Besides being terrified of my boyfriend’s mother for reasons unknown I had a wonderful Christmas with her and the rest of the family. I attended church with them last night and it was warm. I mean to say the church experience was not only sweaty but it was warm hearted. Not really surprising in fact nothing truly surprised me; it was all exactly how I thought it was going to be. We went to Knox Presbyterian, a smallish church who’s mission statement is ‘an ethnically diverse congregation called together by God to so love our neighbors as ourselves that we make disciples of Jesus Christ. We are a unified family shining as a beacon of light, spreading the good news of salvation. We encounter Christ through the Word of God, which becomes life to us as it is proclaimed studied, prayed, and enacted in the lives of people.” The church was indeed very diverse, and everyone mingled effortlessly which I always associate with church, no one lurked in corners (except me), everyone walked around smiles and open arms. The inside of the church reminded me of the ribs of a gigantic whale (maybe they were aiming for Jonah). I looked at it again and brought me all the way to the bottom of ocean watching two waves rolling away from each other above me. Either way I found myself continually looking upward at the ceilings architecture for some reason. The cross was tall and the biggest thing in the room, forcing one to remember the suffering of Christ. It was covered in what looked like gold sickle shaped scales, their open sides facing away from the intersection of the cross. It gave the illusion that it was sort of big and hairy, it seemed more like a star to me then anything.

We sat far in the rear with plenty of elbowroom. The service consisted of lots of hymnal prayers and some old Christmas carols. The pastors short sermon spoke of home and how through Jesus we can find home, I wish I had a notepad at the time because some of his points were good ones that anyone Christian or no could use. Either way it reinforced in me still why religion is so attractive, because it makes everyone feel accepted and wanted and loved-which is the point. I think my favorite part was the singing, because for me singing has always been rather relaxing and singing with a group of people whether it people I don’t know or my best friends it’s always ignited some sort of bonding between people. Shelby, James’s mother raised her hands a few times during some of the carols presumably to feel a presence more clearly and precisely. It reminded me of yoga mediations. In yoga meditations your hands are open except for your two fingers, which remain touching to keep the energy flow. Your chest usually protrudes forwards letting your heart open to the world and your eyes close to shut out the physical and concentrate on the mental. Shelby looked intent swaying side to side gently and slowly; she closed her eyes singing softly and her hands in front of her ready to receive that spiritual feeling. I admired and even envied her peaceful concentration, wishing I could believe so deeply in one thing. James kissed my head a few times and continually smiled at me through out the service. I could really tell he appreciated my coming and he made me feel comfortable and that my being there was making the service all the better for him. The pastor asked us to pray with him a few times in which everyone dropped their heads but me it seemed, and the fidgety kids. I watched James interested to see how seriously he might take it, considering he is not a serious person most of the time. But he was laid back as usual but stood still his head lowered and eyes closed. I have liked to ask him what he’s thinking often during the day, to try to catch him off guard on a really insightful thought but most of the times I do it never works. Watching him pray I wanted to ask him so terribly, I wanted to see whom he was talking to inside that Santa hat he was wearing. What he was asking or thanking or forgiving. It was interesting to me to see him doing something other then gaming or terrorizing people with crazy jokes (not to say that that’s all he does of course). But it was just so unlike a James thing to do-although of course him being a Christian and all- of course it is going to be a James thing to do.

After the services James pulled me outside away from the crowd so as not to be plagued by introductions, I sort of fell in love with him again all of a sudden because I hate getting introduced to people I am never going to talk to again. Although I realized that he was doing it just as much for him as for me. All in all I am a very shy and very unfriendly person most of the time unless I know I am going to see that person again. I just think it’s sort of a waste of time. Either way we found J.J. who is a junior now in high school (James’ sister) playing with a little def boy who was so un-shy I felt silly about running out the church so quickly. James and J.J. chased the boy around the courtyard getting them selves wet with dew. He was laughing so hard and jumping all over the two of them. I wondered how he kept himself interested in the service and watching people ringing silent bells.

Shelby and Doug (James’ step dad) thanked me for coming in the car and we got back to their house and it seemed as if we had never even gone to church at all and I wondered how much they thought about the service or how it much it touched them at all. In fact through the whole ceremony I looked around at other folks wondering exactly what they were thinking and whether it had anything to do with church at all, I wondered how many of them would go home having been touched by it or just brushed by it. We opened presents and I got so much from their family it was insane: gloves, slippers, a blanket, a scarf, a journal, and a funny hat. Opening that many gifts from people I hardly know was probably one of the more awkward things I have done with that family, I found myself wanting to be back in the church where inside the community individuals would leave each other alone for a while to focus on something else.

In the end I realized I was not nearly as touched by the service as I have been in other obscure moments of my life. Nothing the pastor said actually made me feel spiritually enlightened as much as it taught me more about morals and how to live physically. Nothing really mentally entered my being except for knowledge about the experience and interesting anecdotes, which I have written here. What I mean to say is I have had other times looking at a sunset, or watching a movie, or reading a book, or listening to music, or laughing with friends or feeling complete joy in the arms of James where I have felt more ‘spiritual related energy’ flowing through me and between the things I am encountering. In other moments I have felt more love and light then anything I’ve remotely felt at religious related activities. But then again maybe it’s because I am not opening my heart like a real yogi to the divine. I am skeptical, reason driven and starving for knowledge of things I have no idea about and that is why nothing can really reach me the way it can others. I do not think this is bad, I just think that it is me. And will keep walking this path and do it the way I have been molded because that it all I can do.

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December 18, 2005
I drove fourteen hours yesterday straight down California and through Berkeley and LA traffic. The farther I got away from Arcata the more I wanted to go back. I went to bed last night alone for the first time in months. I was wired from the drive, my eyes were so tired but they wouldn’t close. I imagined what he was doing and pretended I was there too. I imagined him sleeping on the couch, bibles stacked high all around, the little gray terrier curled up on his chest. That helped a little, I ended up sitting by the fire playing with the ceramic nativity scene from Mexico that my mum has had for years. All the pieces cracked, an angel with one wing. Our real sequoia growing wildly in all directions potted in the front room was waiting for decorations and lights.

The week before leaving meant cleaning and we found the mouse nest. Four naked baby mice squirming around squeaking and a terrified mother dashing out to safety under Heather’s bed. Colin had to use a brick to kill them. James, Heather and I stood by watching him pound it into the paper bag we had swept them into. He said, “listen I’ll do it, but I don’t want you people to think I get any sort of pleasure out of this.” We assured him we had no such feelings at all, and that we had just watched The Secret of NIMH hours earlier. We could not have an infestation. It had to be done, but the three city slickers had not the gut and conviction as a farmer’s son might have, so I called him over. It was one of those things I feel you’ll remember forever…I had never thought that killing something like mice would still have such a great affect on me. Heather said that the mother would have most likely rejected them had we caught her too and tried to put them in the wild together. This hardly helped me.

December 23, 2005
The damn Christmas season is upon us. Heathens, Christians and all thing holy or not being forced down our necks no matter how hard you try to resist. Always caught up in a holiday I vow to make my own one-day. To do right one day. Having said that I am going to Church tomorrow, with James’s family. I though it a polite gesture if anything…honestly I feel like I am more interested in the education about a world I still know crap about and a world I think most people including devote Christians know nothing about. The last time I went to church was in Colorado for Easter. Pretty damn boring. This church is supposedly small; I refused to go to the three thousand attendee’s one out in West Covina. So I will be attending tomorrow, and I’ll be sure to write about it. I also have more to say about Heathens and Christians and Christmas, I really think Christmas could be much more magical and compelling at any age if people actually knew why we hung lights, or left out cookies, or why Santa wears red and why is everything green. I feel like the true meaning could not only be a family oriented one but an earth oriented one also. And if you want to throw Jesus in that’s fine too, because for some people he is the light of the their world just as the sun is the light of the pagan’s. But alas I left all of my notes on the subject in Humboldt…

Whenever I think about the place I long for it greatly. Luckily the heat in LA has subsided and it is bearable. But I am suffering headaches from an unfamiliar bed and the smog. Today I wanted to go to Don’s Donuts so badly it surprised me. It’s just a damn buttermilk donut, but I wanted to go to because I could glimpse the plaza from the street, and look out over the bay and up at the forest on my way there. I miss the quiet of Arcata. The lack of worrying about who I have to see, who I’m obligated to see. I am now both Northern and Southern Californian all in one. I’m so laid back it bothers people, but so tired of sitting down that I need to twitch and fidget. I guess I am having an argument with myself. Living in LA, and living so far away from it for so long makes the place so damn hard. I am not surprised to hear that you die sooner here. Driving down Venice Blvd at 8 in the morning I noticed the sky was clear all the way to the San Gabriel Mountains, but later in the day on the same street I could not see head or tails of any natural feature in the distance. In my side mirrors however the sunset was brilliantly orange, influenced by the smog, it was still beautiful.

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Cool Wing

Cool Wing
Originally uploaded by skinnymalinkee.

I have not written in a long time. I mean I have not written anything at all. Well nothing related to myself. Perhaps it is because I have been writing so many things for school, and to Clyde (my inmate). Or perhaps it is because I am so content that I do not need to do anything to promote a better understanding of my life.

I am considering changing my major. I cannot decide now whether I should just finish geography seeing as I am 1/3 through the requirements, or if I should move into religious studies or anthropology. I wish I had the mental capacity and studious ability to do all three, but that would be certain termination of my little success at college. But I grow increasingly interested in world religions and the whole psychology behind religion, also the ways in which the ancient world (tradition and myth) were assimilated into the present one through things such as religion. We shall see.

