C a r o l y n ' s D i a r y
diary.carolyn.org
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vIRTUALLY yOURS:
mY
cOGNITIVE
aND
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| be warned: this is my diary... clb | page 52 | |||
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C a r o l y n ' s D i a r y
diary.carolyn.org
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vIRTUALLY yOURS:
mY
cOGNITIVE
aND
... Today |
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|---|---|---|---|---|
| be warned: this is my diary... clb | page 52 | |||
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52 weeks in a year. 52 diary pages over 6 years. 6 weeks per page on average over 6 years. Tomorrow is my half birthday again.]
reading: Slaughterhouse-Five or The Children's Crusade
I wrote in my head a talk, my bio, in the shower. My throat is a lttle bit scratchy and there's a minor fever coursing through my mind. I have a lot of writing to do this weekend for several things, and I suppose being a bit sick will loosen me up.
I'm more thrilled about Arugula now. Even more. It's been settling in, and I am indeed looking forward to these changes in my routines. Perhaps the sky will also be bluer. Subjectively.
Perhaps.
urban folklore -- pay it forward -- heroes in our hearts -- i met a man a couple of weeks ago who i really respected. his demeanor and his thoughts and even his understanding of the happenings around him, were all admirable. i met him at journalcon and i hope sometime he will write to me.
the birth of a religion ensconsed in a movie where variegated was used as a word. and not quantum, ss it was only referred to as a word. anyhow the movie got me to thinking about messiahs, people who add something needed into the soul of a culture or people. its such a beautiful thought. to see a wave of condensation hurt into change, each individual adopting an alteration, making a difference, tiny, adding in to the wave. aching inside me, i wish so hard to experience one or two waves in my life.
standing or compression wave, by either i will be moved, just a free-willed particle
i had an interesting day in giving an early morning tal at a career day. i worked on trying to share some things that have inspired me over my career. i hope i was able to open and expose enough of those learnings to make them useful to others. funny me thinking along those lines, almost a lesson unto itself.
surfing this feeling of beautiful religious admiration. i am finally able to understand the attraction of faith. it is not the trditions or the company. it is the joyous sense that things make sense, and that they happen for cause (though not always reason). this joy is the closest I've ever come to having a faith. fair game. perhaps it is time to be open minded, if not about some god like creatures that don't show themselves, then at least about the range and array of feelings and viewpoints and shared communions that i am having.
I should park myself farther still from the train wreck views of yesteryear.
It's Tuesday evening. I'm alone here in the office. Writing.
I sat down to play NetHack for half an hour, and then thought I might enjoy this more. So here I am.
I was strongly inspired by a talk I gave on Saturday. Somehow, I changed the tone of my presentation to focus on sharing more with others. Instead of trainwrecking my experiences, I picked ones to share that were lessons, something I learned from. I gathered into me the feelings of success and accomplishment, and then spun anecdotes around each lesson learned in being a part of the e-community for so many years. It made me feel good, even as part of me, a little voice in my head, kept saying that I was leaving parts out -- the parts which train wreck me would have emphasized previously.
Perhaps I've finally recovered from all that crazy attention a few years back. The Smithsonian event fucked me royally for many reasons. I guess I expected it to continue in the same way, as if hard wrok wasn't needed any longer, and I could simply glide through the rest of my life. Silly me. Part of my strength is in finding flaws in things, seeing the weak spot, and as a consequence, being able to take extreme risks. A risk is acceptable if its managed well, and the downsize has been prepared for.
An example is buying a house with Richard. It's an exciting opportunity, one that I've been kind of hum-hoing about. I've haven't been biting into the opportunity with much excitement because i hadn't figured out (really felt) how actualized risks would be handled by me. I have that feeling now though. I'll handle it quickly, and with a lot of confidence in me. I guess its back to my childhood religion: "So what do you believe in little girl?" "I believe in me!" (Yes, I was naive and hadn't heard of religion then. Yes, I didn't understand the quiestion, and merely improvised the answer. But it did become a large part of me. Adults back then put such a grave importance on asking the question. Little did I know I was getting the answer so incredibly wrong in their eyes that I shocked them.)
So I'm cool, and okay, and if I actually puzzle it out, I'm happy. So taking the managed risk of living with Richard is good. Good for me. Good for him, and my cats (who'll enjoy mousing access again), and his dogs, and my life, and I'm sure his too.
