elenmosyne

I am so exhausted from the weekend... I'd like to say it's the heat and mugginess after the torrential rains throughout the morning today, but it's not solely that. I semi-ranted to a listening ear earlier this evening about some stupid stuff that happened... mainly involving people who've been alive far too long to really have any excuses left for why they still find themselves capable of acting like uncharitable assholes to other people.

And who are a sure card to get angry and persist in arguments. I wasn't the recipient of that. I like peacemakers to say the least though, because they are always smarter. Not the weak-willed kinds that back down and do it just because, though I'll take them over irrational soldiers any day. The ones that know what bullshit smells like and purposely know they're done with it in their life are where it's at.

Today we finished another stage of cleaning out my grandmother's home after her death this past winter--I was not very close to her although I feel I should have been, and yet I think I was - not in one iota being praiseful - probably one of the most reverent about how to deal with everything in the place, and the simple reality of what exactly we were doing. I walk into the house and see 60 years of unknown memories permeating the place, that my aunt and uncle and parents speak of as we go about the task of moving furniture about and parceling out will dictations.

My aunt and cousin are likely my witting partners in knowing the seriousness - but also the goodness in what we are doing. They are coincidentally the part we are "estranged" from but not really for any reason other than my mother's side of the family had a lot of chaos and tumult that eventually split most of them apart, and even my aunt and her mother in the last years.

The only items that I decided to claim as 'my own' were a small framed painting on glass of the sacred and immaculate hearts, as well as copies of This Side of Paradise, Wuthering Heights, The Winter of Our Discontent by Steinbeck, The Old Man and the Sea, a beaten up 1950 printing of The Greatest Story Ever Told, and To Kill a Mockingbird... which I started reading earlier. I think the last time I had was ninth grade right along with The Catcher in the Rye. Atticus Finch is the model upon which all lawyers and a lot of fathers ought exist (at least, as a baseline template!), but will never be I'm sure.

I sort of wish that I could write shorter, crisper entries... because I'm sure that my rarely putting down "just a sentence" has got to be a turn off. Every so often I feel like I have something that short and pointed to just slop up... yet it always seems like by the time I think of doing it, I'm already on to something else.

On the way to a corner store to pick up some batteries on a whim, I walked past all the construction that's going on doing that strip in Berkeley - and Berkeley is such an old division of Detroit. With the cloud cover, the damp, the destroyed road with hilltops of dirty rubble and the massive demolishing machines sleeping by the roadside while the workers had the weekend off... it felt distinctly not at all like Michigan, or even North America, even though my only eye to places outside is in photographs.

Oftentimes I feel that the difference between here and anywhere else in the world while, large and not at all assuring the same safeties as one's own homeland with one's own peoples, customs, laws, and agreed upon principles... hell, you don't even get that just walking down the street in your own neighborhoods, but regardless, is fundamentally minimal.

The wrecked street and machines were appropriate, but actually, on rainy days where brick or concrete walls get soaked, I never think of them as mere building sides. They always remind me of sea walls instead.

A friend of mine earlier this week just realized how immature and egomaniacal people can get when they get dumped, particularly when all previous signs seemed to point to them being "nice" and "sweet"--it's not like it was anything new to her, but to know it and experience it are sometimes two different things for anyone.

She's busy doing rotations in Chicago for her second year med stuff at UofM, but luckily that keeps her busy between dealing with the about-face executed by her "sweetie" and trying to get acclimated to life in a new city. And since I've been seemingly pouring music out into tin cups lately to anyone that stops by and says, "heeeeyyyyyyy, oooh i like that what'cha listenin' to? can i have some?", it was only inevitable that another mix cd doth be begotten.

I think there are probably two or maybe three people on my friends-list that would have it in them to make majorly titanic tracklists--I'm genuinely not as -diverse- as some people, although my music tastes vary far and wide, or narrow and needle-like pending. They'd probably know how easy it is to pick 100+ tracks and then have to whittle it down from there for whatever the person'd like/would fit them most/be new and also engaging to them.

And seriously, there are things like listening to a handpicked selection of songs with you lesserly or greaterly in mind... but there aren't many that match popping a cd or three into a car player and not knowing at all what's about to come on, or what the person may have selected. It's you, the drive, whoever's listening with you, and deliberate songs. It's special, folks.

I cut this one down to about 46. Old songs, new songs, songs I don't like so much, songs I only like the unique sound to, songs I find funny as hell (track #5 on cd 3, because I am a white kid from Michigan), but Rabs'll appreciate them all. Maybe. Hopefully not. It's a lot of popular music and hits a lot of different things.

This is the way it went:








--

Jess: a spring peeper is a frog!
Jess: we went to a pond today and they were everywhere
Jess: my mom was like 'come hereeee little peepers!'
Don: and all she wanted was to find a prince
Jess: she got a stick and was pushing it into the mud to get one to swim
Jess: she already has a prince!
Don: but isn't your mom married too? ^_-
Jess: yea
Jess: to my dad!
Don: I know... I'm kidding, being all mean to the way that people change on you
Don: I'm sure they're super happy

( a vaguely related conversation )

It's been a little while... and I've just been an eensy bit busy, one part being occupied with the practical demise of my car. It's facing the death hour: it's a '98 grand prix and we've gone the distance with eachother (in fact, cross-country and many Chicago-bound to and fro miles between), but right now it's looking grim. There's something wrong with the suspension or axel and it'll be about $900 to fix... which may not be worth it, ultimately.