Finals are upon us here, as well as frosty and freezing nights. We finally got our heater fixed, but for a while seeing our breath indoors at noontime was a normal event. We caught a mouse, one of two we hopes. Unfortunately it was after he decided to eat, shit and pee all over James desk (which is kind of funny if you think about it) and on my paper wing. The silly little thing had been running all over our room and boldly marched around the apartment in broad daylight. After several attempts to catch it by bunging up holes and setting “mouse traps” which consisted of boxes and paper bags we decided it was time to trek to Ace to get a humane trap. That same night the mouse wandered into a paper bag by the trash on its own and we slyly tipped it upright. Tiny little bastard he hopped up and down trying to escape as we carried him outside. Heather and I let him go out by the creek beyond the apartment buildings.

THE PAPER WING. I drew it during the summer; it was a representation of a song that is very dear to me by Nickel Creek entitled “When You Come Back Down”. Anyways I left my wing with James in Los Angeles…that is all I will say for the rest may be a little too sappy for folk’s ears and a little to precious to disclose. Anyway when he came to live with me he brought my wing and it was safe until the mouse had his way with it. I was not as distraught about it as I thought I would be in a situation like that. It may have been because I had just taken “artsy fartsy” pictures of it a few days earlier. But perhaps it was because the mouse didn’t destroy James, just my wing. That may sound a little abstract but again I don’t really want to explain more.

I have become increasingly excited about going home in recent days. I am looking forward to seeing all my “home” friends, my parents, my dog, my old room and the warmth. I am sure it will be a great relief. However it will be strange (having lived with James for two months and five days) going home to adjust to a new routine together. Everyone will want to see us separately or alone and expect us to live separately most of the time; it just seems so bizarre to think about it. I honestly feel like living with him is the most normal thing I have ever done in my entire life. And somehow when we decided to go ahead with living together after only a couple of months, I knew it would work out. I mean I wanted it to and we made it work. Who knows about the future…but these past few months have been really easy. Nothing has gotten in the way. That is too say no complication we have had has come close or even attempted to challenge the thing we hold as a top priority or value in our relationship. And I can honestly say the things that I thought would break us apart have come and gone and still there was no threat. Every time something bothers me that he does, or something more trying and intense comes up the feelings I have for him never falter…ever. It’s always there constant in the back of my mind. It’s like looking into something murky like fog and seeing the lighthouse beam reminding me that land is still there, stable and strong and the heart of everything I love lives there on that gorgeous shore.
Sometimes when I see, hear, or read about other people’s relationships I can’t understand how they aren’t working out. I feel like I’m one of those obnoxious people in “Brigit Jones’ Diary”. The married ones who always give Brigit a hard time for not being married. Those are the people I could not stand, but now I’m turning into one of them. I feel as if I can hardly relate because it seems so long ago. That’s another thing, Humboldt slows time down-I feel like I am in fairyland while I’m here. The whole situation sometimes makes me feel really old, and as if I have been here and doing this all my life. Which is nice surprisingly.

Maybe I’ll have something more philosophical and “writing-ish” at a later date…. Peace till then…

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Spilling...
Originally uploaded by skinnymalinkee.

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It's been a while...i'm finding i am in another writing hole. I want to write i just have nothing to write about. And when i force myself everything that comes out is shite. I suppose i could be utterly boring and write about what's going on in my life. Well there's a little tib bit i could share:
I write to a lifer at Pelican Bay state prison through a program on campus. I have not recieved any correspondance back; i grow increasingly anxious about it everyday. His introductory letter was not what i expected, only because i had no what to expect from an inmate. I think secretly deep down i thought it would say stuff about killingand raping people. Rather the letter was eloquent and the hand writing superb. Goes to show how deep stereotyping runs.

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Do you ever get so scared all of a sudden because you feel your turning into your parents day by day and it seems unstoppable? It's not that i dont lvoe my parents and consider them great people-it's just one learns the qualities he/she does not like. Then when you've found out that those same qualities have been instilled in you it's scary becuase you always promised yourself you would be different. More on this soon...

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The lantern lights are casting that pink grapefruit light again in our room. This time the open window lets in the cold arctic air being blown along the polar jet stream. I’m wrapped up in a gray blanket, sitting-my legs stretched out crossed in front of me on our double bed. My fingers walk along him restlessly. I wonder sometimes what they would do if they weren’t joined to my hands. The murmuring television sounds from the living room filter through the thin walls. It smells like breathing and linens. He’s propped up on one elbow, and he smiles at me. I remember. What we talked about and what we did. More reassuring though are the seal-like eyes that are looking at me. I have never seen the woody eyes look like this before. It might be the lighting and the tone of the face they are set in. No I have noticed them before-they are something new from the past couple of days. I go over it all again, everything is calmer now like gentle autumn sunsets. In the end it has produced a new perspective. Now when I look at him I feel like I have dug something jewel studded out of a cobwebbed mine that I already excavated a long time ago. I suppose I am enjoying the moths that it seems to awaken in my tummy. I seem to be sleepier now; as if all there was to do was lie here and eventually just fall asleep.

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i literally dont know what to write...im completely freaked out about where my life is going. The only thing that makes sense is the way i feel when i get home after work or school and he's there. It's like all i need is him and us and going places. Honestly it feels like all i need is something that simple. Everything else im doing doesnt really make any sense at all. I have no idea where im going with this place, the things im doing. And the more i go froward trying to just work through it to get to some idea of what i want the more i am confused. Im devoting myself to someone, so i guess i need to devote myself to something? It just seems that everytime i try to i fail. Nothing comes naturally to me...nothing sparks so much passion in me to want to work at it. I just like everything, i dont love one thing enough. i need a calling, i need a passion, i need a gift, i need to get over myself.

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I've never had this feeling before. I mean I've had times where I didn't feel like I was really walking around, times I felt like it wasn't me and I was watching TV or something. My brain had that whole "someone else do the thinking for you" thing. But this is different, I actually feel like I cant tell if I am awake or not. Maybe when it settles in I'll realize I'm awake, this is all real he's there looking at me and making me laugh. Right now I feel like when I walk home he wont be there that I was asleep the entire time. I don't feel quite to aware as I normally do and I wonder why that is. Maybe I just need to do something really physically rigorous to wake my body up and translate the energy to my mind. He says he feels the same way though. I know I'm happy, there's nothing I am worried about its just I am in a complete state of shock. I had been waiting so long that I just became used to the waiting. And now that I don't have to anymore, and that place of waiting is empty, I have to wait for something to settle in there and make me believe. Maybe when I get used to him being here with me all the time it will settle in...We shall see....

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He said, "Hey does anyone feel comfortable sharing some sort of personal experience like this?"
I had no idea what he was referring to. I hadnt been listening. But the older woman in the class (who always talks mind you) raised her hand. He picked on her and she told us that she used to do a lot of folk dancing. One time she danced from 9 till 5 in the morning without hardly stopping and the next day she was tired but she felt complete love for everyone she talked to. How she felt as if after dancing she was the best person she could ever be.
I guess it interested me enough to pass along the little anecdote to my blog. I sat in class after and tried to think of a time when i felt similar. But i could remember anything specific just that i knew i felt that way at some point. I guess i felt happy because i loved everything not because i was just happy in general. Because i know i could say im happy in general all the time, like the mountain under the snow metaphor i used a while ago. But this is different. This is when you have uncontrolable joy, there's no other way to describe it. If anyone out there has some sort of specific experience like this i'd like to know.

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So I had time between classes today and I decided to go out to the quad and see if any local bands were playing. I could hear the echoes of someone’s voice on a microphone. As I got closer the voice seemed desperate, and pleading. I came down the stairs of founders and realized the voice was speaking about Jesus. The man talking stood with about five other people in front of a table. The quad it’s self was probably ¾ empty…some boys were sitting along the concrete benches, there were a couple of tables set up, and a group of typical Humboldt hippie folk sitting on the stairs. People walked through, some stopped and listened most however seemed to be avoiding people with flyers and scurried off to their next class.

I sat down on a bench for a moment to listen to what the preaching was all about. The man (I decided he must be the preacher at the church) was talking about his story of converting to baptism. He said things like, “I used to hate Christians, and I used to party all through college”. To this the hippie group applauded which surprised me. He then talked about how he heard this song at a “pagan dance party in Daytona Beach Florida” which he claimed told him his life did have meaning and to seek the lord.

I was listening a little and then a man in a blue Hawaiian shirt approached me he said, “How ya doing?”
”I’m alright.” I smiled politely.
“Would you be interested?” he handed me a pamphlet. I hardly had time to look at it, I didn’t really want to deep down, and I was just about to say no thanks but he said, “You know Jesus loves you.”
“So I’ve been told.” I looked around uncomfortably; the man’s eyes were so intense as if he was trying burn the fear into me. If he weren’t so well dressed he could have passed for a homeless person on the 3rd street promenade. His voice had this ounce of craziness in it, resembling the “poor souls” as my British mum might call them wandering the streets.
“He cares about you. He can save you, guide you and give your life meaning.” He said leaning over so that he seemed to be bending at the waist towards me. I forced myself to look at him, but I couldn’t keep his gaze and I fiddled with my scarf. I said an uncomfortable, “okay.”
“He can love you deeper then any man could.”
This made me feel really strange. It was a little creepy, I didn’t like the way it seemed to roll of his tongue, and it was as if he used it to pick up girls in a bar. I didn’t say anything hoping he would get the hint and walk away. We were silent for a moment and he said, “He’ll be there when you’re ready.”
I said “thanks”, trying to force the tone that accused him of being crazy out of my voice. He walked away.

