in order to synchronize it with another set of sounds. I think that's beautiful, moving time like that.
I get to hear something I already love to hear, and then play with it and make other things with it. I get to take these things that I have chosen and like, and then contribute my character to it. I can't think of a more perfect medium for me, actually... and it just slays me that I get to work with SOUND.
It's not like guitar, where I'll always hit a wall because I'll never get around to learning all the chords. My hands will probably never do the 'thing' and my guitar won't just play awesome things if I let it play by itself. I don't know if I felt this way about guitar, because with this, I feel like I just discovered something enormous like sex.
I remember Gabriel watching us dance in Maui and at Burning Man... and watching him gauge the crowd. When he saw we were slowing down from fatigue, he would slow it down and we would catch our breaths without even knowing it. Then he would build it up until you couldn't stand it anymore and then drop it when all you could do was explode and outpour full-blown onto the dancefloor, or junglefloor, or playafloor.
His subtle observations and reactions were so undetectable you'd find yourself dancing for hours without stopping, and even when your body couldn't dance anymore you would be possessed and seduced by the music until your exhausted body became enraptured by something unreal,
and that was something like witchcraft, or something like a medicine to me. It occurred to me, watching everyone, that Gabriel was a mover of souls- that he loved to watch and take part when these people moved their souls and were healed by whatever it is that heals us when we move, when we dance.
I love that. I want to make people move because we need it and we want it. I want every tension and stress to shake out of the soles of their feet for no other reason except that they feel empassioned, and compelled to. That is a beautiful thing.
But I have been rambling for half an hour now and should probably go back to bed. My point was I'm so happy to work with music, and to feel like I will probably be good at it.
I don't mean 'good' in the sense of being talented, but good in the sense of it suiting me- like neuroscience suited me, and photography and painting. Like writing. Like the other things I could do forever without care of whether or not I were 'good' in the traditional sense, but because I just love it, and it fascinates me endlessly.
It's the best kind of 'good'. Because it's as effortless as finding joy in something.
I hope I can slip a few minutes of practice in before work tomorrow morning. *yawn*. Go to sleeeep, Josephine.
Nick gave me my first lesson today and I loved it... I went to sleep replaying what he was teaching me in my head and getting excited about what little more I understand. The bass that was playing won't stop resonating in my memory; it's playing nonstop relentlessly in my head as I type this (trying quietly.. Nick sleeping in the other room)
And usually I find this annoying but here's the part: I fucking love it. It kind of makes me crazy. I can't stop thinking about practicing and getting closer-closer, and more and more en pointe. It makes me wish it wasn't four in the morning and I could do something about it.
It's a little frightening because it's like a new itch that has to be scratched up there with 'hungry', 'thirsty', 'need cigarette' and other such things. I was sitting here earlier debating whether or not I should go to Maui or buy a set of turntables since I do not think I can afford to do both. That's how much I'm excited about the dubstep.
I was worried I would get sick of my favorite tunes, but I don't think I will (of course I don't know this yet). All night the two I was working with have been playing in my brain and making my soul dance, and it's tough because it's really fucking hot music and it doesn't necessarily make me horny per se, but it does make me feel hot and bothered, if that makes any sense. Agitated, but in a good way. The kind of good feeling that makes guys get boners on the massage table... it's not because the massage makes them feel horny, it's just because it feels good... and then you just kind of open into it.
It feels good to play music this way because I get to interact with sound in a whole different way than just listening to it. I get to listen for things I heard before, but that I can change now with slight finger pressures. I love that you move the sound back and forth in time with the flick of a wrist in order to synchronize it with another set of sounds. I think that's beautiful, moving time like that.
I get to hear something I already love to hear, and then play with it and make other things with it. I get to take these things that I have chosen and like, and then contribute my character to it. I can't think of a more perfect medium for me, actually... and it just slays me that I get to work with SOUND.
It's not like guitar, where I'll always hit a wall because I'll never get around to learning all the chords. My hands will probably never do the 'thing' and my guitar won't just play awesome things if I let it play by itself. I don't know if I felt this way about guitar, because with this, I feel like I just discovered something enormous like sex.