It has 140k miles on it now. I bought it five years ago at a police auction of all places for a steal of $2k under the common value and it's been perfect.. but this might be the end of the line.

We'll see, but for now I'm driving a loaner Canyon, and I gotta say... I dig the truck. I always have had a thing against them because they're big and, honestly, I prefer cars.. amongst other reasons like parking and handling because of the low center of gravity (that's for no real reason except that I have a bad habit of taking turns fast when alone, though not dangerously so), but it isn't so in this case. I do not however dig gas prices.

It's enough to make me either pack up off to a big city and be a smart person who rides the bus or be someone who drives a Prius. And at a rated 60 city mpg... it closely justifies the $382/mo. payment in the longrun fuel savings.

I will never agreeably grasp Hummers or other large vehicles that're non-utility for reasons like that, especially as the emphasis on getting away from petroleum-bases is only going to increase as the years keep going by. The idea of throwing away money.. because you want something supersized to drive around in... does not blow my mind, but it does disgust me.

Then again I never will understand "status" purchases to ride around in anyway, because I don't have those same kinds of ego hang-ups to stumble around with.


One other thing:

I've been trying to lend a hand to someone lately who's having a little bit of a battle between a responsibility to somebody, then their limited time outside of school. They feel like they're being unfairly asked of in the situation... and to avoid going into specifics, basically they "technically" are dealing with someone else's problem, but it actually isn't a -huge- one to tend to. It is truly very minimal.

I don't know how to help people who are.. not a whiney person, but on certain matters they will -become one-. Against their other dispositions and responses. I don't know how to help them get from that step of: "I want to whine and sit here" to "I'm tired of whining and want to do something about it".

Ideally that second step'd be more like "...that was really ridiculous of me, I'm going to stop being that way right now", but that's not it here with this friend.

And under the surface I have this extremely negative reaction to people that are being irrational about something, and even when you're forced to tell them the fact that they are rather than stay silent, they continue to be. I understand their frustration... everybody gets frustrated, whether they handle it on their terms or they let others help them through it. I don't sympathize though with those who decide they'll actively persist in the "why me" act when someone else could use a hand from them. It is stupid, it is self-absorbed, and it is destructive... and utterly useless to boot.

It reminds me of like... it's like with younger kids, when they get upset for whatever reason and if it's for a valid one or a pretty minor one. The ones that start sobbing up a storm and wailing like the end of the world were nigh will do their thing.... but if you leave them alone and don't validate their behavior, they miraculously stop.

Miraculously? No. They just realize that there's no point and quit. That's all.

Some of them. Others continue long and the habit is highly difficult to break. I have no idea what to do for this person, but leave them alone to deal with it.. because they don't want any overtures of help, they want to complain right now. Otherwise they're a generally good person however, this fault and stumbling block of theirs aside.

It is now... June 2nd. Aside from this realization, it also strikes me - again - that I will be a whopping twenty-five in the span of six months and five days.

If you say six months doesn't go by quickly, peek real quick at the last six, and then sell that line again. Hint: it won't come out as convincingly to you, or at least, it shouldn't.

Beyond my own regular obsession with the fact that I'm finally approaching the point of no return and zenith of my youth, it occurs to me because somebody has a birthday party later today at 3. I had a discussion earlier this week about "appropriateness" of gifts for someone who's of middle school age, and had to explain why video games (let's get a pass card for Square Soft relics and all the other creative and thoughtful games/developers over the years) definitely don't rank up there on the "worthy and desirable" priority list, even if the gift-getter in question wants them.

We picked out something though that I thought he'd like and that also wouldn't be an invitation to sit on his butt clicking away at a 360/ps2-3/wii/whatever controller.

I understand the ways in which people think so little about what they feed children, anybody's children with.. their minds, their hearts, their eyes and their ears, but seriously, if I hear another sincere "why does it matter? they want it" from somebody I may just try to legalize good book reading and classy/interesting music listening amongst a million other things. I do have an unapologetic autocrat in me somewhere, that's for sure.

Half-jokes aside, video games aren't bad, but mostly I'd rather they be minimal in anybody's life - same with tv, beer-drinking, pop culture sex and beauty magazines (who -always- seem to have the secret to fifty gillion orgasms and that so sexy little number to wear to please your big hungering man..), and everything else that is if not the great satan, then at least dumb.

Louise:
if I wrote poetry I bet they'd all be really cynical
Louise says:
and no one would want to read them with fear of never being able to look at a man buying a bunch of flowers without thinking "I wonder what he did"
L: -again
D: heh
D: yeah, I know, that might happen
D: or you know, any additional minus sign that people are senseless or selfish and destructive about.
D: but sometimes they are good, though, truly good, bear that in mind as well. it's existent though sometimes quite rare
L: well I did actually ask a man why he was buying flowers once (it was 1am and I was working at a servo) because I figured I was just a cynical bitch who needed to realise the world isn't a horrible place
L: then he told me that he felt guilty about cheating on her
L: so that blew that theory out of the water

-

Those that much covet are with gain so fond,
For what they have not, that which they possess
They scatter and unloose it from their bond,
And so, by hoping more, they have but less;
Or, gaining more, the profit of excess
Is but to surfeit, and such griefs sustain,
That they prove bankrupt in this poor-rich gain.

