There is no pill for loneliness.

About a year ago, I broke down and sought help.

No.

Sometime last year, I happened to break down in a nurse's office and was told that I needed help.  I'd recognized that fact for a while. I'd been screaming for help internally for several months or more, but ASKING aloud was a hurdle I hadn't yet cleared.

So.

No therapy, just a happy little pink pill. Really, it has helped. I can function. I can be nice, and smile, and get out of bed. I almost can't recognize the person I was last year, the behaviors--how frustrated and out of control, how angry, how depressed. How helpless, even as my brain is telling me: this is crazy! All you have to do is stop. Say sorry. Get out of bed. Go outside. DO SOMETHING.

It was hard to say yes to medication. It felt like, still feels like, a cop-out. And I'd taken pills before--a little blue one--that made me numb, and I didn't want to be numb. But this one's better. I can still feel. I still have desire, whether it's answered or not. I still get sad, but the pill files down the corners, fills in the pits so I don't sink down too low. It might be rounding off the highs, too. I don't know that I ever feel really happy, but I do feel good. Just sometimes I sense an underlying panic that time is going by and I'm not doing anything with it, because really I'm not. The rounding of corners also seems to take away my motivation. There's a busy little person inside my brain who has a running list of things she'd like to do--crafts, books, trips, exercise, etc.--but for the life of me, I can't make myself actually do any of these things. I'm not depressed, but I'm curled up in a little ball--killing time with mindless games on the phone, endless television, or just immobile, wondering what it will take to get me up and going, as I get rounder and older and less comfortable in my clothing and appearance. Is it the little pill? Is it the new job forcing me to be extroverted and public when I am very much an introvert? A combination of these and more?

As my mood has evened out in the past year, I've taken stock of the introversion, my relationships and interactions with other people. I think there is something that keeps me distant from everyone. Like a clear gel layer. I used to describe my depression like a gel layer--like the Japanese food konnyaku--cold, grey, almost opaque. It's clear now, sun can come in, and I can see you, but it keeps anyone from getting close to me. Do I have my arms out, pushing people away? Is there a dullness that repels? People that I consider my best friends obviously have much closer relationships with others. There's a politeness and formality that close friends don't bother with. And small talk with strangers, acquaintances are full of awkwardness, and in a room full of strangers, I'm aware of new connections forming as I remain outside, aloof.

And, oh my god, if I meet my idols? I've given up on that. I've met Amanda Palmer twice, the second time actually had a conversation piece prepared (I had submitted a piece of fabric that ended up on a kimono she was wearing. She was sitting on it as I spoke to her, but so flustered after two hours in line I forgot about it, basically apologized for the long evening and it wasn't until I got out the door and that I remembered and broke into tears. I didn't even chance the line when I went to hear The Bloggess read. And I no longer have regrets about the time I sold Robin Hitchcock a postcard and said not one word about what I fan I was. Because saying nothing means there's nothing TO regret).

Maybe it's my imagination, a function of the introversion and anxiety, but honestly I don't think so. Something missing from my brain? I feel empathy, almost too much sometimes, but I don't offer anything of myself, maybe. I don't know.

Where's the rainbow-colored pill for personality?

Speaking of Ukuleles....

Amanda Palmer - The Ukulele Anthem (Occupy Wall Street 10/12 NYC)

Famous Last Words

After the last post, about a year ago, after my renewed commitment to be Be ALL That I Could Be, the roller derby league underwent major changes. Reforming, regrouping, and all that fun stuff...so I didn't skate for about three months (which at that time seemed like eternity). At the first of the year, the reformed league found a place to skate that we really couldn't afford. I felt like only a few of us were really trying to hold things together, and in trying to hold things together and make it to all the practices, I got really behind in my studies...Then my son got a part in a play. I took some time off from derby to catch up with school, see how my wallflower boy had bloomed into a pretty neat young dude...By the time the semester ended, the league wasn't skating anymore.

That'd be the end of my derby days, except back when I was full of hope, I'd bought a pass to Rollercon, a massively awesome roller derby convention in Las Vegas. I went, had blast, learned a lot in skills and in the nuts and bolts of running a league, met wonderful people, felt inspired to return to skating...was making plans to go to Rollercon in '13!!!

 and then I returned to reality of the place where I live, and the way my life looks right now. To skate, I need to travel, and I seem to have neither time, energy, nor motivation. As of now now, I've gone cold turkey...trying to clear my head, not watching derby, not spending much time on Facebook which is 75% derby-related for me. Concentrating on school. Concentrating on a struggling relationship. School's a bitch. So's work. The end is in sight, though, for school, and who knows what that will mean for work, and maybe this lead balloon will lift. I don't know what I'll do with my free time when I get it back. Maybe I'll be involved with derby somehow...as a fan, as a volunteer, I don't know...Haven't thought about clearing out my gear chest of derby skinz, holey tights, laces, wheels, tools, skates, pads & guards, knee highs, because denial is a river in Egypt...Not sure I'm ready to shut the door completely, although it seems mostly closed right now.