And the risk? There are two I know about right now. One is that we are the two principles in my company (ours, i guess). If something were to go wrong because we were living together (in any sense of the phase people assume -- their problem, not mine), then I'll manage that. The other risk is of course that we don't end up getting along. With our history as friends and enemies and friends, there's little doubt in my mind that we could end up enemies again. C'est la vie. A chance not taken is life not lived.
Part of my pursuit of personal joy is found in living fully. And to live fully, I have to take opportunities and make them into beautiful things. I have done that before.
[okay the optimism is turning my stomach at this point. there's nothing like being a reformed nihilist turned optimist. eeek]
and off to the gym I go now.
I was right. This was enjoyable.
Too little sleep last night, 5 hours. And I jumped out of bed at 5 am this morning. Tonight I'll go to bed by 10, and sleep in, try to sleep in.
I'm meeting this morning to go over a document governing the house buy. Some sort of co-habitation, non-common law agreement for Richard and I. I think its wise to spell things out up front. My lawyers like to look after me.
And then I'm looking after this and that. There are a few things that've been loer priority, and its time to finish them off. And the bigger project of moving the FSC office out of the FSC Building, to new, bigger, cooler spaces. I'm looking forward to that all coming together. So many details to arrange.
And I'm a bit spacey due to lack of sleep, and a bit under the weather. I have some sort of bug, had it for almost a week now. That and overworking is catching up on me. A bit of rest is in order.
Deeper thoughts? Not really. Too sleepy and I should get dressed now.
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Sunday morning daylight savings day. Everyone but me is sleepingin late today, whether from Halloween parties, or a desire to advantage up on hours. FSC has its annual paintball game this afternoon. It should be a blast. Here's the now open-sourced code we're using to generate teams. I have a 50 dollar bet riding on this code. Richard bet that he could get it listed at FreshMeat by Tuesday. Heh. Well, I'm giving him a head start in attaching the code here, since I would bet again that he hasn't submitted the code yet. The code did undergo a "scupulous" code review at the office, much to my amusement. |
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I felt the AdBusters banner was an appropriate commentary on both paintball, and the old annual tradition of going off to a Korean BBQ afterwards for dinner. Please, God, do not tempt the FSC teams to that fate yet again. It's no wonder I've been a vegetarian for going on 3 years.
We've created a hundred team lists from which we'll randomly select team assignments this afternoon.
I'm wishing I had a digital camera now. It's time to buy one.
At work.. late in the day. One meeting to go. I'm a bit sick, and have been for 2 weeks. Some sort of cold or bug or something. Just enough to take my energy when I do something hard.
Paintball yesterday was a blast. Lots of people played, and we kept regrouping into new teams. I did get shot once by my own team member (who will go unnamed here). I think he/she was more astounded then I was. :)
And I hired a couple more people today.
Nothing big or deep or thoughtful after a day at the office. Just a lot of small and not so small tasks left. And a meeting. And then some dinner and warm cats, and perhaps a good book. [note to self: take good book home or you'll be stuck with Chapter 3 of Lolita (perverted writing... ick)]
Well... better not keep the gentlemen waiting in the boardroom.
miau
Pictures of England from several trips ago
Here in England, its Armistice Day. And there were firwaorks exciting Angela and her dogs last night, delayed from last week for Guy Faulkes day.
My backspace key is wired wrong on this ssh cient, but its not worth fiddling settings over. Apologies to my future self for the higher abundance of typos this week.
I've been sick these past few days, and going back 3 weeks really. Sniffle cough. Luckily I suppose, Angela and Richard (her boyfriend) have a similar bug too so we're all spending an easy time this weekend. Perhaps when i feel better and so does Angela, we'll trip around here.
It's peaceful here, and restful, and I expect I'll get lots of rest and quiet. I'll also try to visit a few places, castles and kings and history such an important part of local awareness here.
I'm mostly just coasting on relaxation, without adesire in the world to be more involved with anything. i think Anglea actually appreciates this, and I'll not be in the way much here.