When I had time to think about this after hurrying out of the quad I decided that I didn’t like that the hippie’s were attacking the preacher, I thought that a true genuine hippie would be more tolerant. I also didn’t like that he used the word pagan in his description of a dance party. It sounded like such an ancient Christian thing to say about anyone not Christian. I liked that my school had allowed them to come out and preach. I believe my summer experiences and my growing awareness about religion in general over the past few years had made me curious to stay there and listen. I can definitely say that I am more positive towards people and their faiths then I have ever been in my entire life. And I know my encounter with the Hawaiian shirt man could have been a lot worse if it were earlier in my life. I told myself that he was only preaching his belief and that I must respect it. And after all that deliberation I still had the feeling that I have in all my encounters with religious folk throughout my life that he wanted to say “you’re going to hell”. I know that in the Christian faith I’ll go to hell because I have not accepted Christ and God and other stuff, (that I’m lacking the exact knowledge in) even if I am a good person. It automatically makes me feel inferior to Christians, like I’m not good enough. I’m not good enough for these Christians and I’m stupid for not believing. Does this mean I’m never going to be good enough for others I met this summer, maybe even him if I don’t accept God? I don’t want to ask because I’m scared of what the answer will change. I love him though, there is nothing for it I just do. I think I am too young to decide anything about higher powers. And for all I know my thoughts about these folks are false. If you refer back to my Aug 4th and June 8th posts I am still questioning everything, I am still learning. At the moment I would rather learn about all religions and then perhaps take from each one to help guide me in this life- I’m looking for my path to wherever I’m going. Isn’t that what life is all about the journey?

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A Couple Of Things From The Past Week...

Ominous
Originally uploaded by skinnymalinkee.

-When you dip below the clouds life pretty much becomes agonizingly routine in the worst ways... For a couple of months i've been high above them where most people strive to be. And i still go there, a lot, and a week from today i'll go there everday. But below is still there being ever so much like four white walls and stacks upon stacks of paper.

-Only a week, i imagine the airport all the time. There's butterflies and smiles and i'll never let go.

-From the Buddhist perspective one should not devote himself or herself
entirely to one person but to every person. Single devotional love is the
ultimate form of attachment, and in buddhism there should be no attachment to any one thing becuase everything is fluid. When you devote yourself to one thing the scariest moment is when the feeling is not reciprocated. Then love often can be transformed into chaotic confusing rage, even violence quite easily.

-You and me flying on a jetplane, dont know when we'll be back again.

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I walk to school everyday, and on this day it was foggy as usual, the treetops disappearing in the mist. My hands hurt from the cold; I can’t seem to stay warm here. Sitting in the big lecture hall I was restless, I couldn’t focus on the video about Buddhist monks. Usually the topic would envelope me, usually I would be fascinated with trying to understand how completely different their lifestyle was. In fact the only thing that I seem to have comprehended at all from that class was breath deeply. 10 deep breathes. I went to lecture for Mapping Sciences, and thought I was going to be sick all over the floor-the more I go to that class the more I feel like I’ve reverted month, years to my former high school self. Shy, insecure, feeling completely inferior. The more I go the more I want to run and never come back, but now I can’t. Now I can’t just half-ass it. I’m supposed to enjoy all of this more then anything-and the only thing I enjoy are the things that have nothing to do with this mapping sciences crap. What if I get out of this place and I haven’t retained anything?

I sat and I called my voice of reason. I took ten deep breathes and I listened to him tell me that he loved me, I reminded myself that was all that mattered. It helped to keep my mind from shattering. Later in lab we met in the courtyard, it’s one of my favorite places. You wouldn’t believe the quiet there, it’s enclosed and at the highest point on campus. Zoë and Colin sat down next to me. Zoë who is my lab partner of choice in that class, and Colin who I have history with but am now quite over and friendly towards again. I was just sitting there talking to Colin, asking him about his climb up Shasta, trading weekend stories- pretty normal chitchat for Colin and me when Prof. Cunha asked us all to gather round the transit thing for measuring something or another-something everyone else seemed to grasp but I had no idea about. So up Colin got, ready to show off all the knowledge he keeps in his damn big head. Zoë, whom I recently met in lab and have become buddies of sorts, practically grabbed my elbow and asked, “Are you trying to hit on that Colin guy?” I said, “Who Colin,” giggling under my breathe at the irony of it all, “No. No way”. I said. She laughed a little, and then she said, “well if you were, I was gonna say your going about it all the wrong way.” And she went and stood at the center of the group. I was sort of caught off guard by this last comment. It only seemed to add to my need to repel my damn toast and strawberry jam. I stood there, trying to focus on the Professor as she diligently explained how to triangulate our position. But all I could think of was, wow do I look so young to you Zoë? Compared to you, do I stand out that much? Is this what I looked like all through high school, this clueless kid that everyone wants to cradle and protect? I could hardly believe that she was telling me I was going about hitting on people the wrong way? I realized she had no idea about me. None whatsoever. And I had no idea about her, as I was soon to find out.

After lab, I was sitting on a bench in front of Founders Hall looking out to the bay and the bottoms where the fog still earth seemed to be sopping up the fog. Zoë sat down next to me, we talked a little, and I asked her when her next class was. She said “Oh I don’t have one, I’m just waiting for my boyfriend, well my now ex-boyfriend to come by. Yeah he just broke up with me yesterday.” I said “oh my gosh why?” She said, “I actually don’t know, he didn’t tell me.” At first I was still suffering inferiority complex, I felt like I was 15. I wanted to say, don’t you dare let him get away with it, and don’t you dare. Late I would wish I had said “I know why he did, especially if he didn’t give you a reason, it’s because he’s damn scared”. I vaguely remembered all the feelings I felt last February when it had happened to me in much the same way. I also thought about how this must have influenced her random choice of comments earlier in the day. I wanted to laugh again at the irony of it all.

I wanted to tell her about my experience, tell her that I was madly in love with someone now. That back in February I was confused, hurt, how I forgave and forgot and eventually loved again. I wanted to be the older and wiser one; I wanted my security back, my damn newfound confidence back. But it didn’t come. I just sat there and listened to her, and then she got up and left. I checked my phone to see if any messages had come in from the person that mattered most, from the only thing that made any sense.

Now I’m infested with anxiety, I feel sickish anytime I am in class, I keep going though. I know I’ll be ostracized if I just give up. But I’ve never felt in such a hole in my entire life. What am I doing here? What the hell am I doing?

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"The sexual excitement we feel is related to the way we look at the other person. To clarify the notion of the objectness viewing position, we shall contrast it with another position referred to as tenderness. When we feel tenderness we look at the other's body as a whole. Our gaze spends most of its time in the head area and within the body boundaries. However, this position involves penetration for the other beyond the object characteristics. The body is experienced as a whole rather than as separate parts. It is perceived as embedded in its natural environment. For example, the reflection of sunlight off the hair, the grass one is sitting on, or the creek that one is near, all facilitate the tenderness orientation. There is a desire to place one's arms around and embrace rather than to use one's arms as instruments to maipulate the other." -James Barrel

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So if you dont want to read a sappy lovey dovey thing, dont read this-fair warning:
I always get what I least expect in dreams. This one the morning of September 12, 2005 was particularly nice. I was at home, walking around the Marina Del Rey parking lots. The parking lot was lit by the street lamps and it seemed to be misting like Humboldt might, so the light came down in sprinkling shafts to the wet pavement. And as dreams do I was suddenly inside a huge dome, much like a barn that had been built over the parking lot. Hundreds, no thousands of people were waiting in line for something. There were fake flowers all over the walls. I decided to leave, not being much of a person for weddings at this time in my life.
So I turned walking opposite the direction of the line. And I saw you. But it was as if I had seen you everyday for the past three weeks, and I walked up to you and simply asked, “What are you waiting in line for?” You replied, “I’m waiting to kiss the bride.” As if everyone in the world waited in endless lines to kiss the bride. I said, “Oh boy, well in that case I’m getting out of here.” I turned and kept walking.
Somewhere in the depths of my mind I saw you step out of line, you were wearing a brown 1970’s prom suit and your hair was longer then I remembered last. I realized I had never seen you with hair that length before, and that I had not seen you in three weeks. And I turned 180 degrees in a 180’Th of a second and ran back over to where you were. How could I just walk up to you and be so oblivious to it, I felt like I was in shock. However I couldn’t find you because you had already left. But then I saw you, sitting on a bench. It was dim, like candle light. Your face was in your hands and a bouquet of flowers upside down at your feet. I knelt beside you and pushed your hands away and quickly pulled your lips to mine. We kissed intensely, and I pulled you over on to the floor on top of me, never letting go of you for a moment. You held me close to you so that I could hardly move. It was like in Chocolat when the mother thinks her daughter is aboard the flaming gypsy boat. She literally tackles the little girl to river bank and squeezes her so hard it hurts, but nothing else matters, not even the mud they are in. It felt the same for us. We were both alive; we had both not seen each other in ages. So in this moment of meeting again, there was neither time nor space it was just us, as cliché as that might sound.
We lay like that kissing each other and holding each other not caring about all the people still waiting in line to kiss the bride. Callan randomly came over dressed in a Santa outfit. She brought us caramel fudge, we thanked her, and I pulled the covers up over us and I wouldn’t let anyone in. We looked at each other laughing and eating caramel fudge and I wouldn’t let anyone in.