The aim of all is but to nurse the life
With honour, wealth, and ease, in waning age;
And in this aim there is such thwarting strife,
That one for all, or all for one we gage;
As life for honour in fell battles' rage;
Honour for wealth; and oft that wealth doth cost
The death of all, and all together lost.

So that in vent'ring ill we leave to be
The things we are, for that which we expect;
And this ambitious foul infirmity,
In having much, torments us with defect
Of that we have: so then we do neglect
The thing we have; and, all for want of wit,
Make something nothing, by augmenting it.
-"the Rape of Lucrece"



The two snippets aren't connected, but I liked this excerpt earlier. Another late entry... so that'll be that as tomorrow comes swiftly.

It was yesterday that some guy decided he'd like very much to start a fight with me. He liked it so much that we danced right there on the spot because he thought he honestly couldn't wait for my answer to his flirting and invitation any longer.

A day later and the thing is in the past, yet the whole matter still pisses me off, even though I'm fine about it (as in, well able to handle my response to the situation). Neither of us were "winners" in the match, though we wound up going through the bloody mess, and the guy likely has no reason and idea why he was that compelled to throw down. And I am convinced again that sometimes that's all people are: sharks on leashes. who need you to feel it.

Just gotta remember the good things too, but I am sick off of some people's bullshit. I am well aware now of who gets priority though when it comes to good cop bad cop. It ain't the bad cops. later, but not right now, not right now.

I am fine though, I'm always fine. Once you cross certain thresholds you realize that no one surprises you, no one does something you hadn't imagined them capable of from the beginning. I am only surprised by people's virtue and true inner beacon signs, and that right there is a joy.

I don't really got a lot to say at the moment.. or rather.. got a lot, but no time tonight or inclination to put it all down the way I want to. I had this very lovely conversation with a few people the other day about a general but pretty important topic that's been on my mind a lot (and always is), but I'll post about that later - it'll probably be one of those super long ones.

I was pretty glad to get a chance to really dig into something with other people for once... like... you can enjoy the superficial and the fun for so long, but sometimes all you really wanna do is say exactly what's on your mind, and have someone around who knows what it is you're saying - and reciprocate. I don't really need it, but I enjoy it very much when the stray contact like that runs across your doorway and stops for a second.

Not really sure what I wanna say here... but then, not really sure either if it's too important. This past week I've oddly been switching up the dreams between ones of dying (oh yes, sweetness) and other ones in which past familiar faces appear in huge jumbled mashes of purpose and story. I'm (apparently) getting more and more appearances from old friends like high school era souls in them at times, I have no idea why - perhaps old attachments, and my own mind reaching out in dreams?

I've had the same kinds of cameos from the same groups of people for years ever since '01 (sometimes once a year, sometimes more), and leaving those days behind... it typically is one or two people who recur, however. I always consider those dreams to be simple manifestations of missing like.. say, people who're on the level of friends you'd have a true lifelong bond with, and my head simply grabs and plucks those images out from the time and stuffs them into the dream.

The friends that pop up weren't really that type (though they were good/close friends), yet no matter years later every so often they appear and I'm reminded quickly of how very much it is we've all changed in the time since those days.

-

I got my pocket picked the other day. It was my own carelessness: one, I actually took my wallet into a gym facility, which is a big no-no even with lockers available - two, I actually forgot to make sure the lock clicked on the door with my stuff. It was only twenty dollars luckily, but I'm killing all my cards that are still in my possession instantly and having new numbers set up. (in case they wrote down the card #s and simply left them, though I don't expect that - but always watch out for what you don't usually, right?)

How lame.

It's actually funny in a way, as retarded as the fact is - not the loss of the twenty dollars, but the absurdity behind a petty theft like that. I found my pants laying on the bench tossed there after having been rifled through... cell phone, keys, a random pair of clean socks in the cargo pocket, loose quarters, a cheap silver men's band, all these survive, after the interested party had searched and, in the end, found.

Despite its minorness, I felt something similar (in the sense of it, not the scope) to that much larger twinge that some people get when they lose something, or someone does something to them, and it's their first taste of it--say that another person might break into their house and invade their living space, or any manner or brand of intrusion that exists under the sun... not really my first taste of it, or my first taste of being an intruder in other senses, but it's been a while and it was strange to be reminded of the fact out of the blue.

--

busy.. I'll just post this right now, someone's grabbing my attention on aim.

I discovered this cute music video while putting together a mix cd for someone the other day, so here's a look at something quirky from Feist. From youtube to you, mushaboom:



(I also have no icons... which is ok! I'm trashing some old stuff and looking for new non-crappy better fitting ones!)

This is a bit of a crap placeholder, but so far I've been a little buried with the term soooooooo.... this is consigned to getting no love. I'm sure lj will have to cry out a lot more before I actually decide to pay some attention to it (or anywhere online it seems), but even then my ears are probably gonna be deaf - til some time avails itself, or til I decide that posting e-mails are an absolute necessity

Because all I wanna do is be outside and do things on the weekends instead of sit home and write or think or anything =P

So one day, but in the meantime my feet are getting familiar with being bare and what shorts are like and all the all too common little things of spring. I also may have an option to see Chicago this summer, or (what what) England/Germany? Or maybe even Australia, linked to the same second trip but pending on if it's after July or before

I don't even know how the other one works out, but apparently if it's my will, there's an invite from an old friend out that way. I may put my finger to the wind, we'll see.