I remember Gabriel watching us dance in Maui and at Burning Man... and watching him gauge the crowd. When he saw we were slowing down from fatigue, he would slow it down and we would catch our breaths without even knowing it. Then he would build it up until you couldn't stand it anymore and then drop it when all you could do was explode and outpour full-blown onto the dancefloor, or junglefloor, or playafloor.
His subtle observations and reactions were so undetectable you'd find yourself dancing for hours without stopping, and even when your body couldn't dance anymore you would be possessed and seduced by the music until your exhausted body became enraptured by something unreal,
and that was something like witchcraft, or something like a medicine to me. It occurred to me, watching everyone, that Gabriel was a mover of souls- that he loved to watch and take part when these people moved their souls and were healed by whatever it is that heals us when we move, when we dance.
I love that. I want to make people move because we need it and we want it. I want every tension and stress to shake out of the soles of their feet for no other reason except that they feel empassioned, and compelled to. That is a beautiful thing.
But I have been rambling for half an hour now and should probably go back to bed. My point was I'm so happy to work with music, and to feel like I will probably be good at it.
I don't mean 'good' in the sense of being talented, but good in the sense of it suiting me- like neuroscience suited me, and photography and painting. Like writing. Like the other things I could do forever without care of whether or not I were 'good' in the traditional sense, but because I just love it, and it fascinates me endlessly.
It's the best kind of 'good'. Because it's as effortless as finding joy in something.
I hope I can slip a few minutes of practice in before work tomorrow morning. *yawn*. Go to sleeeep, Josephine.
3/12/2007 - resonant brain splatter
okay.
I figured it out now. You know how I pledged to become a ninja fairy DJ when I was still in Maui and about to move to Boston? I feel like it sounds when our dear Willem goes 'UH'.
There was something, Amanda, remember about the giant robots fuckin throwing down stomping on the ground resonating sound deep in our bones and in our bellies and I was possessed like I couldn't not dance even if I tried and double negatives frying your I's in the back of your eyes from all the subsonic vibration silent killing going on feeling like cathartic love-making all slow and intense and focused and direct and your brain has become so inverted its synapses are clawing outward through every cell in your body and you can FEEL it, every cell, every sensation and pressure and it sounds like muted groaning and it feels like ___________?
Holy shit. I feel like every person has a frequency that resonates with them, just like they have a height and an eye color and a shoe size and a nature to them. And mine, it's slow, and intense, and dark. Like dubstep.
So lesson number one in Mr. Nick Dika's School for Ninja Fairy DJs: learn to spin dubstep. Oh gosh. My hips shudder I'm so excited to learn. Record-buying spree this week.
I figured it out now. You know how I pledged to become a ninja fairy DJ when I was still in Maui and about to move to Boston? I feel like it sounds when our dear Willem goes 'UH'.
There was something, Amanda, remember about the giant robots fuckin throwing down stomping on the ground resonating sound deep in our bones and in our bellies and I was possessed like I couldn't not dance even if I tried and double negatives frying your I's in the back of your eyes from all the subsonic vibration silent killing going on feeling like cathartic love-making all slow and intense and focused and direct and your brain has become so inverted its synapses are clawing outward through every cell in your body and you can FEEL it, every cell, every sensation and pressure and it sounds like muted groaning and it feels like ___________?
Holy shit. I feel like every person has a frequency that resonates with them, just like they have a height and an eye color and a shoe size and a nature to them. And mine, it's slow, and intense, and dark. Like dubstep.
So lesson number one in Mr. Nick Dika's School for Ninja Fairy DJs: learn to spin dubstep. Oh gosh. My hips shudder I'm so excited to learn. Record-buying spree this week.
3/7/07 - R.I.P., Canon PowerShot 3.2 megapixel digicam
Dear Canon PowerShot 3.2 megapixel digital camera,
You had a really solid two and a half year run, I'd have to say. You made it through several trips to the desert, a few trips across the country, about a dozen moves, numerous hazardous environments involving water and/or electricity,drugs, beer and flooding. You made it through being wrapped in plastic so that I wouldn't get blood on you while photographing the gruesome details of my laboratory job.
You made it through a few hundred times of being dropped, and you faithfully deposited pictures into my equally pulverized iBook even though your lense shutter didn't close anymore and you were so scratched up and beaten that people laughed at me when I took you out.