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IS THERE NO PLACE IN THIS WORLD TO ESCAPE FROM FREAKING ADVERTISING! COULD YOU PLEASE STOP POSTING SILLY PHONEY COMMENTS ON MY BLOG, WITH AN ATTATCHED ADD LINK. THANK YOU!

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A crazy thing has come up, a crazy and possibly the best thing of my life has come up...you'll have to deal with my uber abstractness today-any questions just ask!

First things first I must take things lightly-like how they pump air into the ice cream, in the end that's all your paying for. What I mean to say is if I am too serious about this, if I am too heavy I will be too worried i will work myself into the anxiety state my family is known for, I must think of the air-the lighter side of things. For in the end that is what i am doing this for- the good parts!

Then there's this… a continuation of my thoughts over the past few weeks, in fact ever since he left.

Looking for you light I went out:
It was like the sudden dawn of a million million suns
A ganglion of lightnings for my wonder
Oh Lord of Caves, If you are light
There can be no metaphor

It's a Yogi's poem, about his meditation experience. Shiva-Ultimate Yogi, God of destruction (and creation) in Hinduism. The rebel who above all upholds that all the physical shit is not worth anything, while all the mental consciousness is all that your effort should be fruit off.

So these damn lectures are all coinciding with my life's happenings, is someone trying to tell me something here? Am I too set in the physical, too unexposed since birth to notice?

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So I’ve recently been told I’m stronger then I think I am, by someone I deem to be the strongest person I know. Is he right? I happen to trust him with every ounce of trust I have. You know I guess I believe him. I mean this past week my computer's hard drive failed, as in it is official I’ve lost everything but what's posted on my blog and my photo pages. It's amazing how hard it is to not function without it, but I’m making do on my roommate’s computer. Probably the main thing is that I’ve been cut off from the light, and only seeing it in the distant undergrowth of the dimmed forest is enough to make someone crazy chasing after it. When its there, the color comes back, the color of his eyes comes back to me. I feel like I’m half alive, like nothing makes sense when I’m not in its divine wake. But I’m still going...I haven’t just fallen over, I think it's because I know someday soon it'll come back to me. Secretly I wish for it to just suddenly catch and set the world ablaze again. I’m vaguely reminded of something from The Silmarillion- the two trees of the Valar. I can’t ask that of certain people though…it’s an intense thing to think about. Would hardly be fair, not something people do. But the more I think about the alternative-the waiting, the longing and the ultimate scary part the getting used to shadows-the more I’m frightened that I’m not as strong as he says I am. I just don’t know what to do. Is it right now? Is it too soon, is it too late? Can I go on? Is it a good idea for the physical, for the mental? Yet ...It’s dark, I’m cold…and I love him.

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I wake up and I reach out and there’s nothing there, but the light seems to remind me that there is something to get up for, even if it’s only to mean I’m one day closer to the unspecified date when I can reach out to touch the warmth again. I go to my classes, which I’m supposed to love, which I’m supposed to throw myself into completely and I can hardly sit through a lecture with out thinking about other things. I have never had such a hard time focusing, or analyzing or just doing basic work and things that used to come so naturally to me. It’s as if I have lost all capacity for basic comprehension. It’s actually kind of freaking me out. Hopefully it’s just because I can’t seem to get back into the swing of things, and eventually I will be able to. Last year it was like “whoo hoo I’m at college”, now its just like “go back to work”. No more excitement.
Plus I feel like I’m living for something much more important that flies high above everything I am doing here. It’s as if I am living in two worlds. One being the basic physical realm-school, eating, sleeping, shitting… and the other the mental and spiritual realm of this new thing I’m exploring and relishing and ultimately the greatest thing ever. Yet I am broken off from this new realm because of distance and now I have to squat in the physical places of life of stuff that doesn’t seem to shine the way it used to. I don’t even know if this makes any sense but I’m just thinking about Plato and Socrates and crap my Philosophy of Sex and Love Professor’s been talking about.
Anyways around the time I’m about to go to bed and apartment quiets down I develop insomnia-type qualities. I lie awake for an hour or two before finally falling asleep. I get a song stuck in my head and it keeps me up because I’m repeating it over and over. I try to figure out what the reason is I’m here at school for is? I seem to need to be told it over and over in order to make being away from the light worth it.
I also find I am questioning my entire focus at school. Geography, a subject that I do really love, is it right for me? Why did I choose it again? What will I do with it again? What the hell is going to happen to me in this physical world?

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“A mind that is stretched by a new experience can never go back to its old dimensions.” –Oliver Wendell Holmes

I think I may have just been filled up with so much light I didn’t know anything else to do but just to let it completely flood me. I closed my eyes and the light was still there, the sort you see at the bottom of a choppy swimming pool. I cried from the immensity of it. And you were there, with me, you were the lamp holder. It was probably the greatest experience I have ever been apart of. My World Religions Professor said that many people believe that love is the highest spiritual experience one can have. And it makes sensef for religious/spiritual folks to believe that, I know for sure it's the greatest thing i have ever felt. It was pretty cool, the coincidental coinciding of this lecture and this experience...

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So i thought by now i would be able to post something really insightful...except my computer really did die. As in it wont load anything but a screen that says please restart your computer over and over and over. So i have been without any of my music, pictures and most importantly writing. So right here right now i want to thank my Blog for keeping some of it for me, incase i can never get the damn machine to work again.

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Prism in the window

Prism in the window
Originally uploaded by skinnymalinkee.

I AM ALIVE!!!!!! yes im so alive....
sorry been so long since my last post, i've hardly had time to look at pencil and paper. I just started school, had to move out, and move in. has been rather crazy. but alas i am alive, and its wonderful. when i have a chance i'll sti and write, but i only just got the internet setup. things are moving along just slowly. and for some reasons i wish it would just hurry up and get to a specific day that hasnt even been dated yet. anyways more lata....
(in the meantime this is a picture of the prism hanging in our dining room window, quite lovely at sunset)

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August 5, 2005

I just finished reading The Magicians Nephew and the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe from the Chronicles of Narnia series in less then ten hours. They are releasing the movie versions this winter and I wanted to have read them before hand. Why oh why did I not read them when I was younger. Yet at the same time I think I know why, I would have become frustrated with them, as I did so many times now until I reminded myself they are supposed to be like one giant old fairy tale. Real fairy tales, the way they are supposed to be. Like the Grimm’s, or Anderson. Then I didn’t mind so much, and I sent my thanks to Mr. Blatz once again for his Mythology and Folktales class my senior year of high school. I appreciated a lot of the major themes and characters more because they are so classical. Also the similarities between Tolkien and Lewis are incredibly close, and no wonder, the crazy men were in a damn writing club for so many years it only makes sense.

Since being here allows for so much spare time we always have either the radio playing or some CD playing filling the quiet empty space with something other then our occasional laugh at how funny sitting in an empty apartment reading Harry Potter and Narnia is. Not having a car will prove to be a difficult and limiting thing. Anyways back to the point. I realize now that all these song’s lyric make so much sense once you’ve experienced what they are singing about for yourself. Why did I ever think they were sappy and silly and so beyond reality when I was younger? Because now I realize they are all true. Incubus’s “Wish you were here”, Al Green “Let’s Stay together”, 10,000 Miles by Mary Chapin.

August 6, 2005

I think it’s happening again. Like last time. But I think I’m safer now, it’s safer to do now. I’m letting myself out completely again. I think I might have been doing this all along in this relationship and I just didn’t know it. Ever since what last year? Anway I have said many times before when I begin to love something or I begin to open up completely I tend to be quite passionate and let it all out, no holding back. This means complete honesty and effort on my part, and it comes so naturally for me to do that, there is hardly anything holding me back. And since I feel like I have let myself out so completely with this person especially recently its proof of complete comfort and complete love. And now I think its more mutual then other past experiences. So in that way its safer. I have more to say about this eventually.

So I picked up Sue Monks Kidd’s The Secret Life of Bees again. I like reading things a second time through, reminds you of why you loved it so much in the first place.
“ …And wondered how he could stand me. In one short morning I had exhibited insane laughter, hidden lust, pissy behavior, self-pity and hysterical crying. If I’d been trying to show him my worst sides, I could not have done a better job than this.”
“Otis pressed his forehead to the heart, standing there the longest of them all, head to heart, like he was filling up his empty tank.”
“I have noticed that if you look carefully at people’s eyes the fist five seconds they look at you, the truth of their feelings will shine through just for an insant before it flickers away.”
“That’s because May takes in things differently than the rest of us do…when you and I hear about some misery out there, it might make us feel bad for a while, but it doesn’t wreck our whole world. It’s like we have a built-in protection around our hearts that keeps the pain from overwhelming us. But May-she doesn’t have that. Everything just comes into her-all the suffering out there-and she feels as if it’s happening to her.”
“Did you know that there are thirty-two names for love in one of the Eskimo languages? And we just have this one. We are so limited, you have to use the same word for loving Rosaleen as you do for loving a Coke with peanuts. Isn’t that a shame we don’t have more ways to say it?”
“Have you ever written a letter you knew you could never mail but you needed to write it anyway?”