It's more time pending than anything, yet with some available funds in my hands... why not hit the road for a while? I'm thinking both, plus a third that's been cast around in my head for some time. There are some things that aren't super important to do right now, but if this window of time's presenting itself I think that I definitely want to throw some of this summer up in the air

It was a few months ago that I ran across this one, discarded in some campus library booksale. It's a collection of poetry by a woman named Anne Ridler, but it was sometime this week that I actually got to thumb through and then actually read what was on the pages inside. I liked it, there were about eight poems that (in whole or merely parts) that stood out in my eye.

Sometimes it is the particular point(s) of the poem that will endear it to me, sometimes the general feeling it has surrounding it, other times something else. Sometimes it means something to me, sometimes it's merely no more for what it illustrates and presents and that I value it for doing.

I don't get that "little joy" of running across a poet who happened to inscribe something that takes with me very often... I can appreciate much that people decide to create and what they're saying with it more often, no matter the size, and a plainer and more genuine/purely original piece of art can mean far more to me than someone else's overelaborate attempt at "depth". Typically that simple yet honest and beautiful aspiration toward art and/or their mere expression of a plain idea/emotion/thought... is all that's exactly required sometimes, to make a thing good enough. (quality and composition aside this time - whether the structure of the writing itself, the words/meaning, or the structure of the presentation in the poetic form)

But there's that threshold of something that genuinely digs into you and more or less you feel some vague kinship with the writer, and that's what makes me appreciate some of these. I don't know a thing about Anne Ridler, but I am glad she decided to do that poetry thing for long enough to get her stuff into a book.

This is undoubtedly my favorite, probably because... well, guess, if you've never shot for the stars by now:


Dividing forms can disappear,
Leaving the elements that they share;
And a human eye not only see
But cause this change, if it look rightly--
Jerusalem is not above all wars,
And wilder and more skillful eyes
Could see it now, and in these places.
~"Ringshall Summer"

--


( Kirkwall, 1942 )
( Ringshall Summer )
( For a christening )
( Dead and Gone )
( Blood Transfusion Centre )
( The Constellation )
( The Images that Hurt )
( Nothing is Lost )

I don't have much time, but I want to get a couple things down before heading out in the next hour or so. This weekend's flown by (as time often seems to do), between friends or family or library visits.. and tomorrow is already in my mind. For some reason while I'm no friend of math and yet intimidated by organic chemistry, I like the latter more despite the other's ease--math is more boring on one level (and interesting on another), and easier, but it doesn't quite capture my attention.

There's a game later though (to like, play, not watch)... because I'm a brute like that. I haven't gotten together with a bunch of guys to skate on a team since high school - that's six years folks, the grey hairs will be popping up tomorrow no doubt, but between all the bruises and stiff lower backs.. it's going well so far. It isn't a very high skill league; we're all fairly decent, and a handful of the guys have or do play college hockey (not NCAA, but div. I or II in a league beneath that). I'm not talented like that, but I know how to play at that speed.

Just a couple of things to share though, nothing too big. One funny little story from looking around for some books in a public library, then something else.

-

So while stepping into a restroom I hear this guy singing in the bathroom--on the pot. I'm not kidding. I don't know a lick about classical singing, but it sounded precisely like that from the brief exposure I've gotten from being dragged to a concert or two in the past couple years, and there he was in the stall singing away.

It was actually.. like, quite honestly, pleasant and you could call it beautiful, if you weren't aware that the guy was doing this while sitting on the john. I tip-toed back out after walking in... because for some reason I felt obliged to let him keep that bubble of utter anonymity, like how sometimes you might not want some fellow interstate/road driver to actually catch you singing along to a song on the radio, but I think I got caught too.

He went silent just as I made the escape from the operatic bathroom, so he definitely got the hint as much as I tried to disguise it. It was decidedly the most classy bathroom habit ever, though, easily.

And for the other thing... actually, I gotta roll, so that one thing will have to wait.

Seriously, I can't believe it's already Friday (and the exclamation with it nearly over, no less). Why? Only for the very plain reason that this is the one week I get to do absolutely like... well, nothing, and live out those days doing whatsoever should come to my mind. It's a week turnaround between winter and spring for the school, yet it doesn't seem enough apparently.

Take that complaint over 7+ days of that going by 'too fast' with a very large grain of salt however, because it deserves one. I am... though, honestly, -tired- of school.

I never thought that -that- monster would ever find me bow to it (that being boredom/wanting out/justgetmedonealready), even to a small degree. I don't really have any complaints over institutions and myself, knowing some of the futility in any of the things that can be said about them, but I am definitely aware of how seriously and on a superficial level I'm tired of being there. Of doing it all, as much as I actually do enjoy it, and as evasive I am of that self-caused beast of the doldrums. If you know me, I am no enemy to being offered stuff to learn and read about.. even though I've sadly gone through like various stupid periods in the past where I was real judgemental about some select things that had worth, and not seeing why they were significant because of - not idiocy, but merely not grasping the broader point and knowing enough to read into the points presented. I was high-horsed and assuming and unawarely arrogant about it... and all born out of an ignorance. That is, basically, so stupid.