Once I return to Toronto though, I'll be moving away from the quiet condo in the sky with my cats, to a more grounded home. I'm growing more found of th eidea every day. There are a number of people I know who live in and around Cabbagetown in Toronto, and I'm sure to find in comfortable there. I'll give notice for my condo for Feb 1. Lots of overlap and a long retreat time should things just not work out moving in with Richard. So many people don't think highly of him within my persoanl circle of friends. Lots of careful nvigation will be in order to blend these groups together.
Enough meandering through how things this morning.
Morning... On my way into this city this morning.
Issues... Is it important to dip into the existential aspects of life on occasion or more frequently? I beleive that its important to be able to when its needed -- when there are concerns bearing dirctly on me that require me to change, and to change in a positive and adaptoive manner.
Where does this practice come from then except for the day to day use of these tools -- self-examination, philosophical exploration, etc...
There are other methods, slower, of carrying out this self-change. The slow process of healing by simpy doing healthy and simple things also works, and I have indeed been relying on this over the past two years myself.
This all arises after talking with another friend about previous bad experiences. We weach bear our own burdens into the future, and have to address them or collpase in some mental manner. My way though really does involve examining a lot of things, discussing them, and learning from others' input and observations too. A life without that sort of discussion is to me not worth it. I don't think I want to live for the feelings in the moment or the sense of accomplishment at acheiving goals -- not only these things anyway.
We are each made differently. Still I d hold that there is value in being aware of this very fact. The value? That it too is up fr change.
And off... to London downtown.
Toronto
Where was I?
We went pubbing with some of Richard's really nice friends on Sunday. Seems thought that pub food on Sunday night is quite hard to find. I remember the river, outside the pub windo, swollen and speeding along, covered in swans.
Staying with 2 dogs and one cat. Angela and Richard bought a beautiful, new house several months ago. I'm proud of Angela for pursuing her dreams with a sense of confidence. She has earned that after everything that happened years ago with her old paramour. She has done wonderfully in creating her new lifestyle.
I wandered London a lot, and on Tuesday, saw two things that I decided to do: attend Chicago, The Musical, and visit Spain.
So I planned to and did both.
In London, I found so many books I've been unable to find in Cnada or the US. These included a vast number of Philip K Dick novels and the 3rd Harry Potter book. I'm quite pleased, and somehow feel the trip was worth it just for these finds.
I didn't really feel like taking pictures of anything until I hit Spain. Luckily the old photos I have here really do capture me sense of London.
I don't think cameras could capture the rainy damp weather though. Although I arrived in canada to a bit of snow last night, it still feels warmer here than it did there. I was just soooo cold. Hence Spain and the Mediterranean.
I saw so many places and people. I walked for hours every day.
Following on a train ride in the morning which was longer than the flight, I flew EasyJet from Luton to Barcelona in the morning. I arrived at lunch to a sunny and beautiful Mediterranean coastal city. They held the Olympics there two years ago, and the city is still simmering. It was outside tourist season entirely, and yet everyone was a tourist.
I met more people in the evenings, and toured around a lot during the days.
Places http://www.concierge.com/features/insiderguide/barcelona/barc_thismonth.html
I met Jason and Matt during their first week of studentEuroVac, and a photographer with a new print mag from Travelocity... Look for me in their Jan 2001 issue.
multi trains, multi buses, multi shuttles, multi conversations about which of each to use, and a flight, and the multi trains, multi buses, multi shuttles, multi conversations about which of each to use
Amazing pub fare and great conversation
Stonehenge - photos http://www.britannia.com/wonder/earth/thehenge.html
Came home. Called Richard and found he was waiting at the airport for me. How sweet. We don't do well coordinating at airports. this evening I try again as I'm flying to Montreal.
First thing back though last night, we went to visit our new house. It's just spectacular. I'm in love with living there. Still, I need to pack and arrange to move. Haven't started yet.
Sleep deprivation provides an interesting, if somewhat dissociated view of daily life. the bigger picture sparkles before my eyes a hundred times a minute. The little pictures, those perhaps imaged best through a fly's multi-facted eyes, flutter by without pause. I try to focus on one, and it disappears, and some grave new view of a universal essence drives into persepctive instead.
Like getting dressed this morning to trip off to my meeting, or finding the key for the lock, or eating breakfast, such simple things. Like these things writ large.
Stonehengian monuments to life appear in the foggy distance, as photo-memories of a space-time parcel that is my life and others' lives and everything on and on. Drifty.