You even made it through the jungles of Maui and being borrowed by Kavel, the strange, emaciated stinky boy with the pube beard who got voted out of the tantra commune. You made it through waterfalls and dust storms, and over the deep blue ocean to Lana'i.
I'm probably proudest that you made it through burning man, through all the dust storms that blacked out the sun. You kept on shooting even when everyone told me that if you bring a camera to burning man, it would not leave fuctional for all the dust that would end up inside it.
I also got melted chocolate on you so that the playa would stick to you, and to your sockets. You are a fuckin trooper, is what I'm getting at.
No, you faithfully worked until I shot a 300+ suicide girls set for rachel and deposited it onto my equally damaged iBook. You took fabulous pictures day after day on every adventure I've been on for the past two and a half years. And then you died.
So what can I say, you lasted way longer than I or the laws of nature, chaos and gravity could have ever expected you to. I am thoroughly impressed. I'd take a picture of your beat up, sorry state and post it on this blog, but you're dead. Oh well.
love,
Jo
You had a really solid two and a half year run, I'd have to say. You made it through several trips to the desert, a few trips across the country, about a dozen moves, numerous hazardous environments involving water and/or electricity,drugs, beer and flooding. You made it through being wrapped in plastic so that I wouldn't get blood on you while photographing the gruesome details of my laboratory job.
You made it through a few hundred times of being dropped, and you faithfully deposited pictures into my equally pulverized iBook even though your lense shutter didn't close anymore and you were so scratched up and beaten that people laughed at me when I took you out.
You even made it through the jungles of Maui and being borrowed by Kavel, the strange, emaciated stinky boy with the pube beard who got voted out of the tantra commune. You made it through waterfalls and dust storms, and over the deep blue ocean to Lana'i.
I'm probably proudest that you made it through burning man, through all the dust storms that blacked out the sun. You kept on shooting even when everyone told me that if you bring a camera to burning man, it would not leave fuctional for all the dust that would end up inside it.
I also got melted chocolate on you so that the playa would stick to you, and to your sockets. You are a fuckin trooper, is what I'm getting at.
No, you faithfully worked until I shot a 300+ suicide girls set for rachel and deposited it onto my equally damaged iBook. You took fabulous pictures day after day on every adventure I've been on for the past two and a half years. And then you died.
So what can I say, you lasted way longer than I or the laws of nature, chaos and gravity could have ever expected you to. I am thoroughly impressed. I'd take a picture of your beat up, sorry state and post it on this blog, but you're dead. Oh well.
love,
Jo
3/6/07 - Nightmare Vision
I had a dream the other night that felt a lot like the vision I had during my ayahuasca journey, in that it felt like a message was being brought to me in the form of a very vivid and intense scenario.
I mean. I guess that's what a 'vision' is, technically.
This one is recurring... I don't remember details exactly at this point but I thought it was worth noting.
I was in a room with a lover, and friends sitting on the floor and smoking a cigarette. I little girl comes in and I feel ashamed for smoking in front of her so I motion to put it out.
In this particular scenario My mom comes into the room and is very angry with me. She pulls out a blue shoe and makes a motion to hit me but I kick a table in between us and tell everyone to 'get the fuck out of the room'. I don't want them to see me get beaten.
A fight proceeds, and it is mostly defensive on my part... I am being kicked and slapped and hit and hit with the shoe, and I'm trying to push her away.... I'm not really getting badly hurt, but it is definitely a very negative situation-
There's lots of anger and crying and screaming. I'm getting my ass beat, basically. I don't feel as if I'd done anything to deserve it.
Just when it gets really bad I feel really hot and sweaty and exhausted and sad and angry and all these things combined.
And then something happens like fingers snapping and my mom and I are in the same room, only it's got this golden feeling to it, all iridescent and full of gorgeous flowers and gardens. It's really really beautiful, and my mom looks at me with so much love in her eyes and she says 'It's so beautiful, and you're so beautiful and I love you so much'. And then she hugs me.
And it feels nice, but I'm confused. I feel exhausted because I suddenly get the distinct feeling that this exact thing has happened over and over and over again, where I get beaten to a pulp and then, like fingers snapping, everything is more than okay. It makes me so tired.