And you know, we stupid people never see the point of what is written or why a thing exists if we don't understand it. =p

I just don't -love- this though--who does? It's school, it's people telling you stuff that they learned about to then be able to tell you about it and be paid for it.. and if it's stuff you wouldn't know else if you go listen, if you can only pick it up there... then it is worthwhile. but seriously... I am done listening. I mean, I want to do--that is the root of this. I'm tired of being an ear, even if some of the people along the way truly are pleasant and even downright good professors. And it isn't all one-sided... but the whole process, the journey, the ugh on ugh, I have no enchantment with. All the good things aside, it just is a means to some other new thing. That is all.

I'm just fine though, I simply know how nice it is to not be responsible for a little while before you go and take up the mantle again. This is essentially getting a taste of something you like, and wanting to hold on for a little longer. Everybody likes their freedom, apparently, and to an extent I am no different on that part of the whole parade.

There are a lot of things on my mind.. but maybe all I wanna do is just be for a while - right now, I mean.

I like to tell myself how little it is that I actually need, but then a moment comes along and makes me realize what it is that I want out of life, and I don't mean material things like that sexy car that someone wants gimme-gimme'd, or other ridiculous stuff.

It is wise to want, but I'm not totally sold that some of my desires aren't fundamentally more ridiculous than some others'. I just want however.. a thing I don't even know? I think right now what I want is a challenge. And a few other contradictory things as well.

4/22


--

So it's time for something a little different. Mainly a little bit about school, and then a little bit about actual learning:

This semester's rapidly coming to an end--I'm more or less glad for the fact, even though to tell the truth.. aside from the people I know outside there, some of the profs and other people I didn't truly know well I'll actually miss. It's like by the time you've gotten used to your surroundings and the people around you, just as quickly the hourglass runs out and it's time to pack up.

But with the end of this one, it marks the equivalent of two years of primarily science and math credits, straight-up, all over eachother. And I have more or less weathered and done well in them all.

What this illustrates to me?

I have this down. It isn't any wonder to me, really, that these aren't subjects that come easily for me: they require different sets of skills to work with, different paces, a different kind of attention to devote, and a different work ethic to drive through. If it were that I could reorganize things in me to reap the benefits of having a natural draw to them, I would--I know that I'd be a far different person for them, and that extends beyond any plain classroom and all the meager benefits to gain in there. I have no such desires to wish time and circumstance away however, for at this point in it all - I have no need precisely to even start on such a foolish and useless path.

I know myself well, and now more than ever: I know my weaknesses, I understand my strengths and virtues, I grasp how I could be better without some of the sore points, likewise I see how I could be -worse- without some of the good things. This is in no systematic tallying way... it is merely acknowledging facts, in specific terms - no more, and no less. I think there is a default answer that everyone wants to give and expects out of someone else in turn is a yes, to these questions: are you content with yourself? are you happy with who you are? do you feel up to the tasks you have for your time? living your life, are you comfortable with what you've been given to work with?

I am, however. The question itself is a gauge--and to that I say, I've all the confidence in myself that is appropriate for a person to have, without stepping erroneously and grievously into self-delusion, arrogance, or pride. I feel the current of my own life and I'm not at all afraid of what is out there to be done or what may come.

And yet being sure of what I am doesn't erase the knowledge of what I -could be-; no, am yet to be--how could it? How awful a thing, to not be aware - and we all are by degrees - or be capable of for a moment admitting to yourself, if anyone, where your foundations and outerlying structure can be reenforced? worked on? bettered? And in earnest? In a place where selling yourself to people - to employers, to acquaintances, at times even to friends or family or lovers, is necessary, for some that knowledge can have no room and so they decide to bury the things that they decide can't be turned to an advantage. They leave it by the roadside somewhere that may never be revisited in their soul's eye again, forgotten like any irretrievable period in your life; for all you have is now and ahead.

So it dies, but so dies with it what they have the power to turn in themselves. They gain in a sense, but they don't actually become better in any way if they're committing to living a part of their lives in survival mode when it comes to what they risk. There is, literally, nothing learned or changed, and in bending they haven't gained at all.

And over the course of this whole entry I've actually diverged from the original point that I set out on making. But my point, both the first and the new one: I've gotten this far, I've dived into some of the toughest spots academically for me, and while those gains are miniscule in all truth, what I've proved to myself -via- that in other areas.. is worth it's weight in gold. I understand why it's been necessary to tackle and now, from here, where to take it.

The only other point to make here, tied to the first and largely to myself:

Now to spend some time breaking down some other, less defined, but far more vital walls at hand. I am not ready just yet--there is too much else for me to get out of the way right now--but to steal someone else's line, there is in the rafters, in my heart that "yes, nearby"

A pair of old entries, from the past two weeks.

I posted sparingly 'cos of the end of the semester madness, but that finished up Thursday and now... well, not freedom, but a reasonable facsimile for sure.

written 4/16


--

It's a beautiful day outside. The wind is blowing, the sun is shining, and for all appearances it's the kind of day that could make you think absolutely nothing is - or was ever - wrong in the world. For anyone, period, dying or ill, or any fate that is theirs. It is, in a word, pristine.