And what does this mean? I'm looking for focus in the smaller things. Make those calls. Arrange those things. Hold on tight while the how details of life create the future I will live in. And others too. My responsibilities for the being and essence of my little space-time cone, this is my focus by dint of me being me, accidently for certain, and yet responsible for all that is me. Arrogantly taking possession of the nature/nuture/free will debate, aching to be entirely the latter, and tired enough to foget I'm not, for awhile.
I suppose I don't know what it means either. :) So I'm off to my meeting instead of meandering through place space.
Bouncing out of bed after a full night's sleep feels good. I'm still full of cold germs, and I've booked a medical exam just standardly. All that travel caught up with me.
Today, I'll phone moving companies, and arrange to move into my new house. I really cannot wait. I find the main streets near the new place to be a bit less friendly then I'm used to. Cabbagetown is near two very rough neighbourhoods, and these spill in a bit. I may just need to get a car to live there after all. Time will tell.
I popped by the house yesterday though before a lunch meeting. It's just a cool and wonderful as last time, and now I have keys! My third floor cathedral space will be spectacular to live in. Along with incredible ceilings, it has a walk-out deck and a fireplace. There's also a skylight over the stairwell, and a small bathroom up there. It's really a full apartment for me and Moppins and Fleiss, and then all the wonderful spaces ont he second and first floor are a total bonus for us.
Richard has moved into the master bedroom suite. I'm sure he'll love it. And we have a guest room as well. The real plus there though is the tremendous first floor. It's a complete party / entertainment space. Fireplace, full beautiful kitchen, tremendously high ceilings, and it opens up right through to the skylight in my space.
Of course, I do need to move there soon. It's time to pack. Haha. This may be the ver first time that moving won't be stressful.
After the vacation, I came back to a mountain of paperwork in the office. I'm almost caught up, and hope to complete that today so that I can get back to other more inspiring aspects of my work.
Deeper thoughts...
I want more focus and structure. There is something that happens to me after meandering through the same sort of things for years. A kind of fuzziness that precludes a specific focus and direction. My shorter term goals change too rapidly, and are not adding up as they should into directed prosperity. I'd like the feeling of having a single, long term goal to implement daily. I either need to work on changing that need, or acquiring a functional goal of that sort. Flapping in the breeze is really not a feelgood alternative. I wonder what else I want out of life?
I fibrillate between wanting a lot of social exposure and wanting to sleep peacefully on a beach. My vacation satisfied about 60% of beach desire. Moving should satisfy the rest. And so the social cravings can rise up and play with me more soon.
Sideways thoughts...
Staring into my monitor... there is a place in there, a world larger than my apartment or the city, a place that roots in my mind and blossums into the worldsphere. Here is true beauty, the sensualism of hope and possibility. I am in love with my telnet session and the web server behind it, and expanding connectivities of memespace. My one true joy in life is to grow a tendril into that space and taste the potential.
Communicaton, an old discussion between many old friends, is the tool and the medium by which this joy expresses itself. Turning inside-out, unfolding each internal crease for exploration, and then drinking and tasting the interactions. It is my joy.
Direct touch between what is me and what is evertyhing else. Although my fingers type on keys and my eyes watch a b/w screen with characters, as I type Ctrl-X Ctrl-S to watch these letters become shared space with everything, the transition is transparent to my self. I direct the mindspace simply out to the world without medium.
It is all beauty.
And an alarm clock rings.
Bye bye html world.
So I'm at the office, and rushing out to the doctors. I hope the problem isn't a serious one. It's knawing at me though, and I better get a professional opinion form a live doctor instead of relying on crazy web sites, er... online medical resources. Wish hypochondriacish me luck.
I've liked the "O" entries here for some reason. Just passed half-way through the page, and no pressure to create new html layouts, and no suspected pressure to end off the finishing page with a some teaser.
Today, Richard moves into teh new house. It's also his birthday, perhaps the first time since I've known him that I've remebered that. I guess we're both growing up.
I'll move in next week -- when the movers are available to move me. Pictures available soon.
Alright.
One's beliefs make up one's world view. We acquire these through genetics, our upbringing, and through our own reasoned and emotional decision making. This world view effects our future self. Decisions made against it, or based on it, create character, and the stresses and joys of being a person. We get feedback from the world both about the things we do that work well (given our goals and tastes), and the things that are less then effective. We wear our character on our faces in in body language, tone of voice, and in the knowledge we accumulate and apply.
