So Damned Predictable

It’s still awfully quiet here. Is this the best you can do, offer me this profound silence?

So something… for something I haven’t touched on before. You know besides the fact that I’ve harvested several Roma tomatoes today, in addition to a small handful of yellow pear tomatoes and this would be the first time ever, in my life, that I’ve harvested my own crop of anything. Last night it was the third bountiful harvest of basil, which was promptly, as expected, turned to pesto and placed in the freezer. This, in the midst of winter, will remind me of summer. As now, in the midst of summer, I’m preparing for winter and imagining a cozy feeling. I’ve been pulling up onions now for weeks, nearly months. I’m not certain when to harvest the garlic. I’ve started snap peas for a late summer season crop.

Yesterday we walked around Lake Lagunitas. A bug flew down my shirt and bit me twice on the back. It left welts and then buzzed away. Now, what’s the likelihood of something like that happening?

I’m moving away from being there to being here. Here doesn’t talk back so well. I want the repartee. I enjoy the dialog. It’s so quiet here.

Let me tell you something different, something I haven’t touched on before…

When I ride my bicycle I feel free and I know it’s teaching me something about how to approach my world and my days. Mostly I walk. Mostly I move fairly slowly and methodically through the world. I pay attention to what’s near and there’s time to see everything coming for how slowly the world approaches. The bicycle is faster. I find myself looking further ahead and aware of just a tad bit more. When I’m riding my bicycle to the ferry terminal in the morning, I find myself thinking, “Yes, this is good. Look further ahead. Yes, this is good.”

How To Change The World

The violets in the mountains have broken the rocks.

-Tennessee Williams

Know Thyself

I have seen myself. What’s emerging in the wake of shuffling off this mortal addiction must give us pause. It’s not me. Whoever this is, it’s not me yet. I have historically appreciated myself and this part-time monster who is me is somewhat of an annoyance. I come to the sloppy conclusion that it’s down to me to address this little problem I call myself.

I like to break a problem down into its parts. Some contend I can’t see the forest for the trees with this kind of approach. I say if you don’t look carefully you’ll miss the little gems, the hidden mushrooms and the first wild flowers of the season and it’s these private moments of discovery – well.. for me that’s what it’s all about.

I sit with my problems. Yes. Where others would have floated away, I sit masticating the moment. I will solve this puzzle and I’ll be the wiser!

Loves Me Lightly

I’ve been very new age-y today. Last night I found a meditation site on the web with real audio. A ten minute guided meditation at your fingertips, replete with music and a visit to my authentic self. Very cool.

When I arrived home, Ed made an early dinner and I called to arrange for a massage. A woman named Tina, with rough hands, kneaded lavender scented oils into arms, fingers, stomach, thighs. She played Japanese music and kept telling me to breathe. My feet are tight, she wonders why the muscles in my feet are tight.

I took a shower and did a full body exfoliate with jasmine and rose oils. The lavender oils loosened everything and the shower smelled like a flower store. It was heavenly. It still is, really. The smell of everything lightly rising from my skin.

And exiting the shower Ed makes me hot tea with honey and sets it by my computer. He loves me lightly, offers up these little gifts and then disappears into the other room. Just when I need space he offers it up and asks for nothing in return. Here’s the tea, now you just do whatever you want, whatever you need. I’ll be in the other room.

Today was just a perfect day. Today this is just a perfect life.

I Need A New Joystick

I have opinions about everything – fairly strong ones. In my internal life the universe is dichotomous – there is right and wrong, good and evil, black and white. I’m the right, but interestingly not the good. There is an intense discordance in my inner life. I’m learning to be okay with it. Ed is learning to be okay with it as well – all at once being my beacon of strength and support and an emblem of all that is evil in the world. He wears these clothes well.

I had the most productive day yet. But I don’t want to measure the value of my life in yardsticks of productivity. So it was productive but not as joyful as it could or should have been. I do want to measure the value of my life in yardsticks of joy.

So what is joy? What is joy? How do I find this thing that eludes my disposition so these days? Of course I could go off in another direction in a spiraling tome, but does it get me any closer. I’m not sure of this.

I think some people on this planet are zealots for their way of being, doing and undoing. Like Nietzsche wrote, “Many are stubborn in pursuit of the path they have chosen, few in pursuit of the goal.” I’m not so different. My path is my path. I’m not so different from anyone else in this regard. You know, this is my path so fuck off. But I’m also pretty keen on the goal and maybe to some degree that sets me apart – apart with a subset of humanity who are fairly married to both to process and the product.

So even I’m wondering where this is going - how this has to do with my joy. I might be wondering this for awhile. I need to be okay with this. Today is all that matters. I really, really need to see and feel my today with more clarity, love and integrity. It’s time to get a new battery for the meditation helmet and see if I can open my third eye a little wider.

Turning Corners

The mountain was beautiful today. Forget-Me-Nots and white wildflowers (I don’t know what they’re called) are popping out early. I see them and smile, like I’m opening a present that’s been waiting in a box since last spring. I took the short loop today, hoping that maybe I’d spy the first wild iris of the season. I didn’t. But I did see the purple ones. I don’t know what they’re called either. I’d seen a few fairly heavy with buds and thought that perhaps in a few days.. then I rounded the corner and there they were. Ms. Secret and I did a little spring dance right there on the hill. We climbed up off the trail. I spun in circles while she watched me then she started spinning about too – tucking her back end in and running about in that excited playful way dogs do.

These antics of mine used to frighten her. She’d look at me in a suspicious way and cow. Now as soon as I set foot off trail she seems to know that there’s something to celebrate. It truly is a wonderful life!

I still feel pretty toxic on the inside but at the same time I feel like I’m slowly turning a corner. Haroomf. Don’t we spend out entire God Damned lives turning corners? Just walk around it for crying out loud. Can we just get on with it already?

I was thinking, I was wondering… was I more intelligent when I smoked? Did I think more quickly, were the synapses firing just a bit more rat-a-tat-tat? Or was I more dull and did somehow the addiction and the drug lead me to believe I was more clever? Right now I find myself rather dull. With most other drugs, people just think that they’re more interesting but they’re not. So on some level I hope I just thought I was more interesting - and now if and when I have a thought that I find remotely compelling – well, maybe it will really be brilliant. Or something. I’m not sure.

You know.. one to lie and one to listen….