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July 27, 2005

Too many questions. You’re flying too high. I like the sound of a match being lit. I like when you fold hot laundry and the next day its still warm. I like the bruises on my knees. The pictures that I tacked up on my wall are pulling my eyes out slowly it seems. I wish they wouldn’t.

July 31, 2005

I’ve again proved that you always fear what you do not know. I attended my first bible study, not because I wanted to convert, but because I wanted to understand what all these people were talking about, where all these people get their strength. I never really thought it would be scary, but I didn’t think it would be so relaxed either. I realized I could apply a lot of what I read in the bible to my life, but I could also do the same thing using literature and history and other peoples stories and my own. We read a passage that talked about how even though all the crops were dead and there was no water if you kept faith in God you would get through the rough times. It’s just a matter of getting though the wall you hit. I don’t know if I believe in God but I do know if I keep faith in myself and I keep anxiety attacks at bay by not worrying and breathing with my “yogi breath” I can get myself thought things too. I don’t know if I really a bible as much as I just want books, mythology and people to teach me what I know. To help and guide me on my way. But either way I guess it is a good guide for people and a great way to learn lessons and apply them. The only problem is that its all relative and ones perception of a passage or comprehension might be different then another’s, and sometimes that can be dangerous as well as glorious.

On another note I’m driving along Interstate 5 freeway on my way back to the redwoods I missed so much. Except its funny, every time I stay in some place for too long I build new things and then I just have to leave again. Time does not stop, life does not stop. It just teases you gives you just enough time to get something great going and then everything has to change again. I feel like I left one of the most important things I built behind, and I thought I would die from dehydration I cried so much. But I thought about what I had learned this summer, to be positive, that there is such a thing as fate and everything does happen for a reason. I know that it will be all right, and what the hell they’ll visit soon enough. And there’s so much good in what I have taken with me from these places I have left. And I can hardly help but think of a particular everlasting smiling face and I get all warm and happy inside. It helps; I guess it’s the smiling face that’s my strength right now. And the knowledge that everything will turn out all right in the end.

August 2, 2005

I’m in my first apartment. Nice and cheap. Nice and cold, nice and creaky. Heather and I refuse to sleep in our designated rooms, even though my mattress arrived today. Too strange still. She’s reading Harry Potter, and intermediately playing with a lit candle, could be bad. Today we walked from the Southern part of town, arms and backpacks filled with groceries back to our apartment on the North Western edge. It’s a good twenty-minute walk. We looked in St. Vincent DePaul for old furniture, no luck. We did get a couple of teacups, cute and blue, for god knows what reason. But the cold has made us quite the tea drinkers; perhaps they’ll come in handy. James comes next Tuesday. Smiles. My dad left yesterday and now we are just sitting in the emptiness. But I like the place; our building is one of the only ones on the street with flowers in front of our porch. Red and pink poppies, some wild sweet peas and foxgloves are flourishing there. While walking we saw Founders Hall in the distance on top of its mighty old hill. The Arcata Bay away in the distance, muddy and glistening. The fog rolling back towards the ocean through the trees beyond.

August 3, 2005

So we’ve been spreading out our activities, knowing that if we do too much in one day there will not be anything to do the next. It’s so warm today; the fog lost the battle with the hot inland air. So the sky is blue, real blue. And the hum of the city is gone, now its quiet, all I can hear is the neighbors occasionally and the birds. I had forgotten peace like this. This morning I thought about attempting a short story. But I am frightened that if I start the one I want to, it will not be as great as is it could be because I am so out of practice with fictional writing. We’ll see, needs more developing.

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Fortune cookies
You may have to be patient now-think, listen and heed signs.
You have a reputation for being straightforward and honest.

I guess my dreams are just expressions of my anxieties. Lately events have played themselves out in my dreams how they might in real life, or how they could in a worst-case scenario. Recently sleeping next to somehow seemed to alter my sleep patterns. I was loosing my dreams; I could not remember them any more. So for a while I focused my energy on remembering them when I woke up in the mornings. Now I can catch glimpses of them and most of the time I don’t like what I’ve caught. Some days I’m allowed the chance to doze. I can push my mind to a strange place, right when I’m going in and out of sleep and awake. If I manage the delicate line, I can loose the feeling in my arms and legs. As if they are sort of floating above where they rest, or as if they are not even there at all. I wonder if that is what angels feel like? I think I may have developed a thing for the idea of angels and fairies, or perhaps its for thier wings per say. At work the parrots fly all over the house and their wings are small but they produce quite a lovely noise in the air. I think it might be what wings symbolize, or what people believe angels and fairies symbolize. Another wish I tend to make (along with two moons) is for fairies and angels to be real, some how I feel like it would make the world less grey sometimes.

Who am I wishing to?

Quotes from The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
“To this day, I find it hard to gaze directly at people like Hassan, people who mean everything they say.”
“He was so goddamn pure, you always felt like a phony around him.”

Last night on the 10 freeway the earth rushed by under the wheels of our car. Outside the window I could see LA’s shadowy rooftops and treetops stretching out in a swirl of city lights. The moon, full and tinted yellow from the smog, was the only thing constant. It seemed to be racing us across the city, never pulling ahead or falling behind just there constantly running with us, maybe even guiding us.

Jelaluddin Rumi (1207-1273) master poet, these are some quotes from his Islamic manuscripts.
The minute I heard my first love story I started looking for you, not knowing how blind that was. Lovers don’t finally meet somewhere; they’re in each other all along.
Let the beauty we love be what we do. There are hundreds of ways to kneel and kiss the ground.
Birds make great sky-circles of their freedom. How do they learn that? They fall, and falling, they’re given wings.
The morning wind spreads its fresh smell. We must get up to take that in. That wind that lets us live. Breathe, before it’s gone.
The ground’s generosity takes in our compost and grows beauty. Try to be more like the ground.

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I wonder what is actually going on, what I am actually feeling and see if I am just labeling it wrong. How do you know? It has been a good summer, I guess if I had to pick reasons why I could tell you but I don’t think I need to really.

Sometimes I wish for two moons. Since I was little I always thought that if there were two moons the earth might be pulled quite differently. Last night I wished for two, so that I could read by moonlight coming in through the window. I remember full moons and unveiled stars at my sleep away camp lighting everything up silver. Moon shadows and foxtail. I think it’s one of my favorite things in the world, and living in lighted vicinity doesn’t allow for much chance to see such a thing. But I think everyone should. It’s one of those images I can see clearly just as I can see my backyard or the dashboard of my car.

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July 6: I am worried for august. I am worried for them that are eyes. I am worried that they will become sore, that they have not been. I am living, I am looking beyond and I see what I think I need, what I will get, what I want, what I don’t. I am tying to make everything fit, like packing a damn suitcase.

July 7: I am worried for august but now I’ve been reminded and I’ve remembered that it will all be all right. Whatever happens happens. I wonder what it will be like; I mean I wonder what it will feel like to leave again. If it will be the same as before, if I will readjust the same. There will be so much to distract me at first, and then I’ll settle and I’ll think and I’ll draw conclusions from the depths of the well. I kind of wish I could just go away sometimes, not even to Humboldt, which seemed to be the thing I needed most in my life. But somewhere new see if it can open yet more doors. Help me figure out what to do what to say. How to be better, how to be I and be better and how to keep all my principles and please everyone too. Figure out what I want in life; figure out where I am going in life.

July 8: (Addressed to 'Jaimito'), I keep realizing how amazing people are, so much complexity, how you never really know more then 65 percent of a person I would say. I look up to more and more people everyday I find. And there’s only one of every person, making everyone pretty unique. I realize how much greater people seem to be then I am. I want to be better. I haven’t met everyone in the world, but I think you are probably among the best people I have met, and will ever meet. I mean you are good. I guess like an earn filled up with holy water or something. I feel like you can do nothing that would be unforgivable, I think that’s why I feel safest with you. And a while ago I used to think it was creepy and a little phony and of course I think differently now.
In a conversation with Anna a long time ago, that I printed and pasted in my scrap book I said “perhaps that’s what love, in all its varied forms is. You and the other are the only ones who know exactly what the specific bond you both share is.” And it’s true. And most of the time the two people don’t even know themselves. I don’t know why I love Olga deep down; I mean I can find things that I love about her, but still there’s that unexplainable thing that pulls you towards people. It doesn’t matter what they look like, what they do, what they believe, where they are from, you just love them. No one else can even come close to guessing why either.
I know that feel like I could really fly, that you do help me with my wings. I like that this entire summer I have truly been myself, and your okay with that, just like Olga and Anna are.I wish I could see around the corner in front of me and understand my future. I’m walking the path walked millions of times before by people. Because everyone goes down this road when you have this quest.

July 12: I got up this morning having to think about how fast the end of summer has been creeping up. The reason it mattered lay right next to me. The end just Creeps up like the tide at night. No one sees it it just comes silently and washes everything away. On the way to work i listened to Death Cab For Cutie, I mean i actually listened but it pulled me back to humboldt. Instead of looking at the 405 i felt like i was looking at the 101 and the bay stretching out before me glistening in the sun, the redwood hills smokey in the morning. At work i typed the word 'total' so many times it looked as if it were spelled wrong. And i realized i have only 5 days of work left. I only have three weeks of LA and all the people in it left. I feel like i havent really seen anyone long enough to be satisfied. What will i do that weekend, when im packing? I dont think my cheeks will be dry thats for sure, although i hadnt thought i would cry till i almost did in the car today. I hate things like that, things you hate and love at the same time. I hate leaving LA but I love Humboldt. I hate that i cant make a decision, i hate that i cant decide to give up something that could be something just because i want to live as much as i can in my young years.