And yet I'm in this building, not at all sold on the bait and prepping for some last-go exams before the real finals. It is stupid. I feel like I'm throwing an internal fit here, but it's over completely nothing. There is no guilty party here... no wrong-doer who rubbed you the wrong way, no act of your own to make you angry with your own self.. it is nothing, nada, zilch, a negative. If anything it could be school... but it's not even that, really; it's one of those things that gets under your skin, and by virtue of being so undetectable.. you can't even figure out what it is that's making you so sour, let alone what to name it and from there uproot.

There is no one escaping my inner critic today... but most of all for that fact... it all turns back on me, for knowing how undeserved, how awful the outlook is from its origin point.

This is actually really, really stupid.

I'm not the kind of person who always steals upon a solution to a problem and never looks back--life's not circular, but it's not linear either, so something that fixes or rights you one day may not be the same thing to do it in -the next- down the line, nor may it be solved for eternity thereon either. I'm not terribly much the kind to sympathize with people who seem to be recurring on stuff either though. There are some things that you can't do anything about in life and that will -always- be there, and will -never- be gone, and if someone's of the mindset of dealing with them... then they may as well just deal - be it one way, or the other. Find your way to do it and make it happen. That's it.

It's stupid and a little foolish to wrestle with same partners every day or some equivalent cycle, unless it's of the exception where your match-up with the angel has nothing at all to do with you... and is born of actual love toward a thing, a people, an enduring problem, a matter at hand, ultimately

I really hate it though (*sings* ~but hate is a strong woooooord~) when people say, "Be more of this (insert trait or value)," or "just deal"--and that's it. That is my irony max for the day. I absolutely love their thought.. their value for what they want you to get back to, their pragmatism, their beauty of mind and heart, but it's not always a useful suggestion.

I think a majority of some people's internal stuff-ups actually are solved by that when they aren't too great and they're listening. Some of my own are as well, if the moment is trying and all I need is a reminder to let me take it from there on my own. But say to them to be more of something, or be a different way... be patient with them, encouraging, work them through the steps with love, and all they will need to do is flip the switch on the traintracks, think a little, and chart their new course. Steered toward the clear, they are set: all they needed to do was take the time to step back and be this new thing

It is a positively glorious way to be and I think my heart melts at the thought that people really truly are, the cons of them not knowing the way on their own aside. It's like one of those dreams in your life, one of those visions that you'd turn a new leaf over because of if it descended and came to your eye.. and that really actually does come true, and it's real and there for you to touch! If only for a little while! I think I'm obviously somewhat overstating it... but all the same, when people are easy to work with, open to handling a matter/learning, and can make progress on it... whoever they are, sometimes that is heaven to me. That is worth everything in the world to me, makes me rethink everything and want to shoot for the stars, makes me wonder why that moment of crystallized realization isn't ever-present sans their moments of beauty

That one single moment of bliss, of actualized like... everything, and a representative seed bearing every single hope and dream of yours here, can make me think that every single good thing actually could well be true in the universe.

Maybe all people's situations are derivatives of this and that's all, maybe? And yet some people will actually make an excuse out of their lack of A to B simplicity when in truth, one person's added difficulty with making the journey from "identification" to "resolution and beyond" is merely a reason: a fact, a simple truth, never to be confused with an excuse or a "pass on responsibility card" that makes it less important for them to take by the reins and sort out.

And all that out of a vague, indiscernible thorn... that is somewhat passed. And yet I know it and me aren't done, not yet.

A good friend of mine referred this poem to me lately:

"If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run -
yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
and - which is more - you'll be a man, my son!"
-Rudyard Kipling, 'If'

I don't know about the end, but the rest: definitely.

Happiness is



..sweet...

And yet I grow too wary of it over time. When it arrives, is it to be - and then snatched away?

A thing lorded over you the instant when life ceases to deliver not only the daily, intermittent although lovely sparks of short-spanned joys, and so turns it into something not permanent - but enough to be dangerous, all the same? And all beside as quickly able to end as any thing under the sun?

And this is stupid. Why hold a thing that is dear to you at arms' length - for fear, for the attempt at your own liberty--and in so doing, make your own chain? I know why: there is too much else to be done to let some things in, with the time and resources they can suck up, if there are other important things yet that you want.

This is vague... but it really is about as general as it appears. I've become quite a master apparently at prioritizing and weighing what can come and what can go in my life, to ignore the smoke that life puts out there, and thus put up the impenetrable defense. To allow only that which you choose and not waste your time. It is worthy, it is fine, and it is effective - so it is said.

I know where my "musts" lay, what I intend to do, what I want to accomplish, what I want to be part of. A moment's whim is not enough to bring some sea walls down, so long as the borders aren't harmful--everyone has territory lines they draw, that remain theirs, because they need them. These portions of their souls that they so heavily rely on keeping safe.

And yet in my heart, I understand too much where real freedom lay in actuality, and what opposites of this liberty - real liberty - risk suffocation of the heart itself:

-the ability to let all things pass through you, holding less back
-the ability to be happy, and not be too conscious of this
-the ability to act in dire circumstances, for the sake of those you deliberately extend love toward
-the ability to love freely, though wisely, and on a daily basis be merciful and just in the fitting proportions to those whom you deal with

I just get so tired thinking about all the 'little steps' on the ladder rungs... knowing where I am right now, sometimes I really just wanna fly with it and be there already.