I've held for 20 years or so that each person is an experiment in world view viability. Countering for such things as unavoidable circumstances, we're all fairly much in the same situation. With enough will power and effort we can switch places with each other anytime given a similar geographic region. Some things might be more of a challenge to one person than the next, but overall we are all equally able to arrive at similar points in the social success ladder (pick your favourite standards of success and sub in here).
So these world views have a lot of impact on where we are and end up. Simple things like whether to get married, whether to have kids, whether to have career ambitions, etc., all arise from from the basic and rather fixed beliefs that form this world view. Do I see the world as a place that will reward me for getting married? No. Is having kids a good thing for me as a person? No. Is working towards independence and personal choice in everything good for me? Yes.
I don't mean to confuse freedom with infinite potential. Each task we engage in requires efforts, a cost and benefit matrix results, and opportunity costs paid, or transcended.
Interestingly, to me, we each work hard to continue our own world views. In fact, from my own experience, and in watching others, I've noticed that its quite easy to do things that go against it, and we work to reinforce that we don't. Often this even seems the easier course as mental trauma can easily result when there are divurgences between what results in reality and what our dreams are. But if you do systematically pursue those dreams, your own dreams of course, you do systematically end up acheiving them (barring opportunity costs). So why is it then that some people don't like their lives?
The simple truth of the experiment that I perceive the social world to be is that while people are very often attached to the world view, they don't like some, not all, but some of the results. This conflict just plain hurts. I'm okay with it. Compromise seems to be a strength of survival. I don't compromise the world view I have, although I do change it from time to time. I do however note daily occurances that conflict with it. Handled with awareness, these ease off and I become a changed person. After enough of that occurs, I allow that the world view needs some tweaking too. Or, and here is what I am most proud of, I change the world instead.
The world after all, is this amazing social consensus. With enough ooomphf it can be shifted and altered, and slowly over time moved around a bit. Often these movements add in sophistications that other people appreciate too.
Back to the experiments yet again. Let's say that I've decided to always feel comfortable. I could engage in maximizing my current comfort with fluffier pillows, and more Haagen Daaz. I could attempt to stimulate every sense to the optimum level for my tastes, and try to maintain that state constantly. Other things would be less successful. I might not be able to hold a job. I might not desire independence. Etc.
Let's say i wanted to maximize my knowledge base, my collection of facts and hopefully as a result my understanding of how things work. I'd read everything, and learn to retain a lot of that information. i'd be good at recalling it, and using it relevantly. New information would be stored up in useful ways connecting in to previously learned things. I might not bother with enjoying sensory experience as much. I'd sure be less comfortable then the first person. If I played it right, i might be respected for this knowledge base, or I might be an astounding geek.
What of the person who places beauty as a foremost quality. Might I retire to the salon regularly for a new hair colour? I might seek jobs that emphasize and reward beauty. I wouldcertianly want friends around whoappreciate the beautiful too. Would I have the time though to learn a lot? In today's world, i doubt this course would also lead to comfort.
I could go on. I know people in each of these categories. Each has chosen to pursue one human ability or goal extremely.
I'm more moderate then any one of them, and yet I am not at peace with pursuing none of them, with just being a nice guy.
I've chosen to pursue them all in good generatlist fashion. My experiemnt, the person who is me, is to try to be very good at all these things above, and so many more.
I remember in high school that there was this social pressure to choose whether I was a "brain" or a pretty girl or a musician / actor or a "jock" or a person with lots of friends or ... I chose most of these things. I decided that it might take me longer to accomplish all of these things in parallel but that was the wiser choice. I think that is true now. After 20 years, I have accomplished a great amount in each of these areas, without acrificing any one of them.
I know that I am not going to mess that up now by making decisions that would narrow these options or force me into a corner. I won't do that. I will continue to add in so-called lofty goals, and to pursue each.
The pain of holding a false belief is strong. If I titled entries, this one would be "False Beliefs". My false belief is my lack of self-confidence in the quality of what I do. Someday, maybe, I'll see myself as the person others appear to. For now, I'll trundle along with a lot of self-esteem (I can indeed do anything), and not a lot of confidence in the outputs of my life. Later perhaps that will come too.