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i have alot to write about, im just not sure how to approach it at the moment. it needs consideration i think. i can't splatter it here without precaution. mostly i have no idea what i even want to say. I think it might be one of those things, the ones where you just start writing, picking one of the zillions of things you have to choose from and you develop it in in the writing. and it all unravels like yarn in front of you. I iron a lot of this out when i practice this sort of "figuring out". i just wish i could at the moment, instead i've waisted my time explaining that i want to write, not actually writing and i have to return to faxing and typing.

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Waking up this morning was strange, the first thing i thought about was going back to humboldt, what it will be like.

I feel like i've been so on the go, more then i have ever been in my entire life that i'm not even living it becuase i have no time to really sit back and think about it. I feel like this is what a transient might feel like except i'm staying in one place. I just keep moving and i am never home unless to sleep or for 'other activities'. Yesterday was the first day in about two weeks i have been at home alone. I picked up a Kite Runner, read two pages and called Olga. I just couldnt handle sitting there. About a month and half ago i would have just sat there for hours reading but i couldnt handle being there alone not doing something with someone. Last night i went to bed at 10 too and slept what 8 hours which i see is the best thing i could have done on a designated alone night.

My life at humboldt was so laid back and it ahs completely turned around.

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All I can remember sometimes are the ways people look at you. Rusty green darts I try to hide from, but i cant and i dont want to. It is funny how you think that’s it, there are no more safe arms to hide in, but they are all around you. It's funny how you have those gut feelings that something is going to happen between people. I am actually one of those people who denies everything and anything when it comes to myself in these sorts of situations. frankly im damn frightened of the consequences most of the time. and im trying so hard to just let it be, to not freak out and worry so much. whatever happens happens, and stuff is happening and im enjoying it more then i thought i would and i realize how freaking lucky i really am, how undeserving and evil i really am.

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I cant believe how fast summer is going, much faster then school. But i feel like the days themselves last more then 24 hours, but somehow i only use four of them to actually sleep. The rest of the time i'm doing things, working, hanging and other stuff...yeah. anyways i find myself sitting at my boss's computer thinking about the arrows i drew all over my foot, and how wierd it was that i feel asleep sitting up and counting pages and pages of the California Practice Guide to make sure i didnt miss any. It's interesting what happens to a body that is ill nourished and sleep deprived. You dont die you just kinda lag around forcing your eyes open becuase if they close your doomed to sleep. and when you do accidenlty fall asleep its so deep that you could be doing anything like flipping pages and you wouldnt know the difference. I've actually never not slept this much in my life. tis rather interesting. after work today i'll be going to do some laps in the pool that should be funny.

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Tom (pompous random dude) "theres a place for good in this world, a place for evil, but there is no place for ignorance."

My dad is standing sort of idley with his beer as we wait for the beef to cook, hes singing to Steeleye Span. I remember this band from when i was little. I can vaguely remember the words, and my dad tries to imitate thier accented voices. hes not doing very well but its funny.

So everyone comes back for the summer and everyone's a horny bastard? lol well thats fine with me.i worry too much, and today i sort of had revelations about life in general. basically how great it is and how im happy all the time now, cept of course when i get sad, but deep down im always good, always happy. Sometimes the sadness or hate or evil or whatever just coats everything, sometimes its so thick you can hardly see through. but its always there like a mountain under snow. solid. i trust in that. I have faith in that, thats what keeps me going. i have faith in myself now, i think it might be a first. i mean i guess to say i know its all going to be alright. i hope im doing things right... but someone recently told me just to follow your gut feeling. and ive been doing that and im standing by it-im going to follow what i feel is right at the time. ill jump, but ill take care, think before i do, listen to my insides. they have led me to this place in my life, and with help from my closest friends ill manage. im having fun and living and enjoying and thats all that matters.

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Zooooooom

Succulents
Originally uploaded by skinnymalinkee.

So i havent posted in a while, give me a break will ya. but yeah i havent, started working this week. Pretty boring stuff, not at all what i want to do in my life. but its income, a very welcome one at that. i actually feel like im getting stupider by the day doing 6 hours of tasks i hardly understand. then im out the rest of the afternoon into the night. I havent spoken to my parental unit for more then five minutes a day i think this whole week.
Last night was a much needed let go, splitting a bottle of hobo wine and cheap champaigne with your best friend and getting ass drunk is probably one of the best experiences you can ever have.
I wish i had more intellectual things to post about, but my brains sort of fried, and probably will be the next week or so. I actually had a lot of things i wanted to get out in writing, but ive been so busy with craziness that i havent been able to. hopefully soon....

In the meantimes enjoy this pic i took at the J. Paul Getty Museum, can you believe the colors of these succulents?

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Warmed like hands around a cup of tea.

(The inevitable entry about love and life in general)
This huge painting hangs on my wall, once I wanted it there because it kind of drew your attention away from everything else in the room. It’s called “I used to want, but now I don’t”. I’m scared what the room will look like its gone, Sometimes I suddenly take it down, or it falls off on its own. I always end up hanging it up again after a few minutes. Wanting entails long days of waiting. I remember it was so painful. It kind of drives you crazy, and I don’t know if I am strong enough despite what I say about how far I have come, I don’t know if I am strong enough to defend myself against it, and walk all over it. What you get for it is amazing don’t get me wrong, its just I don’t want to take the risk. Fear of loss of stability, for fear of change, for fear of things that happened happening again, and for fear of loosing. Maybe I have just been injected with this huge shot of patience, of understanding and knowledge and that’s what I am having a hard time grappling with, that I’m not actually afraid. More like I can sit and say when it happens it happens, and everything happens for a reason, or doesn’t for that matter. But if one sits back and lets life live itself then you don’t get anywhere, I suppose you have to take those risks to see if they are meant to happen or not happen and if so what reason caused them. Right now I am so enamored with how great life can be, it’s hard to think what I want to do first. I keep envisioning myself standing in this awesome light with my head thrown back and my eyes shielding something so brilliant it’s hard to stand in its wake. So I am just doing what seems best day by day with some general guidelines for the future with nothing set in stone. I will let my heart tell me what’s right when stuff is happening, no matter how cliché that sounds. But it’s the truth man, and it has been working so far.

(Thoughts on Faith)
I’ve been thinking a lot about faith recently, religion and what kinds of people it produces, who I am with out it. I guess I always thought I was pretty atheist. But sometimes I wonder if things could actually exist the way they do with out someone else’s influences. But at the same time why not? Who’s to say chemicals, hormones, science, and questioning “why” are not all side affects of our brains becoming to complex and advanced for our own good. But why did they do that? Actually recently I have become pretty agnostic. If there is an afterlife or some carrying on of consciousness after death then great, if not then we don’t know the difference anyways. For me it’s more about celebrating what we have now. That should be enough; I mean this life alone is like the greatest gift from wherever and why. I feel like its kind of a waste of precious time worrying about giving thanks on a weekly basis for it. Living a structured, strict and inhibited life because of it. Rather you have to grab everything you can; it’s the only way you’re going to learn. I understand that for some people it’s where they get their strength to go on. Sometimes I wonder if that is the reason I am so hopeless sometimes. But you know what when I was little I used to pray all the time even though some where deep down inside I knew that I didn’t believe in god. But nothing ever happened. I felt like because my prayers were not being answered praying was useless in the long run for atheist or orthodox. Everything is relative, what one person considers a sign could just be a coincidence. Who’s to say the answer you receive is actually the answer or not? I guess I just haven’t had an experience to make me believe otherwise. Don’t get me wrong magnificent things have happened to my friends and me and in the world but I’ve never thought they were related to a God-perhaps though that’s because I was raised atheist though.

Along with being raised atheist comes all of the negative input, which I am sad about. But with anything you learn as you grow you are taught mostly the negative, well in my family that was the general idea. I suppose the idea of people who are deeply religious believing I am going to go to hell because I am not part of their religion is one of the things I do not like most about religion. I do not and have never believed that I am a bad person for not believing in god or following the bible etc. and I will not tolerate anyone who feels that way about me. I think its just plain wrong. I will not give in to people and loose my own principles if a group decides to encroach on me. Having said that it makes me angry that I still sit there and say Jesus freaks. It is not fair. I believe in the Gold Rule (treat others how you want to be treated) and in this situation I break it every time. I want to be tolerant and I am not practicing it. I think also that it is just a part of society unfortunately prejudice lives in us all about everything no matter how tolerant and humane we believe we are. I can’t say accept all people’s faiths when I myself judge people by theirs. But there are some things that I cannot accept churches doing in the name of God. Missionaries have practically wiped out all indigenous cultures and beliefs I think that is wrong. However some have done well too. Some wars are carried out in the name of religion; again I do not like this. Church and state should be separated or equally represented in a country of religious freedoms. I feel when they become close religion is then being forced upon me. I also don’t understand where one draws the line between science and religion. Where does one say okay on this side of the line I am putting all the scientific facts like evolution, the world starting more then what 6000 years ago etc on this side? What is the deciding factor? And how can one believe some science and not others? Now I can understand people who say they believe God or their creator instilled evolution as a mechanism for change that really all science is just his creation, they don’t deny it they just believe there is something behind it

This leads me back to me. What do I believe in? Having taken mythology I feel like I can better judge where all religion came from. It is all so similar to mythology; all of its roots are mythological because the stories in major religions today are the same as they were thousands of years ago. Just now they are written down and people go to worship and fear instead of to learn by word of mouth lessons and things that mythology and folklore provided. I suppose if I am closest to any sort of religious living it would be paganism, because I believe the earth and everything is connected and needs to be protected and worshiped above anything else because its where we live. Whoever made it thank you, everyday I thank you, and I apologize for it not being well taken care of. Having said that I know most people would say “what a tree hugger”. And you know what I am one. I believe in that. I believe in the Earth. And it is true that when I look at it its hard for me to believe there is nothing behind all its beauty. When I look at my friends, when I look at my life it’s hard to believe it is actually in motion with out the influence of some one else as I have said. I feel like the churches could be used for great good, but somewhere along the way people forgot what they were actually going for. With any major organization though there are always faults. I feel also that I do not need a religion to tell me how to live my life and whether I am living it correctly and justly, I should just have the common sense and human decency to do that anyway. Instead of fearing the wrath of god and hell, I like to believe that I am doing something in the meantime to give my thanks to whatever and however we got here. That I am doing something in this lifetime for this life time, for its life here then worrying about how I am going to get into the next life. I have only just realized this within the past few years of my life. And I feel like this is where I am getting my strength; this is my strength and reason to get out of bed. To better myself for others, to betters others for the world. To better the world, make this life good for the next who come.