Today was a great day, full of goodness... and much real happiness.. I don't know what's wrong at all. It is a small thing, a footnote, but present to me in its undefined state all the same.

--

"The next step is rejoicing. To rejoice means not to feel jealousy or resentful of the virtuous deeds done by other Dharma practitioners. Instead, if we wholeheartedly admire other people's good practice, we will be able to accumulate great virtue. When we see someone accumulating the causes that lead to the attainment of a well-placed rebirth or we see someone who has attained such a status, it is a cause for rejoicing. Likewise we should rejoice at the accumulation of merit that becomes a cause for attaining enlightenment.

"We should rejoice at the liberation of sentient beings from the sufferings of the cycle of existence through the practice of the three trainings. We should rejoice at the causes of the attainment of buddhahood, the ten levels of the bodhisattvas, and the resulting state of buddhahood itself. Likewise the generation of the awakening mind, the mind wishing to benefit other sentient beings, the source of oceanic virtue that brings peace and happiness to all sentient beings, is a source of great joy."
-Tenzin Gyatso

If you're phobic you might not find stuff to appreciate out of a quote like that. I tend to be able to draw spiritual worthiness from a wide variety of minds, and (by consequence) in turn value the same ability in others.

This one isn't all that insightful to me - that is, lending new sight to a thing that wasn't under your own consideration.. or charting new territory... it is more like when you read something and like it for the direction it applies, for what it happens to give you right then, in that moment, alone.

It's half-way through the day and I'm absolutely floating--on sleep deprivation. I'm a light weight without a doubt when it comes to that (but that's for lack of 'training' in the art, I imagine, and a lack of need so far to do marathon sessions to study/cram..).

I don't feel floaty like 'it's nice and sunny and wheeeee how super cool', nono, that little bit of natural adrenaline and not so natural caffeine to make your heart beat noticeably went around 7am

More like, "man, gimme a corner cot somewhere to fall backwards into. zzzzzzzzz...." =( heh

=\

(And damn, if it wouldn't be good) It's due to: a) a killer chem exam in t-minus 2.5 hours... and b) a wimpy paper that wrote itself, but still needed someone to put in the time between 12am and 12:30p. Or more like 6a-9a with all the chem stuff going in the hours prior

With weather kind of like this (and this and this), I'd very nearly bet on a grassy nap on a hill somewhere:





--



--

It's been all over the news that shooting down at VTech, and it's one of those things you'd definitely take a hundred days of Hollywood star baby-drama publication over, any day.

Some of the people talking and analyzing/giving real info about the whole tragedy--the ones not merely jumping on it to talk about it or who're blowing hot air around are interesting... but it's likely some of the videos of student retellings that actually put you closest to the reality, them talking and describing what they simply saw before their eyes. It drags it out of the screen and, imperfectly, gives you a miniscule glimpse of their morning.

Of the dead two professors went down, and one in a real, true, irrevocably honest act of heroism in laying his life down for his pupils. But this is curious:

"Some students have complained that they were put at risk by the university, saying they had received no warning until an e-mail more than two hours after the first incident.

"Student Billy Bason, 18, said: 'I think the university has blood on their hands because of their lack of action after the first incident.' But the university president has defended his staff, saying they 'had no reason to suspect any other incident was going to occur'.
--bbc

And it's like, how could you not suspect? The first report came at 7:15--two hours before it happened, forty-five minutes before classes began.

I understand why they thought students in buildings would be safer than roaming outside with a shooter potentially abroad, but faced with the alternative? In this kind of climate, the first thing leaping to a lot of people's minds would be the fact that a school environment would be the prime scene for violence if anyone had the mind for it.

It seems like that'd be the first scenario you'd worry about knowing the past seven years or more of school-deaths, so why did they discount it?

So I'm sitting here in this library and doing my thing reading articles here or there, and occasionally goofing off/procrastinating, and apparently eavesdropping on this pair of international students while I'm at it.

If that isn't multi-tasking... I don't know what is. =p

..ok, they're gone... I didn't mean to, but they were talking about experiences they've had over here and problems with conversations/the language... and help me, but I find that stuff interesting so yeah, I'm a snoop. They're both Asian (I couldn't begin to designate where), and the guy there I knew, he tutors for a few sections of math in one of the buildings, but mostly they were talking about ideas of staying here, amongst other things.

And they were noting troubles with other people using informalities (slang, etc.) in English around them, with this effectively throwing a monkeywrench into their heads and being a silent killer to the conversation. Which I can sympathize with... if you aren't being attentive to where the person you're communicating with is coming from (I don't mean geography, but you know), you very likely will fail in your effort of communication at least in part, if not in totality.

To say the least, very good communicators always bear this in mind, no matter what kind of interaction they're entering. This ensures not only that they will do their best in understanding the other's words and meaning behind them on that end, but on their own it also decreases any chances at very bad miscommunication like... people out there who want to express their displeasure with someone for doing random thing, but wind up totally doing it in an inappropriate, and/or potentially argument-causing way and gaffing it. Or simply by not electing another, equally appropriate way that would avoid territory you'd rather not venture to with someone. It is always, at baseline, of highly great use to -you- but with an even greater benefit to others as well.