A year ago, the thought of quitting derby caused so much conflict, like tearing a hole in my gut...but since then it's been balanced by the stress of playing even a small part in attempting to get a fledgling league off the ground, the realization I really don't "fit", resignation that school needs to win right now...I regret not coming to derby at a time when I could put my all into it (i.e. 10 years ago, without school), but I don't regret going outside my comfort zone to put on skates, look stupid, feel good, and have so much fun.

So who knows what will happen? On to the next crazy adventure!  Screw it, maybe I'll take up the ukulele.

Time Flies: A fresh start, Take 5

I last posted in 2009? No, I think there were later missives, but those pages got torn out. They probably had something to do with making a fresh start on this blog, making a post or two toward that fresh start and then coming back months later to get rid of the evidence of yet another failure to make a fresh start--at least blog-wise. I waffle between lack of motivation and lack of time, and usually both, but here I am again: Ready to Make a Fresh Start.

What will it be about this time?

This time...it will be simple. And probably repetitious and unreadable after a while, if I do indeed continue it for a while. I still envision the lack of time. Currently, along with my usual full-time employment and family, I am a half-time grad student and a wannabe derby girl. The heart of the matter is that I am unhappy in my job (a change for the better in hindsight has resulted in a Loss of Mastery and of Self), not thrilled about school (hanging on the thread that it will help get me out of the niche I feel wedged into), and these two things leave me little time or energy for derby. Women's Flat Track Roller Derby. My only real hobby of the moment. I cannot give up my job, and I cannot give up school if I want to improve the job situation, but honestly, I don't want to give up the only expendable thing. Roller derby forces me to exercise, forces me to socialize, makes me feel good and a part of something. It keeps me relatively sane and gives me a reason to get out of bed on the (non-existent) weekend and to keep chiseling away at job and school.

Why would I have to quit? I should put more time and effort into my classes. I should be home to cook my family healthy meals. I am bad at time management. The house, inside and out, is a disaster area. I am at work all day, I am at practice in the evenings, and when I'm home I'm trying to catch up on homework or I am avoiding homework, or spending time with the family. Furthermore, I don't have the time or energy to devote to derby so I never quite get good enough. I can't stop properly or effectively when the pressure's on, and I haven't figured out how to turn around. I'm slow, and my endurance is relatively low. I'm spread too thinly so I'm a half-ass worker, a half-ass student, and a half-ass skater. But....I'm not quite ready to cut my losses yet. Fall term starts tomorrow, and I'm going to make one more run at Doing it All and Being All That I Can Be.

This blog isn't going to be about school, it's not going to be about work, it's not going to be about my domestic frustrations. It's simply going to be a record of my derby progress. If there is progress, if I do feel like writing about it, and if I survive this next term, then there's a place for me in derby and a place for derby in my life. If there's no progress, then 2012 will mean I can get more use out of the Rose City Rollers season pass that I won at their season championships in June.

I don't know what it will look like. For now, it will just be a record of what I learned, what I did, where I hurt, how I felt, who I met there, or something like that. Maybe some pictures. We'll find out really quickly if it's going to fly or not. After a two week total break from skating, I'm planning to return to practice tomorrow, and my plan is to write a little something when I get home, before I plow into homework and before I give up and go to bed. 'til then!?

Dormancy

Dormancy. That describes the state of this blog, more often than not. I don't even consider it to be a blog. I feel that a blog should have some purpose, and this one does not, other than possibly being the place I think about when I'm mulling over my options. I've been in my own sort of dormancy now for several years...my head down working toward something: trying to got on my feet post-divorce, get full-time employment, get my degree, plan a wedding, get used to a new job, and now, looking at grad school because I don't feel comfortable in the corner that I've wedged myself into. Unnecessarily stressed and unhappy, I allow little brain-space for those things that might keep me sane. Things like hobbies, exercise.