I look at her and I ask her, "Why does this keep happening?"
I really had this heavy feeling, like a million years of being beaten and then everything being beautiful like it was never horrible. It feels heavy, and not quite right. It feels completely confusing and deceiving.
I can't remember if my mom answered my question. I don't think she did, I think I just started crying, because I couldn't understand about being beaten over and over again and then suddenly everything being okay over and over again. I was overwhelmed with the wrongness of it and I just couldn't stop crying. Apparently I must have been crying in real life because Nick told me I'd been sobbing in my sleep pretty much all night and he was worried.
Now that I write it down it makes sense to me. It's a hard thing to put into words and it has no answer or wisdom to it. It really makes me relate to the child in me, though.
It makes me see my perspective for what it is. I think I realize there's a lot more to it than I am currently aware of. I hope I can see past it some day.
I mean. I guess that's what a 'vision' is, technically.
This one is recurring... I don't remember details exactly at this point but I thought it was worth noting.
I was in a room with a lover, and friends sitting on the floor and smoking a cigarette. I little girl comes in and I feel ashamed for smoking in front of her so I motion to put it out.
In this particular scenario My mom comes into the room and is very angry with me. She pulls out a blue shoe and makes a motion to hit me but I kick a table in between us and tell everyone to 'get the fuck out of the room'. I don't want them to see me get beaten.
A fight proceeds, and it is mostly defensive on my part... I am being kicked and slapped and hit and hit with the shoe, and I'm trying to push her away.... I'm not really getting badly hurt, but it is definitely a very negative situation-
There's lots of anger and crying and screaming. I'm getting my ass beat, basically. I don't feel as if I'd done anything to deserve it.
Just when it gets really bad I feel really hot and sweaty and exhausted and sad and angry and all these things combined.
And then something happens like fingers snapping and my mom and I are in the same room, only it's got this golden feeling to it, all iridescent and full of gorgeous flowers and gardens. It's really really beautiful, and my mom looks at me with so much love in her eyes and she says 'It's so beautiful, and you're so beautiful and I love you so much'. And then she hugs me.
And it feels nice, but I'm confused. I feel exhausted because I suddenly get the distinct feeling that this exact thing has happened over and over and over again, where I get beaten to a pulp and then, like fingers snapping, everything is more than okay. It makes me so tired.
I look at her and I ask her, "Why does this keep happening?"
I really had this heavy feeling, like a million years of being beaten and then everything being beautiful like it was never horrible. It feels heavy, and not quite right. It feels completely confusing and deceiving.
I can't remember if my mom answered my question. I don't think she did, I think I just started crying, because I couldn't understand about being beaten over and over again and then suddenly everything being okay over and over again. I was overwhelmed with the wrongness of it and I just couldn't stop crying. Apparently I must have been crying in real life because Nick told me I'd been sobbing in my sleep pretty much all night and he was worried.
Now that I write it down it makes sense to me. It's a hard thing to put into words and it has no answer or wisdom to it. It really makes me relate to the child in me, though.
It makes me see my perspective for what it is. I think I realize there's a lot more to it than I am currently aware of. I hope I can see past it some day.
3/4/07 - Quoted as an Expert
Not to bring up the sore subject of an ill-fated career, but I just got an e-mail from Stacy Tisdale, a CNN correspondent who interviewed me for her book about 'Life Planning', which is the common label for the type of financial advising I was working in.
I thought it was pretty hilarious since I'd only been working there for three months to be quoted as an expert, but who am I to correct, I get to be in a book (even though it's probably not going to be that great).
So here's the quote that's going to be published. I would have worded it better but it's alright:
"While it is important to become aware of powerful messages, don't get lost in trying to figure out where they came from, or whether or not they are true. That's not where the truth is! It is productive and enlightening to go about the inquiry of it, but most importantly, it is important to realize that this is something you are thinking about, and not who you are."
- Josephine Tempongko, 'Life Planner', SG LLC
I thought it was pretty hilarious since I'd only been working there for three months to be quoted as an expert, but who am I to correct, I get to be in a book (even though it's probably not going to be that great).