To know the arts of this is more important than many and all dream. And yet it is a very delicate thing that neither can be taught, though it can be helped to a point and encouraged to those interested and receptive. Only accurate imagination and experience will serve you here while wading through the varied shorelines though. It is a thing that very literally can make all the difference in the world.

In just a little bit I'm headed out the door, I've hardly even been around here lately: and besides, it's insanely tough to get anything done at home sometimes, as bizarre as that thought seems on the surface. I spent most of the morning and afternoon on homework at some cafe and later going out with a camera, with the time until the 9pm Easter vigil down in Royal Oak.

I've come to prefer the shrine over St. Mary's or St. John's though--Fr. Ron is a sweet man, yet I think ultimately the people and location down in Royal Oak appeal to me more all things considered. I don't mind the extra drive down to Royal Oak if I happen to be out this way in Milford, if I'm not on campus or staying at someone's house, and the area I've simply become accustomed to in the past four months. It's busy, it's vast, it's far different than the limbo of countryside and growing smaller towns out west toward Brighton or Hartland, and that amongst other reasons attracts me.

There isn't anybody that I'd exactly prefer to go with though. Most of the people I've come to know here in Rochester wouldn't understand, and the same goes to an extent for my immediate family: neither parties have anything close to that to seek or derive, so it leaves me on the solo track in this--but that's quite okay! I may venture out with my aunt's side tomorrow.

And it looks like, finally.. the sun's starting to come out again after all the snow and cold that's been pre-dominant all today. Have a good night, everybody.

This is a bit of a long entry, so pass by and skip or read at your own leisure.

It was sometime earlier in the day that I saw this real estate sign/advert., with the tagline being something along the lines of "Let's make the home that you'd want to live in forever--come in today!" And it made me think about that, and my own reaction to the idea.

It seems like such a normal, natural desire for everyone to have this or that place to call "my own", to carve out that niche and stake your flag in the western territories, and it is.

Yet I suppose that the desire itself doesn't appeal much to me at all. And that is a bit of a lie: because everybody does welcome the basic stability of having somewhere to make base camp at. It's that basic priority of security being met, that at the end of the day you've got somewhere that's yours, that's safe, that you can work around and live in, and conduct the shape of your life from there. Nobody, essentially, ever prefers the idea of being homeless.

But I don't have that "urge" to own or have anything of the sort permanently, or have the same dream... to be honest, when people start talking about 'homes they'd love to have', while I can be moved occasionally myself if I see a place that just truly looks nice and makes me dream a dream for half a second, most of the time I just don't give a damn at all underneath it all.

( read on, young man )

I'm thinking it over though. I don't know if that lack of specific attachment is something to fix, or if it's something useable for good, or if I'm simply nosing around in the wrong areas and haven't found the right situation that calls. It can seem very 'smart' to not give your self, your whole self, your soul to certain things if they aren't a draw to you ...

..but at the same time I think people who walk the streets of life living that way, staying back from things they don't love without effort, secretly are unhappy for choosing or having to be cautious. And worser so is the fact if truly they never needed to be in the first place.

But again, some warning signs are wise to heed. It's your own life at your discretion, and there's nobody else to blame but yourself if you mess it all up. You have this one shot in the middle of it all here, and there aren't any takebacks, ever.

As soon as 2pm comes and goes tomorrow, I am free: see, there's an eensy gauntlet of double exams that morning, and as soon as it's all over? I'm planning to blow it all off afterward on the invitation with a couple folks to go watch big guys beat eachother up, on ice skates in Detroit.

They also call it hockey, but only in Canada. It's really just boxing on ice... (I'm kidding -->It's better than boxing on ice. ;P It isn't that, really though..)

I haven't even paid serious attention to anything major sports-related for about ten years now though, honestly? I mean, I play, so with the icefest I'm bound to check in on that in the news periodically (or in the event of the Tigers actually not sucking nearly winning last year, them too), so apparently this should be interesting.

If I don't come back from the den where 20,000 shout, stomp, and clamor in unison, somewhere near the Detroit river is likely where my mugged body'll be found. =p

But I think it'll be a-ok

So this is what a journal looks like defunct apparently. It's been a long time since I've posted here, but after kicking the idea around.. I decided that ought be remedied and for some of the dust to be brushed off here.

That said, hi there. It feels a little strange posting somewhere that I haven't touched in six months.. if anything, then simply because of the time table and distance to breach itself. But I guess that's what happens when something is left by the way side though, for: the familiar does not remain forever so, after all, and 'old objects laid down, when picked up, do not always promise to feel the same'.

So this is just out there, saying "hey", and marking my place after twenty-some weeks of zero feeds off this locale in webjunk.

This is also a little notice that (of course) I intend to resume updating this semi-regularly, but don't be surprised by spaced out entries rather than something more frequent -- conversely, that frequency may actually happen, so no promises either way. I am regrettably downright prolific at times and equally not as loud-mouthed at others between stuff in life, so.. being aware of that fact and eventuality, I make no claims. I think luckily it'll be a measure of both though!

And I'd better be out of this library before our math class starts. I hope you're all well.