Every so often there's a spark. Rock camp felt like it would change my life. There's the occasional bubble of creativity as I take up some craft. I can still get lost in music, once in a while, and there's always a book. Right now I'm rather obsessed with roller derby. But the spark dims or gets doused, either by my location, my work schedule (which includes a weekly evening and every other Saturday), or my inner dialogues tainted by well-seated introversion, depression, and old tapes that I can never seem to switch off. I'm old enough to know I should be able to rise above all that, but also old enough to acknowledge that I will probably not change. But maybe I can work around this?

I need a project, something that I can work on daily, at the very least weekly. Something that will rise above the work stress. I'm not sure what that is, but I'm thinking...

For now, a list. Small things, big things. Possibilities, a brain storm!

1. Grad school. I don't relish the idea of returning to school. The time, the stress, the money, and maybe I'm too old for this. But there's a spark in the challenge of it, and the lure of progress when I've spent this past year just sort of floundering keeps me moving toward this thing, even as it repels me. I'm still waiting for the official word on my GRE scores to start my school search seriously, but I made my first application to a program that doesn't require the GRE.

2. Sewing. I need to revisit this idea, if only because as I get older the lifelong inability to feel comfortable in the options available to me is getting worse. I don't want to follow someone else's trend or idea of what a woman my age is supposed to wear. I found a book on creating skirts (a relatively simple place to start) and modifying them for body type and size. I have my grandmother's sewing machine which, for years now, I've been meaning to take in to be reconditioned. I don't have space in the house for this project, unless I get good about clearing the dining table so we don't end up eating our meals on the couch and coffee table.

3. The tattoo. Little to be said about this. I made the decision at age 19. Then, it was going to be that thing I did in my 40th year (that's come and gone). I know where I want to go, who I want to do it, and a few ideas about what I want...I've always just been intimidated about going to the parlor alone, but I think that's my self-imposed perception and limitation and I just need to get over it. Reading reviews of the shop have helped a little in that department.

4. Skating. Yep, it's funny, but I really do want to get back on skates. Okay, I really want to join the roller derby league, but that's out of the question. I have to travel to find a rink, to Vancouver, WA, or Portland, but it's doable. If I have to go by myself, like the tattoo, that makes things more difficult, kind of "odd", but maybe it's worth it, just to see...

5. Cooking

6. Block printing

7. Zine (thinking more of a theme-based collaborative thing).

8. Volunteering: hospice, humane society, community house, girls rock camp, roller derby

9. Exercise: walking, cycling, hiking, skating (!)

10.

He Cuts, He Pokes! Go! Go! Go!

Took some time out from weird times to go see a really bad/good Japanese monster movie on a big screen...

We thought the 50th Anniversary screening of Godzilla--complete with subtitles and without Raymond Burr--at the Cinema 21 several years ago was pretty nifty (I think the Lad was still somewhat new to the reading thing back then--now he's a major fan of the subtitled monster and anime genres, not to mention a serious reader). But Filmusik's project Gamera vs. Guiron with a live soundtrack was the bee's knees.

By now the lad's well familiar with the Hero Turtle Gamera, but how often do we get to see it on the silver screen of an old theater? The soundtrack was completely live--chamber orchestra, voice actors, foley artists, and the front row turned out to be a planted chorus who stood up and sang the Gamera theme song. Twice. The audience was appreciative and participatory, and at the end of the show we were asked to please rise for a last chorus of the theme song, complete with "follow the bouncing ball" lyrics. Sheer happiness and lots of laughter. Totally Awesome. I can't wait to see what this group does next.

Filmusik: Gamera vs. Guiron from Galen Huckins on Vimeo.

The Horrors - Sea Within a Sea

Another guilty pleasure. This takes me back, but I'm not sure where...

Blue

It was only after finding a big, blue dildo with vibrating capabilities in the overnight drive-through bookdrop this morning did I wonder why more things don't get shoved in there. Not that I'm complaining. Just curious. There's the occasional food mess (which is both gross AND destructive), but nothing like this. I suppose the library is either untouchable or registers too low on the mischievous conscience.

But I wonder...what was the story behind the toy? Who got the idea to drop it off at the library, and what put that idea there?

Some things never change

I don't remember when I discovered music as an escape. I know by the time I was 10, I was already disappearing into my bedroom for hours at a time, listening to hand-me-down records, discarded from my aunt (the beatles, the lovin' spoonful) or retired from the jukebox in the tavern where my mom tended bar. I had a box of 45's (and still do) that contained gems collected by my grandmother, my mother, and my aunt. Someone bought me the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack when that was the big thing. My grandpa bought me an Andy Gibb album. My first record, one that I chose myself, was Blondie's 'Parallel Lines.' The first album I bought with my own money, as much as money was my own at age 12, was Flock of Seagulls (I still think "Standing in the Doorway" is an awesome song).