So here's the quote that's going to be published. I would have worded it better but it's alright:
"While it is important to become aware of powerful messages, don't get lost in trying to figure out where they came from, or whether or not they are true. That's not where the truth is! It is productive and enlightening to go about the inquiry of it, but most importantly, it is important to realize that this is something you are thinking about, and not who you are."
- Josephine Tempongko, 'Life Planner', SG LLC
2/27/07 - Today on "Post-Graduate Anxious Rantings"
I woke up this morning in a wretched mood for some reason.
Was having one of those narcoleptic sorts of days yesterday where I'd get all revved up like, 'ALRIGHT! Gonna start painting/ cleaning my apartment/ doing my have-to-do's now!" ...and then instead of charging for the paintbrush, or picking shit up, or buying necessaries, I'd charge straight into my bed and pass out. It's like there was me and Productivity, and we were facing off, and I totally faked that bitch out.
So naturally due to my excessive amount of sleep, I woke up at 7:30 this morning without an alarm, got up and had my cereal but it was a disgruntled affair because I had no cigarette (since buying cigarettes was on my list of things I didn't do yesterday). The iPod shuffle gods were dually disappointing too, playing all sort of mushy sad garbledy-gook when all I wanted was some Nirvana or something, and not the sad shit, I mean the 'I wanna fuck you up but I don't care enough" stuff.
I thought maybe since I was deprived of one habit I should pick up another, more productive one so I resolved to read the news each morning, even though I swore off it after listening to NPR so obsessively and I started to have anxiety attacks.
So I go to Yahoo! News (I thought I'd start off with some soft, crappy news) and the headline reads:
"Cheney OK After Afghan Blast; 14 Killed"
What a ray of sunshine. And there's this picture of Dick looking really fucking smug, I mean, check it out:
That look on his face makes you want to suckerpunch the guy even if you didn't know anything about him. If I were making him a latte I'd spit in his drink, and then I'd get someone with something terrible like mouth gonorrhea to spit in his drink, too.
Maybe deciding to pick up the news again when you're having an 'off' morning is a bad idea.
For some reason I continue to scan the 'news' and my eyes are glazing over... 'War... Death..... Wardeath....'
And it's not that I'm apathetic. I just realized after years of freakouts that if I get really upset everytime I find out someone somewhere in the world died, or unfair shit is happening, then I'll look 80 by the time I'm 30 and no lives will have been saved.
Somewhere near the bottom of the fish barrel is this article entitled: "Study: College Students More Narcissistic", which makes me laugh. I always love it when media cites "Studies" (/sarcasm). Because it could have been a study with four stoned guys at a coffee table, or some PhD student with a pen and pencil and one monkey.
Point being, most of the time these sorts of 'puff' studies are statistically inconsequential- psychological studies in particular. If anyone's reading this, just remember that there is no such thing as tangible evidence when evaluating psyche. There are such an unbelievable number of correlated factors that no study of the mind without, for example, neuro-imaging data should ever be considered 'hard evidence'.
All that aside, I still think it's hilarious that someone decided to point out that college students are narcissistic. I mean.... no shit. College is all about building up your confidence, making you think you're learning something useful and that you've got talents that you can use in the real world to make abstract things like 'a living'. You see, this is only half of the lesson you get to learn by having a college education.
The other half is taking your well-educated, critical-thinking ass, slapping a huge debt on you, and nudging you out into the real world. It's here that all your pre-conceived notions of fairness, nobility, philanthropy and idealism get bitchslapped front-and-back when you realize you've got bills to pay, and no one wants to pay you for the things you've learned, at least not for another five or ten years.
In other words, the next few years after college exist so that the ego you've built up in school can be properly pulverized and destroyed. But despair not.
It's my theory (although I am still in the midst of Part II of this educational process) that these two things are required in order to have two things:
- the skills and sense of motivation and ambition necessary to kick ass... eventually.... in the real world, and
- the sense of reality that helps you to visualize and evaluate 'what it takes', compare that with your current values, undergo a little 'value re-evaluation', and then do what needs to be done, whatever that is
Oh and I just thought of another few, which I think are what seperates the rockstars from the groupies, which is:
- really being able to see the reality of who you are, and what you're capable of, and
- developing the courage to be fucking terrified of uncertainty, and still be okay with that.