Always more things happening. The world doesn't slow down. I'm an advocate of having everyoneint he world take a day off. I'd like to see what happens if we all just sit back, take a day off, expect nothing from anyone else (no work), and relax. Would we fall a day behind in the great world lans that we all take for granted? That's the whole point -- we wouldn't because there would not be a benchmark for the world to measure against. We'd simply take time out.
Since I'm not going to convince anyone of this, or at least not everyone, it's moot.
So instead, I'll go to work, do my stuff, advance my position in the world that extra bit.
As time moves on, Terra spins and describes multiple orbits in the universal planetary dance.
Fascinating... The week has just slipped by without me noticing much. So here I am again, early Friday morning, sniffling yet again with a chest cold. I just can't seem to get well this year. But I'm going for a physical early next week, and we'll see.
Hard to think much about anything ethereal with a chest cold. The world becomes a gradient of cold and warm, and my body a seeker of the warm spots. Brain used only to evaluate the quality of each spot. Perhaps I should tuck in the keyboard and curl up with a meeting or two at the office instead.
Had a nice dinner with Andrew last night. Haven't seen him for quite awhile, so we played catchup.
Some things don't change. Most seem to though. This morning, i am waiting at home for the packers to come to my house. They are already an hour late, and the stress is driving me batty. I really can't take moving. So much gets unsettled. The bright side si that so much improves when you do. Shaking off the old habits and patterns, and creating new ones. For awhle though, my life and the cats' will be upside down and packed in a box. Oh my.
Its that old free floating anxiety... nothing concrete to worry about or to actually do. Just sit back and worry about things. I need to be far away from home right now, perhaps at the office, but certainly not sitting here waiting for movers.
On Saturday, i relaxed a lot, and found in myself the urge to write. A book materialized in me, although lacking a plot actually. :) The setting and the people simply appeared. I guess it would be slice of life style. Which style is, granted, intriguing if the life steps out of the norm, or allows a depth of perspective normally hidden. Very my style.
This is helping. Writing always does.
I'm the new E-business Specialist on a local / national station called Pulse24. I'll be streaming out to desktops and tvs every week. There are so many interesting topics to scan for this too. I'll have to work on narrowing down the subject a bit.
Perhaps I'll sculpt a short story instead. Generally, this takes one of two things: an inspirational view, or several weeks of intensive visual playing. Both are quite fun. And it ends with an hour or so of heavy writing. The intensity should be a good distraction.
Arugula is doing well. I've vowed not to go there again until my things are moved though. I want it to be warm and inviting and cozy, and without furniture, the house is huge and empty. Andrew visited last week and helped start a decor theme. There is now Compuhenge in the geekroom, just outside the Temple of Saten (sic). And there is cardboardhenge in the living made up of Richard's empty packing boxes. We've toyed with Woodhenge, and then it became Firehenge as it was made up of firewood, and burned beautifully. Temporary henges have a particularly emotional appeal. They contrast wonderfully with the wonder of Stonehenge, 5000 years old and still majestic.
twitch
Only so much I can meander on about. Brett puzzled out what's new with me last night. Hard t keep coming up with new things. the world always brings them along, but at a certain rate. Or perhaps the rate is mine -- my handling rate.
And on and on .. twitch .. is this funny from the outside?
House move. Office move. twitch twitch
Well... more errands certainly can be found. ciau
Moved.
The cats simply love this place. They're prowling around from floor to floor purring, and smiling. Tails wagging. I haven't seen them ever react well to a move before.
Right now I'm typing on a filthy little computer. Nice OS, filthy keybaord. My fingernails are scraping dirt off the keys as I type. So I need another bath this morning already.
Everything is moved in. Boxes boxes boxes without labels, and full of books and dishes and god only knows what else. Its more like walking into a department store then unpacking. Everyy object has a new and surp[rising appearance here. Almost like there is room enough to use thigs instead of storing them. It's really quite splendid.
I'm having the predicted trouble settling in to living with Richard. His priorities have to change or I will move out again. Right after I moved in last night, he went out drinking with his brother. At 11pm actually. I wasn't impressed simpkly because he had been cooking dinner then, and we were introducing dogs and cats to each other. He just went out. I guess I need to trust somehow that that made sense. Except it didn't. I planned for a low week this week, but he's off to a big presentation this morning across town. So I have to wonder.