(I have more to say about this but I don’t think I am ready yet, I don’t think I have lived enough yet, but this begins to illustrate where is stand as of today.)

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I stepped in the hot milk and honey water and tried to sink down as far as I could in it. The tub was too shallow too small for me to go under. But I wanted to so bad, because it’s quiet under there, a cloistered quiet. A strange unfamiliar fear lapped up around my chin. This was not my aim. I sat up a bit. Foam sticking to my body. I reached to turn off the light. Faint and foggy twilight- the steam disrupted the darkness. In the gloom it should have been porcelain cold. I wanted to go to sleep but I knew I would wake up in chilled water- probably white rapids.

Then I drove, I drove all over the city where they say the angels live. I think I have met one or two. Actually you know what it’s safe to say more then a few. I think they are the people with the eyes that you can’t help but look at, and suddenly sometimes you are too afraid to. The ones you find in your pocket, the ones who you cant wait to see-who have gone away soon to return.

I licked my lips and tasted pineapple; I wiped them with the back of my arm. I hadn’t eaten pineapple in days. My hands still faintly smelled of white spruce. I thought about deep woods, deeper then the ocean, the woods of fairytales. I tilted my head to see if maybe I could hear the wind in the wheat, and I could almost hear it whispering something simple and sweet.

On the canals that the Abbot Kinney himself dug from the slime of Venice I was cradled by the bow of a small boat. Christmas lights in June. Warm enough except for the easterly blowing winds. And I thought about how far I have come, how I keep saying how damn far ive come.

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I feel sort of hollow. it's kinda of strange in that i never expected it, and i realize it is another spectrum i never thought could exist. even though I avoided the gamble it seems I still lost. i dont know where i stand now, i dont think there really is anywhere to stand really. no where that is level and the horizon definite and the path clear as water. the door slammed shut, without even a glow from underneath.

i dont really understand what my problem is and thats why i cant really fix it. I dont know why its not there, and i cant find it no matter how hard i search. and its the strangest thing to see someone so sad, all of it my doing. i have tried so hard to avoid such things, and on accident i stumbled upon it and i feel like my arms are loosing thier strength. it's like a cousin to depression. a strange little cousin, the quiet one. it's amazing how much things change....i wonder why i was so blind to think it wouldnt just by saying no. but i was blinded by my opitmism. and its done something horrible in the end. and i feel like everyone is now pulled in. and i didnt want that. i didnt even think of that. why is it that i keep ruining good things? why do i keep failing?

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They tell me they love me, and it does not do anything to me. That is disgustingly sad.

Partly I believe it is because of Colin for many reasons. If I met someone I would probably break and then that would be it. I would either die because I would realize he’s the first and only person I’ll love because I cant see it any other way, or I would push through it and realize there is someone else. FINALLY LET GO. Because there has to be right? He can’t be it right? He can’t be the last person? Maybe I should discuss this and get some reassurance- a knock on the head.

Even though Colin defines SCHMOE there were some qualities that he had, that no one I have ever met had. They’re inexplicable things that I cannot write down cause they would make no sense to me later anyway. But these things are the things I fell in love with, and the things I have not found in any other place. These are the things i am attracted to i have discovered.

I feel like my efforts, my new found keys are not going unnoticed; they just aren’t unlocking the right chests. IF IT'S NOT THERE, THEN ITS NOT THERE right? I guess for Colin, whatever he felt for me, if anything, just DROPPED. If that "entity attraction" is not there, then there is no forcing it. Becuase its just based on a lie and it wouldnt be fair to either person. So Colin stopped something that was not what he wanted, and tonight i stopped something before it started, to salvage friendship, which i gambled and lost with colin.

Yet why do i feel i am being so selfish? In both situations I am being selfish. I'm not okay with Colin and someone else-but if there were someone else for me I know that’s the only time I might be able to let go of him, because I would get so caught up. And then in the other situation there is this someone else, and it does nothing for me. In this person I do not see those certain things I randomly found in Colin and the relationship in general. It’s no one’s fault, its just how things turned out. SAD.

But now I am going to have to suffer this tunnel vision. Am not going to be able to love anyone else or even try to until I meet someone with these ways that I love?

A NARROW_MINDED way of searching out people. Now i'm blind and untouched by anyone else’s other qualities or advances so far. Tonight i have just put one down- But it was never there in the first place. I have always looked and tried to see it with every potential. But when I imagine what it would be like with them- I can’t. Nothings clicks. Tis not the same as what I see when I think about it with someone I’m attracted to. Sigh. It makes me so very sad and frustrated with myself that the click is not there...

I’ve never been in these sorts of situations till this year and they are changing me. I can feel it even now. Everything’s different from the last past years of my life. I never knew I could make someone feel a certain way by just being me. JEEZ what did I do? All I’ve ever been was downright honest and be me with this person. I guess I’m not that bad then eh? So I should stop putting on a show for other boys I meet? Actually now that I think about it because the narrow-minded attraction

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I am receiving an award. It’s the “Achievement in Disappointing” award.

I am beginning to wonder if I should cut myself off completely from my parents. I wonder if that would relieve something. I love them dearly, but I can’t be with them, I can’t rely on them any more its only setting me back. Am I being too drastic? Maybe it’s the fact that I can hardly stand to let them do things for me anymore because I have failed so miserably this past semester academically. It seems that’s all they want sometimes, and for good reasons.

In other fields of my life I sprang forward just as I have always wanted, and grew cynical and evil in some respects recently like aftershocks. But that is something I should not worry about right now.

Right now I am worried about how I will get from point A to point B with $30 in my pocket and $80 in the bank. Why didn’t I start sooner? Why didn’t I apply myself to fucking life sooner? Why can’t we all live in damn trees and eat pineapples all day in the sunshine. That is always what I say, and it is the symbol of my laziness, pineapples and sunshine. Today I can feel my stomach. Today I can feel my shoulders tense and that weird wraith like feeling is creeping through them. Why haven’t I looked for a job sooner? Why cant I get my act together still, and show everyone that I can take care of myself and do well? Why do I write this shit instead of doing it? I think by writing I am relieving myself and that is a good thing, but I’m letting myself off the hook. I have more to say about this but alas I must go and speak with my father about this whole thing.

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So I went to Venice beach today, I guess that’s something to write about. There's so many people infesting the beaches here, and the heat was sweltering. But I'm getting a sandal tan, my favorite kind.

You know when you get pictures back and you say to yourself "Is that what I look like?" That happened to me today.

Also I was sent to buy fish food for the pond, and in the store I wandered around looking at all the tanks. I knelt down to look at what must have been a Garibaldi. It stared me down. Its forehead jutted, out and mouth opened and closed grossly. It just sort of floated there like an orange astronaut in space. It’s eyes were dead to me, if you asked me what it was thinking I wouldn’t be able to tell you, because that’s the sort of eyes fish have. Cold marbles. Anyway it got me thinking I suppose about eyes in general and how much they can tell about a person. What they are thinking, if they are lying, if they’re flirting, if they’re nervous. I find I am usually enamored with people’s eyes and I think it’s the cause of a lot of my attractions to really random peoples. I wonder sometimes what my eyes are doing-who they are flagging down or shooing away. A lot of people have told me I express a great deal of emotion on my face, and my eyes are like the centerpiece. Generally I’ve been told I look anxious, insane or pissed off. I suppose I scare a lot of people away then. Although recently, having moved to northern California my facial expressions have softened. I can tell because I find my self-walking around smiling. It’s because everyone’s so damn nice up there. Everyone’s hello-grin whats up-grin. I swear if you smiled at some schmoe down here you get nothing but snooty surprised looks. I guess it suits the city well. Its so sprawled and things are so distant from each other, its only natural for its occupants to be the same way.

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no can do.

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i have been attempting postage all week, and it seems ive failed. i wonder why that is. i feel like everything i have written is kinda mundane, "already said type stuff." i guess i need something to shake my shoulders and throw me down, or touch my cheek and drag me from the mezzanine. i wonder if LA does that to a person, i wonder if am beginning to realize why i was stifled here in the first place, why i wanted to leave. and still why i do love it and i can always come back here and "know the ropes".