Yeah. Those are big. I think.
What's the point of all this. I suppose I woke up in a panic this morning for some reason. Are you the kind of person that swears like they've got Tourette's under normal circumstances, and then you're hanging out with your itty bitty grandma and you let a 'fucking cunt shit' slip and you clap your hand over your mouth but the damage is done?
I have fears like this when I'm getting into a relationship, of saying shit I really shouldn't say. Man it makes me nervous.
But I know how it goes. You gotta ask yourself, 'Is it worth the trouble?' and as long as it is, it just is. So fuck yeah, it is.
Besides. My grandmother is super cool, and she wouldn't mind that much. Hopefully Nick is the same way.
Right on. Over and out
-J
2/23/07 - "I Know It's a Slang Word for Vagina.... Twice..."
this is going to be one of those blogs that isn't very well written, but I just need to take some mental notes.
the past few weeks have been such a rollercoaster ride. part of me is still suffering from the loss of my job and the situation I am still currently enduring with regard to my old boss, who is still calling and e-mailing me. it stresses me out so much and makes me really uncomfortable and nervous.
i'm trying so hard not to bring lawyers into it but I really am at the end of my line. All I want is to be left alone and for this to be over.
when I don't think of that terrible mess and take a look at my new life, it really is quite beautiful. It's a great opportunity, I live in a city I really love, and I love my roommate and my apartment. I just started working at Espresso Royale, the coffee shop down the street from my apartment and I love my co-workers and the hectic environment and the music and the hard work.
I don't mind that I don't get paid much. I love what I'm doing, going through the whole thought process of "I have two college degrees, why am I making lattes?"
I'm glad for the experience of it and no doubt I will learn a lot through internal musings and just living it.
I just met someone who is really _______ (I don't have a word for it) and I know I haven't been writing about it, but I don't think anything tangible will come out of my mouth except gushing because it's all coming from somewhere other than the mind.
This part of things is really what's making me fly all over the place and upside down these days. No point to be made except I feel blessed in all sorts of ways (so many) and sometimes you've just gotta say so.
I just had one of the best nights of my life last night. Rachel suggested we go to dinner at the restaurant she works at, Cuchi Cuchi and it was spectacular; so cozy, the decor was gorgeous as were all the workers in their vintage Hollywood attire. The food.... wow. I swooned over possibly the best oysters I will ever have in my life. Everything about it was beautiful, the way it looked, and tasted, the ambience, my roommate bustling around with a beautiful silver water pot, pouring it into people's cups like she were a goddess.
At the end of the night Rachel had these amazing truffles sent to our table. Amanda, you would have cried. Everything we ate just had so much attention to flavor combinations and textures and presentation. The chinese-spiced truffle made me want to cry from how interesting it tasted. We still have three left: Jamaican curry, goat cheese and burnt caramel. I can't wait to eat those bietches.
I'm so excited to hear music and to dance and to meet good people. Ali has been my Boston angel for so many reasons, giving me her apartment, introducing me to people and dragging me out to parties and introducing me to wonderful people, who then introduce me to even more wonderful people...
... I can't wait to get to know them...
the past few weeks have been such a rollercoaster ride. part of me is still suffering from the loss of my job and the situation I am still currently enduring with regard to my old boss, who is still calling and e-mailing me. it stresses me out so much and makes me really uncomfortable and nervous.
i'm trying so hard not to bring lawyers into it but I really am at the end of my line. All I want is to be left alone and for this to be over.
when I don't think of that terrible mess and take a look at my new life, it really is quite beautiful. It's a great opportunity, I live in a city I really love, and I love my roommate and my apartment. I just started working at Espresso Royale, the coffee shop down the street from my apartment and I love my co-workers and the hectic environment and the music and the hard work.
I don't mind that I don't get paid much. I love what I'm doing, going through the whole thought process of "I have two college degrees, why am I making lattes?"
I'm glad for the experience of it and no doubt I will learn a lot through internal musings and just living it.
I just met someone who is really _______ (I don't have a word for it) and I know I haven't been writing about it, but I don't think anything tangible will come out of my mouth except gushing because it's all coming from somewhere other than the mind.