Ctrl-x Ctrl-s Ctrl-x Ctrl-c
Second day here in the new house. Steve will be visiting over the weekend. I want to set out all the furniture, set up my computer, remind the cable company that they screwed up 2 days ago but I still want high speed, and generally start to unpack and settle in.
Sitting on a shell, by the river, feeling the flow to and fro, washing over me. A beautiful butterfly stops here, rich and vibrant with colour and life, and follows down to the ocean, where everything collects, and renews. The mountain is long gone, and the forest only a memory, gone with the sea. The world evolves, the butterfly lingers a while longer, and will flutter away on greater journeys.
| ocean | test site server |
| shell | redhat linux terminal emulation |
| butterfly | host machine for CD |
| mountain | used multiply as it evolved through |
| forest | once upon a mail server |
| river | mail server |
| sea | old test site server |
The cats and I love it here. We set up my space upstairs in a preliminary config. I think there's at least one more rearrangement in my future in that space. It's hard to set up a space that makes a comfortable bedroom for me but that can still lend itself to sitting quietly in front of the fireplace with guests and friends (aren't they the same thing?).
I had my general physical yesterday. My doctor is such agreat guy. I just like him a lot. Anyway, all health issues are in my head at this point -- whether that is a plus is a good question. grin
He asked me if I wanted a cholesterol test, and an HIV test. I though, what the hell, why not. And then I needed to sign an authorization form for the latter. The nurse couldn't tell me why. She merely repeated that they required my written consent. Wow. That made me feel bad. I would have felt better if the HIV test had been treated the same as the cholesterol test or the PAP test. No diff to me. There are differing political ramifications in society... I'm not dense enough not to have heard that. :) But I certianly sthink that a disease shouldn't be politicized, and certianly the testing for it shouldn't be.
We live in an intersting world. Anyhow... they asked me where they could fax the results, so I irreverently gave them the main office fax number for this so-called confidential info. And yes, someone's husband will read this, and pass it along to his wife, and everyone at the office will be watching for the test results. Hahah. You gotta love broadcast media. Perhaps I should offer him a space here for his own editorials on life and such.
Other observations... I should go get dressed for the office now.
Forgot... I'm stuck here til ten am waiting to let in cleaners. Sigh.
Home sick. (quite a double meaning, and yet not intended.) big snow storm outside. hallucinating a bit. floating. we filter the entire universe through our bodies and expect to remain untouched.
had a party last week here, after steve stayed over as a guest for a couple of days. had a steve party. fun. this place is great for having people over. cats love it too.
gonna nap shortly. can't seem to stay awake. floating over the sky. winter outside so pretty. seems my spirit is tired from moving too. its a lot of stress not having everything just be perfect around me. i had hoped i was less of a perfectionist lately. guess i am, but not about where i live. gotta sooth that nerve a bit more too. dogs are here and i'm okay with that. and living with richard is generally peaceful too although he is such a guy... not very domesticated even though he seems to try when reminded sometimes. oh well.. guess i'm not really either. only difference really is that it stressed me out but not him.
hungry too now. such simple things when feeling bad.
An accidental find this morning... a picture of me:
(John) (John Langois) (x) (x) (Kathy Wilson) (__ Jones) (x) (Marianne Larson) (Jamie Zeigel) (Jeff Burke) (me on crutches 15 years old )
I wake up almost every day wondering what next to do. I've hit this point in life where ambition is a game, and it is others' expectations that tend to define what I do. I know a lot of people wh know me, and many of whom rely on me, read this, and that hinders me a little from too openly writing about this. But... perhaps... to me it is more important to air out these thoughts, and to discover what it can be to be a person, then it is to constantly attempt to maintain an image. Snce I am not so very good at maintaining that image anyway, a little further breach into the depths (or shallows) of me shouldn't hold me back.
Looking back 20 years at that high school picture, me on crutches, remembering the thoughts I had then... shy, bossy, perfectionist without a good idea of who I was. All of these things have changed so much, more rich and sophisticated, strengths now rather than weakness. But more than that... a photo that tells of events and interaction. It doesn't show that I had a crush on John then, nor that I thought Jaime was intimidating and scary because he was too self-assured. It doesn't show that I was on crutches for half a year and that they taught me to slow down a bit, be less hyper, be less self-involved (less, not none). It doesn't show that the building behind us was the music room full of insturments and Mr. Macdonald and Mrs. Eady, the music teachers. You can't tell that I was in grade 12 then, 14 years old, that I disapproved of smokers, that I had never kissed a boy, or that I was getting 90's in math.