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Drop me off here on this perfect set of three. I have three wishes, more then three fates and three pearls that keep my head on.

The lighting in my room is grapefruit pink, the window lets in the southern California quiet. This is not really quiet I decide- there’s an unnatural hum.

All I can think about are the northern California beaches. All I can think about are the comfortable silences. All I can think about is how wrong this place looks without a certain someone, it’s like I am looking at an unfinished painting, like all the shadings missing. I am borderline actually sitting down and counting the days till I can see the people that matter most to me. Some it’s a few weeks, others a few months.

It’s amazing how much you realize people mean to you when they are no longer around, and the anticipation of seeing them keeps building and building till the pile gets so big you forget what you are looking at and you just keep going on.

I am worried that I have lost something in this fist year, that I am unintentionally endangering things that are very dear to me. Distance and time mix together like water and water and allow for change. It’s nearly unstoppable unless you move back to where you were, back to the previous home. And by then it could be too late anyway. It’s a risk, a horrible risk and the consequences dilute things, cause you to say “the good old times”. I have had two homes now, my house in LA, and the dorms in Humboldt. With each of these comes a set of the good old times that will never be again. That is the worst part about it all. It’s hard to say that it’s not inescapable unless you just chain yourself to one place, which nothing allows you to do, especially yourself. It’s hard to say it wont change because it’s a lie. And more then ever I am living. Humboldt let me live. I know it sounds horrible, that I am turning my back on LA. I wish I could say I wasn’t stifled here, But when I went away I grew up I suppose and I'm better for it. I don’t know where I’ll end up but can honestly say I'm genuinely happy in general. I did have some rough spots this past semester but I'm better for it, I wanted it so that I knew I was feeling something. And now I know I am capable of things. Makes one wonder what else they can do. How far they can go. I need that. I need to be able to do things on my own. The goal in the end is independence.

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This is the first time ive been able to post in days. and now im home, i was hoping i could post one more time from my desk in my dorm room, but ill never be there again, wont be able to look out the window at the quad anymore. we shoved everyhting in to my volvo, stored somethings and head off along the 299. when i got home i had aches and pains and sore brains from the stress of the week. when i lay down my eyes were wide and i was painicky about everything. i found myself missing people that i didnt want to miss in that way. i woke up and showered and thank god its sunny or else i think i would have had a really hard time. i showered and began unpacking and putting things places, but i kept saying that doesnt belong here. and the music, i played music and i was like no this music is humboldt. now i sit here posting think about how long its going to be till late july, how much i cant wait to go back and be back. but everythigns going to be different anyway, we wont all be so close anymore. thank god for heather living with me. cant wait for olga to come, things will settle and ill be so happy everythign will be worth it when i get to hang out with her.

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I went to see the HSU Calypso band saturday night. was one of the best things i have done here. Pulled not so reluctantly to my feet by the sight of a bunch people dancing. the music was excellent and i danced the whole night. i danced with a girl who later told me as she served me dinner in the j that she could sense i was stressed based on my energy ora i that i was unaware existed. i danced with ruby and the girls who all seemed to have the whole latin shuffle down, quite jealous. i danced with emo kid matt, so great. i danced with a couple of older folks. i just let the whole atmosphere envelope me till i was dizzy with confidence. i let loose i suppose and stopped caring about everything and the steel drum was like the boat i was ridining on.

In everything i do i try and see the worst. and then i look for the good. fear is the butter i coat everything with before it has even begun to manifest itself. my mum comes tomorrow. driving up in my car which i am excited to drive about humbolt in. i dont want to see my mother only becuase i know once i do, it will settle that i am actually leaving. that i will be in a dangerous state of returning back to some form of what i used to be. but there i go again spreading lashings and lashings of butter. really you are moving forward all the time. and now that i think about it seriously, i know that i will never go back. ive come so far with everyone and everythign old and new.
so at home i will have brought with me a chaotic entourage of the things i have picked up and just stuffed into a sack, still to be dumped out and sorted. if i ever oranize these things i might find the meaning of life. just kidding we all know the meaning of life is 42. but really i might just figure out what i learned this year. what i am still gonna keep building and tearing down over the rest of my life. but that current will always be there, underneath everything, and everday new boats are finding it and joining the old to create this massive fleet of ships that is the real me, that never changes.

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Through the Wheat

Through the Wheat
Originally uploaded by skinnymalinkee.

Just been day dreaming lately, and it seems this image keeps flooding me. Hand trailing in the wheat. Silence except for the wind in the tall grass.

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thought i would make a few lists
stuff to be excited about
1) school ending
2) going home
3) seeing my friends, family and beck
4) riding my bike on the beach
5) hiking in the santa monica mountains
6) eating at all my old places
7) getting a job
8) driving my car
9) august 1st and all my friends coming to stay with us

stuff im not so excited about
1) school ending
2) going home
3) getting a job
4) finishing with not so hot grades....
5) missing my friends, and my new home
6) stressing about apartment and expenses

im sure theres more things i could list. but those seem to be the things going through my mind right now. how much im going to to miss this place the people and the funny times. how much i find im longing for the old more and more to go with the new stuff like milk and cookies. im excited to realize i can have both.

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So schools coming to an end. ill be back home soon. away from everything that has become so dear to me. to return to things that used to be the only things dear to me. i dont think i will realize how much this year will mean to my life until later. ive started things now. my life didnt end after high school. im doing something now. ive met people, experimented, experienced, and just lived in a whole new world. i cant wait for summer, even though it's bitter sweet. I cant wait for august. I cant wait for next summer. I cant wait for the rest of my life to unfold.

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I wonder if I have written about this before? Well they say that smell is the strongest of the senses when it comes to connecting to a memory. But today I put my iTunes on random, which means its filtering through my whole library and through the stuff I wouldn’t normally listen to or have not in a while and songs keep popping up that I remember from a certain time in my life. I attach the music that is present when i am with a person or in a place. Like Pinback reminds me of Aleisha and founders hall. Kara’s Flowers and Tenacious d, Olga and cruising in her car. The Hippos are Anna and Manhatten beach. Switchfoot Colleen in Colin's car. Phish, Sara McLachlan Colin and his dorm room. The Velvet Teen and Matt. Heather and the New Radicals or Semisonic. Theres so many things I can connect to people and places its kinda crazy. It’s so horribly sad at times too. Bitter sweet, annoying that I cant just enjoy the music with out getting all sentimental and romantic. But sometimes it pulls me back to places i really do i want to remember and i am happy for that, i am happy that these times can be pulled out of me like weeds growing at the bottom of a pond.

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I stayed behind in biology today. The lab smelled like Thai food, having burned peanuts all morning for energy measurements. Either way one of the students stayed back too, he’s older must be late twenties, said he was a cosmology major or something along those lines. He’s typical Humboldt-scruffy, wearing old jeans, a sherpa-wannabe-hat, a pair of leather hiking boots, and fleece sweater. His eyes, which I had never cared to notice till today, are green. Either way he’s the kind of guy you would expect to see somewhere with a huge pack on his back squinting at the sun. He and my lab instructor were talking about cell function and process and he sort of sat back in his chair and he chuckled.
“I grew up this atheist kid, took AP biology in high school, knew the reason for this thing and that thing and believed and still do that evolution is what shaped all of life and created these thousands of different processes. But as I grow older and go more places see more things of such immense complexity it’s hard to believe that there isn’t something behind all of it besides just evolution. It’s so hard to fathom and take in all this stuff and not question. It’s insane to wonder how if you did one thing different in a tiny process how the earth and universe could be totally different. One mistake and change can make your vision, ya know? It’s so unbelievable sometimes.”
I wonder if the longer you live the wiser you become you begin to have more faith or more spirituality. I believe I have started that. I don’t believe in god or in anything of the sort but one begins to see everything differently the more you know. How everything is completely intertwined. How you cant really regret the past because if it didn’t happen there would be no life now for better or for worse. Everything and everyone is so directly but seemingly distant that its all like one thing. Like a tree or something so many parts so big and sturdy and delicate at the same time.

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For all those people who say i will not be able to do it, that im stupid, that i wont last, that ill smell i want to say this. im already boring enough, i need all the freaking support i can get here. i need to live here, try something get good at something. do you understand? if i dont im worthless, im mediocre at a bunch of things and not good at one thing.

I come from upstairs and sit on the arm chair. my dad is fast asleep on the brown leather couch in front of the TV. He does this all the time, turns on the tv and takes a nap. he's like a dog in that he can sleep anywhere, and now in writing this i realize i can do the same thing. anyways the tv is turned up loud and i look to see whats on. It's the movie "the black swan", Tyrone Power handsome, too handsome for a real pirate fights some "badies" as my dad would say with his foil. i sit down and watch and its so great because ive seen it before. the lady enters and the music turns all soft and weepy like lace on a table. and i find myself wishing i could be a swashbuckling pirate guy with a sword. swinging between boats all in the name of the queen. next will be a cowboy movie and my dad will tell me about when he was my age he would watch these movies over and over and think that it was actually happening in front of him, that the west still had to be won from the nasty indians.

I think about these many many many occasions and i realize how much i still wish like the little kid i used to be. so yes this is a real thing i want to do, i want to see my hands in taters, my skin brown like a polynesian. I was to hang on for dear life while the mast swings 15 feet one way and 15 feet the other. The Lady Washington could be the best thing to ever happen to me, if i can get to do it.

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