This part of things is really what's making me fly all over the place and upside down these days. No point to be made except I feel blessed in all sorts of ways (so many) and sometimes you've just gotta say so.
I just had one of the best nights of my life last night. Rachel suggested we go to dinner at the restaurant she works at, Cuchi Cuchi and it was spectacular; so cozy, the decor was gorgeous as were all the workers in their vintage Hollywood attire. The food.... wow. I swooned over possibly the best oysters I will ever have in my life. Everything about it was beautiful, the way it looked, and tasted, the ambience, my roommate bustling around with a beautiful silver water pot, pouring it into people's cups like she were a goddess.
At the end of the night Rachel had these amazing truffles sent to our table. Amanda, you would have cried. Everything we ate just had so much attention to flavor combinations and textures and presentation. The chinese-spiced truffle made me want to cry from how interesting it tasted. We still have three left: Jamaican curry, goat cheese and burnt caramel. I can't wait to eat those bietches.
I'm so excited to hear music and to dance and to meet good people. Ali has been my Boston angel for so many reasons, giving me her apartment, introducing me to people and dragging me out to parties and introducing me to wonderful people, who then introduce me to even more wonderful people...
... I can't wait to get to know them...
2/15/07 - Dust It off, Keep It Swingin'
When in doubt, follow your dreams.
Yesterday during the two hours I was awake I looked up a bunch of lectures and events around the Boston area. Today after working at Espresso Royale in the morning (and sleeping through the entire afternoon... of course... maybe I made my room too cozy) I went to a Q&A session at BU with Webster Bull- founder of Commonwealth Editions, a publishing company he founded out of the trunk of his car (literally) eight years ago which has grown into one of New England's most successful small publishing companies (named 2006 Publisher of the Year by the New England Bookseller's Association).
The lecture was called 'An Informational Evening for Writers'. It sounded pretty bland.
But something was telling me I'd do best to go, so I went to see Webster. And I'm glad I did. I'm not really sure what I was trying to accomplish... he and Caroline, head of the New England Writer's Union asked me the same question: "Are you a writer?" and it was hard for me to answer because I wasn't sure what that meant. Caroline said, 'Well, are you a new writer?' and I replied. 'I guess?' I had no idea what being a writer meant in the publishing world but I had a feeling I was not one, at least in that sense, yet.
I told Webster I've been writing every day of my life for the past seven years. He said he wished every day he could do that, and that was why he started doing what he does. I didn't really see why he couldn't.. it only takes a few minutes.
But then again I realize they might have a different definition of what writing is in the publishing world, just like they have a different definition of what being a writer is.
The session was small, intimate and fantastic. My favorite kind. Webster introduced me to his daughter Martha who is about my brother's age, and about to graduate from U of Chicago and move to NYC. I asked her to contribute to my media project. She said she didn't write creatively, but that she'd written about things she was excited about.
They might have a definition of what writing is in the publishing world, but for my book, I am looking for people writing about things that they are excited about. So Martha will be contributing to the CMP.
There was a lot of insight gained from both the session and my conversations with Webster, a few notable quotes and notions:
- "There is a false dichotomy between being creative and being commerce-oriented" (something I'd been learning a little bit about at my old job... and indeed my brief experience with Oleg has opened doors for creative potential that I didn't know existed... a veritable 'wardrobe to Narnia' so to speak)
- "I started out in Magic" - Webster commenting on how he started out founding a vaudeville-style magic theater company in his late 20s
- On the future of books: "A book is a physical object in the home that tells a person who they are."(A big question in publishing is whether or not books will be replaced by other media. Bull's belief was that 80% of books will be replaced by other media, but that the other 20% would be valued as a physical presence. He referred to the Family Bible, and how once, there was one in every home.)
- On how he got into publishing- "I believe in detours. Take lots of them, take all of them if you can. It's important to surround yourself with the people you want to be around- the people that inspire you and enrich your life. I was fortunate enough to have a lot of mentors, one in particular has been my mentor since I was 19 years old (he is 55) and he has helped me out every step of the way."
Webster also taught me a lot about the business aspect of publishing, tips on what is best self-published versus outsourced, what aspects you can cut financial corners on, and which aspects (copy-editing, book design) you should NOT cut corners on.