I haven't felt very sociable lately. That's not exactly it. I just haven't felt very connected lately. When I feel disconnected, I tend to disconnect from my usual social outlets, both "real" and "virtual", which--surprise, surprise--makes me feel that much more out of touch.

But this time, my usual escape--music--does include a slight social aspect. It started with last.fm, where I started cataloging all my records, concerts. I discovered a lot of fantastic stuff there, mostly music that I had somehow missed along the way (like early 80's band Magazine). No socializing (for me) there, but it was almost (kind of sort of...okay, maybe not really) the same effect as going alone to a concert and being surrounded by people who are just as much into some weird band as you are.

Now it's Blip.fm. I like its current limitations. It's Twitter-esque in its mode of communication, although the tweets--blips!--contain songs, sometimes nothing more, sometimes a message, sometimes a reply. I hear songs that I haven't heard in years (someone played the Blow Monkeys the other day, yanking me to some weird spot in my own distant past--no I was never a Blow Monkeys fan, but "Digging Your Scene" definitely has a particular time flavor), songs that are new, songs from other parts of the world that I have little chance of hearing in my own cultural wasteland. I send a song out into the world and sometimes someone hears it. It's like being alone and not being alone at the same time. Kind of comforting, kind of weird. Yeah. Music, the wonder drug, or something like that.

Speaking of music that takes me to a certain time and space, this one takes me back to an apartment on Hudson Street when, looking back, everything was still ahead of me. It makes me happy and sad and wistful and hopeful all at the same time:

Everything Beyond These Walls Has Been Razed

At some point I will get back to writing, get past the posting of videos, but you know...when things get weird, music is the perfect escape. At the moment, I'm curled on my side on the bed, the laptop on its side, and typing in this position isn't conducive to meaningful missives...I heard this particular song a couple weeks ago and it has anchored itself into my brain. Seems to fit the current mood (the song...the video's a bit creepy).

Oh My God

So, yeah, yeah...'I Like You So Much Better When You're Naked' is the one that's getting marginal airplay around here, but this is the song I relate to. Some days, it could even be my theme song, if I didn't already have one...

The Light Pours Out of Me

One Random Thing: Pete Seeger

I am always surprised and happy to hear that Pete Seeger is still alive and busy. I'm not sure why the surprise--perhaps I've been thinking all this time that he's older than he is, or maybe I just never knew his age (he just turned 90 on May 3). While I've never been a major fan of folk music, it is part of my upbringing, Pete Seeger and his company are indelibly linked to my childhood. I guess that's where the happiness comes in...although, I must say, contrary to Steve Martin's assertion, Pete can make the banjo a melancholy instrument indeed.

He's better known for lots of other songs, and I guess I'm most familiar with Malvina Reynold's version, but this is a song that makes me happy, too. If you follow the links on this YouTube offering, you'll be able to see Malvina's performances on the show as well, on her own and accompanied by Pete:



Happy Belated Birthday, Mr. Seeger.

Loose Ends

Ready to ROCK: LRC Showcase
Originally uploaded by Grace Fell

I really dropped the ball on documenting my LRC experience. It was so wonderful, awesome, and life-changing that I felt like I needed time to write it out and do it justice, but there just wasn't time. As soon as I got back, I was off and running with a semester that had already started and trying to secure my internship for this past fall. I can now see the light at the end of the tunnel: no more school, just putting back the pieces of my life. It may be too late to revisit last spring's adventure. Maybe not. But if it is, I still have the friends I've made, the photos, souvenirs (a really cool DVD of all the bands and my LRC guitar picks :), and who knows, I'm thinking about going again in 2009. Maybe I'll do a better job at documenting. Maybe not!

Two weeks and counting...

So much for the vlog idea. I did ramble out a bit about LRC but there's just not been any time to edit it. Summer Semester is in full swing, and I am working hard to gain some slack so that my weekend away does not cause too much hardship.

Anyway, it's two weeks--no, less than two weeks--until Rock Camp is in session. My official letter arrived right on time. Here's the skinny:

1. I got my instrument assignment: bass guitar

2. The public showcase will be held at the Satyricon. I'll be playing the same scrungy stage which once held the likes of Nirvana and countless other grunge, punk, metal bands. I last saw a band called the American Girls there. True, the original Satyricon closed down a few years ago and was reopened to be an all ages venue, but still...it's the same stage! And, yes, I realize that I knew this and posted about it on my first update. It's excitin'!

