Stream/River

I like stream-of-consciousness-writing. However, I usually revise what I blog. Spell check, not ending sentences with prepositions, not too much cussing, keeping an eye on anything self-indulgent. I don't want to do that right now (except maybe the spell checking). I just want to write. I think a lot about how hard it is at times to be human. How we talk and interact and try to figure it all out. And how, most of the time it seems like either not enough gets said, or too much, but not often the right amount (that's kind of like Goldilocks). Everything becomes a contradiction. I don't think I suffer from guilt, and then I find myself wondering if god or karma or the universe wants to put me in my place or reward me. And I wish I knew which thing I deserved; to be put in my place or rewarded.
I think about the people I know, some of you will read this, and I feel so inadequate when I want to call or drive there or e-mail and I don't. And then, I go to the place of thinking about how busy we all are, and how in the hell could I keep in touch with everyone I want to anyway. And even if I did call, would you be too busy to talk? But I want to. I want to sit down and just talk. I think about the limited time we have here, and how I want to wring everything out of it, and then how, actually, I just want to sit on the couch with a good man, and watch movie after movie. Or how I just want to sit at the kitchen table, drinking passion fruit tea and reading, and listen to my son out in the yard, driving nail after nail into the wall of the fort he's building. I think about how I don't feel like I have enough time in the day to do what I need to do. And then, knowing that, I spend an hour on the computer looking up funny videos and rereading e-mail. I tell you, I have a blog, a myspace, and then, a week ago, I signed up for facebook! Holy crap. I got on it, and I immediately had a dozen friends. Some of them were people I never talk to but miss. Their bulletins told me they were doing things like "drinking juice right now" or "tired from a fabulous vacation". I love some of these people, but I couldn't do it. I had to delete my facebook account because I could just visualize myself starting to think it was important to keep up with everyone, when all they were really doing was "wanting to drink juice," "drinking juice right now," or "just finished my juice". I think about getting a job and can only sit and drool. I have no real talent and I'm going to end up in a cubicle for 6.50 an hour. This is negative thinking, I know. My friend, Kate, says, "anticipate good". I love that. The thing is, I go back and forth. I'm scared and then I'm brave, I'm so sure of myself and then I think I'm totally incapable of anything. Sometimes if I'm in a group of people, I think,
"I have no idea what these people are talking about. What day did I miss at school where we learned this stuff?" And then sometimes, I'm going on about some drivel like wine facts and I realize someone else is thinking that themselves. I suppose it's all just the human condition, and I think about it too much.
The thing that makes it all bearable is how everyone goes through it. There is this quote (of course) that I may have put in before but I love it. It's "Life isn't fair for anyone. That's what makes it fair for everyone". I think about how the grass in my front yard came back to life and seems all lush and beautiful, when I never thought it would. I think about the universe, and how sometimes I think my dad still talks to me. He always said that he wished he could have gone up in a spaceship and seen the earth from way up there. Maybe he got to do that. I think about how I'm raising this child, and no one ever gives me a report card on how I'm doing. I have a neurosis for tying all the strings together at the end of my writing....but not this time. Here's a few quotes I like, that have no relevance to either this post or each other.....

If we listened to our intellect, we'd never have a love
affair. We'd never have a friendship. We'd never go into
business, because we'd be cynical. Well, that's nonsense.
You've got to jump off cliffs all the time and build your
wings on the way down.
--Ray Bradbury

"The greatest good you can do for another is not just to share your
riches, but to reveal to him his own."
Benjamin Disraeli

"I'd rather have roses on my table than diamonds around my neck."
Emma Goldman

God gives every bird a worm, but he does not throw it
into the nest.
--Swedish Proverb

AND A POEM.......


The Guest House

This being human is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.
A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.

Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they're a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.

The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.

Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.


~ Rumi ~

Miracles vs. Crap

"To be alive, to be able to see, to walk...it's all a miracle. I have
adopted the technique of living life from miracle to miracle."
Arthur Rubinstein

Well, the quote comes first today. I guess, in a way, I'm feeling a bit of Thanksgiving in August. Rough week in some ways. Got through it (still loving the fragment). I'd like to tell you a story but I can't think of a good one right now. Oh wait...maybe one.

When I was a little girl, I was afraid of the dark. I was very attached to my parents and at about 10:00 or 11:00 pm, if I had woken up, I would pad into their room and they would be sleeping. Some nights, I would just lie down on the floor at the end of their bed and cover up with a blanket. Some nights, I would walk to the side of the bed where my dad slept. I would tap him lightly on the shoulder as he slept, and when he woke, I'd say, "wanna get a drink of water"? and he would get up. We would walk down the hall and into the kitchen and he would open the fridge door. There was always a water jug stashed in the door and I would take it, unscrew the lid, and take a big swig. I'd hand it to him and he'd take a swig and then we'd put the jug away and walk back down the hall. No chatting. He would veer off to their room and I would go back to bed and sleep until morning. The thing is, he never one time said "no" to my request. He always got up with me and walked into the kitchen. The patience and care involved in that simple act has stayed with me.

Now, as an adult, when bad stuff happens, I think those childhood blessings helped make me strong enough to deal with some of the shit in life (of course, the therapy helps too).

If I could thank everyone wonderful in my life, it would take a hundred pages, if I could cuss out everyone who has been horrible to me, I could do it in a paragraph. That was a good realization this week. Life seems to be a series of miracles, interspersed with an occasional hefty dose of crap. I'm very aware of both.