The picture reminds me though that each moment needs to be full of memorable events. Each moment should be special, full of people or research or creativity. Resting and then carrying out with maximum integrity all those things that one has to do anyway. That's the way to live with no regrets... or very severe regrets if my beliefs are truly wrong and I discover that someday. But given my mostly mundane, middle of the road ...
[sunrise]
...beliefs and lifestyle these days, surely the biggest regret I could face is not to have been braver in the experiment that is me. Living now in a suburban fantasy, an urban reminescence of what suburbia copies, I find a stiffling control on my actions. I feel like painting the outside of the house purple or hanging my bra out the window or inviting the Outlaws over for tea. Rebel without a cause...
And that's the crux of the matter... my personal energy most easily emerges when reacting to strife. Good times are more difficult, and require a different specialty. Perhaps a recession will perk me a bit, although I've spent 4 years recession-proofing my businesses. Even a market crash will be fairly uneventful for them. So what is there to react to? Nothing directly impinges on me any longer as I have moved into that part of society that isn't ever directly attacked (except by parking tickets). The skills of the rebel are valuable, but much like those skills one developsfrom growing up in a third-world, war torn, country, they do not fit this life niche.
The joy I feel from rebelling, and that which emerges from battling successfully, these are not sufficient to enjoy success. Nor is buying a nice house, and hanging with cats, nor spending spare time curled up with Harry Potter -- for good or evil.
missing entries...
login: clburke password: ******** Welcome to Carolyn's Diary. All session activity is logged. You have new mail. Tue Dec 26 17:29:26 EST 2000 clburke@carolyn.org > clburke@carolyn.org > clburke@carolyn.org > clburke@carolyn.org > diary
Big white window, blank, waiting.
Same mood as yesterday really... A sense of aimlessness. That same feeling I had when in Barcelona, wondering what to do when I don't have something I have to do. I really ought to get over that. And yet, the feeling that there isn't anything to worry about is wonderful in its own way.
It'd be nice if I was really good at splitting the days up into pointful days, and day of acceptance (of pointlessness). perhaps i should go back to writing and researching philosophy. Those days easily split into these groups, even though the work done there doesn't travel outside of the walls of academia. Doesn't anyone notice that the core of our being comes from thinking and curiousity?
There's this layer, a surface, surrounding the world now. My choices create it, have created it. I want to break out instead of learning how it could be good. Perhaps I should have stayed out on the raw and bleeding edge of society? A question? Not an open one any longer. There isn't an ounce of interest left in even thining like a libertarian... what could be gained by anyone with that viewpoint when politics and marketingare simply so much more effective -- if you're good at them. They're also a lot of fun in an age which has dulled other challenges down to take it or leave options. Perhaps that was the appeal of a right wing perspective... it forces you to put yourself on the line. I do that now constantly, and I guess i take it for granted. [Writing really makes me feel better. Talking about this stuff would as well... but that is in the past only.]
Black etchings covering white background semi-permanently while I grow older.
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login: clburke password: ******** Welcome to Carolyn's Diary. All session activity is logged. You have new mail. Wed Dec 27 06:20:18 EST 2000 clburke@carolyn.org > clburke@carolyn.org > clburke@carolyn.org > clburke@carolyn.org > diary
This is the first morning that things seem back to normal. Angela and PapaBear are on ICQ instead of visiting relatives. I feel like getting up early and making coffee.
I cried a lot over these holidays. It could have been the stress of moving, but its more then that. Somewhere I decided to give up, and it hurt over the holidays to notice what I gave up. Last night though I decided to stop putting energy into spinning wheels.
If I feel like doing soemthing here I will, and if I don't, I won't. The small amounts of cooperation that seemed to grow initially also boxed me in. Now I'm going back to independent and opinionated me. I'm sure there can be cooperation around that focus instead of the previous one I was cooperating with but don't want to be part of. [Yes. Vague.]
So I'm smiling again... Don't expect nothing from noone.
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