Webster also offered to let me use his publishing company's printing rate with his favorite press in Chicago when the time is right. Using his resources, I could have a professionally copy-edited, professionally designed book published in an edition of 2000 for about $2.50 per book. Which is unbelievable.
I'm feeling pretty good about where this is going.
Webster is a great contact to have- he talks about me for a while in his speech which will be in podcast form whenever Chris Kenneally posts it, called "Beyond the Book". I'll keep you updated.
I'm going to make something amazing soon. It's going to be amazing because it is going to be me helping YOU make something amazing. I'm just gathering the skills.
I really did learn something from all this. And I'm going to keep learning, every day.
Yesterday during the two hours I was awake I looked up a bunch of lectures and events around the Boston area. Today after working at Espresso Royale in the morning (and sleeping through the entire afternoon... of course... maybe I made my room too cozy) I went to a Q&A session at BU with Webster Bull- founder of Commonwealth Editions, a publishing company he founded out of the trunk of his car (literally) eight years ago which has grown into one of New England's most successful small publishing companies (named 2006 Publisher of the Year by the New England Bookseller's Association).
The lecture was called 'An Informational Evening for Writers'. It sounded pretty bland.
But something was telling me I'd do best to go, so I went to see Webster. And I'm glad I did. I'm not really sure what I was trying to accomplish... he and Caroline, head of the New England Writer's Union asked me the same question: "Are you a writer?" and it was hard for me to answer because I wasn't sure what that meant. Caroline said, 'Well, are you a new writer?' and I replied. 'I guess?' I had no idea what being a writer meant in the publishing world but I had a feeling I was not one, at least in that sense, yet.
I told Webster I've been writing every day of my life for the past seven years. He said he wished every day he could do that, and that was why he started doing what he does. I didn't really see why he couldn't.. it only takes a few minutes.
But then again I realize they might have a different definition of what writing is in the publishing world, just like they have a different definition of what being a writer is.
The session was small, intimate and fantastic. My favorite kind. Webster introduced me to his daughter Martha who is about my brother's age, and about to graduate from U of Chicago and move to NYC. I asked her to contribute to my media project. She said she didn't write creatively, but that she'd written about things she was excited about.
They might have a definition of what writing is in the publishing world, but for my book, I am looking for people writing about things that they are excited about. So Martha will be contributing to the CMP.
There was a lot of insight gained from both the session and my conversations with Webster, a few notable quotes and notions:
- "There is a false dichotomy between being creative and being commerce-oriented" (something I'd been learning a little bit about at my old job... and indeed my brief experience with Oleg has opened doors for creative potential that I didn't know existed... a veritable 'wardrobe to Narnia' so to speak)
- "I started out in Magic" - Webster commenting on how he started out founding a vaudeville-style magic theater company in his late 20s
- On the future of books: "A book is a physical object in the home that tells a person who they are."(A big question in publishing is whether or not books will be replaced by other media. Bull's belief was that 80% of books will be replaced by other media, but that the other 20% would be valued as a physical presence. He referred to the Family Bible, and how once, there was one in every home.)
- On how he got into publishing- "I believe in detours. Take lots of them, take all of them if you can. It's important to surround yourself with the people you want to be around- the people that inspire you and enrich your life. I was fortunate enough to have a lot of mentors, one in particular has been my mentor since I was 19 years old (he is 55) and he has helped me out every step of the way."
Webster also taught me a lot about the business aspect of publishing, tips on what is best self-published versus outsourced, what aspects you can cut financial corners on, and which aspects (copy-editing, book design) you should NOT cut corners on.
Webster also offered to let me use his publishing company's printing rate with his favorite press in Chicago when the time is right. Using his resources, I could have a professionally copy-edited, professionally designed book published in an edition of 2000 for about $2.50 per book. Which is unbelievable.
I'm feeling pretty good about where this is going.
Webster is a great contact to have- he talks about me for a while in his speech which will be in podcast form whenever Chris Kenneally posts it, called "Beyond the Book". I'll keep you updated.
I'm going to make something amazing soon. It's going to be amazing because it is going to be me helping YOU make something amazing. I'm just gathering the skills.
I really did learn something from all this. And I'm going to keep learning, every day.
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