3. I've got my room reservations. Decided to go for inexpensive and convenient rather than cooler and further away. I'll have wifi, at at least. Taking advantage of the daily shuttle so I don't have to navigate.

4. I've pre-ordered my official LRC t-shirt. I am a geek.

5. After reading this blog post by an LRC 2007 alumnus and discovering both a Flickr pool and some youtube evidence of previous sessions, I am much more excited than I am scared.

I'm still kind of scared, though.

Oh, and since the big 4-Oh! probably had no small part in this whole adventure, I can officially say that, as of Friday, I am 40 years old. Hard to wrap my mind around that one, but I've decided that I really don't need to try. I mean, really, aside from the physical slide down the other side of the mountain, it doesn't mean all that much in my world.

So, there will probably be a bit more news between now and when I leave on the 29th. I'm hoping that school stuff will fall in place and that a weekend off won't put me too far behind. I still haven't put a whole lot of thought into what I'm going to be wearing for the showcase. I want to dress up, but how dressed up depends on how hot it is going to be. Also, it seems like most women were just in their jeans and black t-shirts...

Still I'm playing with these options:

Boots--either the knee-high lace up caterpillars, or the red LeVoodoo "combat" Docs.

Space-dyed tights, colorway: Moonrock (if it's not 90 degrees out)

Short black skirt and t-shirt ('punk rock saved my life', 'you are here' gears ringer, or something black)
or
Funky short dress (one that I still own but never really wear)
or
Something else even cooler that I have yet to think of.

Bowler?

Basically, the aim is basic, comfortable, a little retro perhaps. I'm going to be nervous enough without trying to look like someone I am not. Just want to let my own "freak flag" fly free.

Until next time--it's back to homework for me.

Ladies Rock Camp: Counting Down, 30 Days

First, Background:

Okay, I'll admit it, if it is not already obvious. I'm an introvert. My self-esteem is often quite fragile. I carry around a LOT of baggage, and it is most burdensome when I find myself in new and uncomfortable situations. That's where the play button gets pushed and the old tapes, recorded between the ages of 7 and 17, begin to play. Which is why, generally, I've tended to stay within my comfort zone. It's easy, of course, in the past few years, to blame it on school. I have no time to do these things that interest me, get involved, that is very true. But I have had this sneaking fear that I'm using that excuse to slip further back into my shell...

...on the other hand, I'm turning 40. Very Soon. I'm not sure how I feel about that, yet. Mostly positive, and the positive comes from a realization of my own internal locus of control and also of finite time. It's this realization that's exerting an opposite pull, to come out of the old shell, ignore what I think people think, how I look...ignore the fear.

Back in January, with both 40 and graduation looming in 2008, I signed up for Ladies Rock Camp, a weekend event to benefit the Rock Camp for Girls. The Girls Rock Camp has operated out of Portland, OR, for several years now. There are now camps sprouting in other cities around the country, as well as a few outside of the States. The week-long camp takes girls between the ages of 10 and 17, teaches them to play an instrument, has them form bands, write an original song, practice, ending with a showcase event at the end of where all the bands perform their songs. From the Girls Rock Camp website:

"We want to eradicate all the limiting myths about music and gender that make girls afraid to speak up, sing out, and make noise. We want to abolish all the obsolete traditions that restrict many girls' and women's free musical expression and obstruct their access to the world of music. We seek to demonstrate—through lessons, mentorship, positive examples, and the shared experiences of the staff and volunteers—that every genre of music from the heaviest to the most delicate, and every technical job and creative endeavor in the music industry, is available to any girl or woman who wants to explore it."

It's more than about music, but it centers on music. When I first heard of this, I thought how awesome! And then I thought, I wish I had something like this when I was kid. Then I read a year or so ago about how they had done a Ladies Rock Camp weekend open to women 19 and over to raise funds for the Girls Camp, and I thought, well, I wish I'd known about that! I'd have signed up for sure!

In January, news about the Girls Rock Camp documentary had me looking around their website. Lo and behold, there was sign-up information about three sessions of the Ladies Rock Camp happening in O8. My excitement exceeded my trepidation (the sessions were months into the future, which helped). It felt sort of like fate, and...I was already shelling out a huge amount of money for spring tuition, what would a few hundred more dollars do, especially if it would go to a worthy cause?

This is where I am today: I'm signed up for camp at the end of May. I think I'm going to be playing either bass or keyboards (because I have no musical experience whatsoever, it was all pretty much a crap shoot, which is why I can't remember the order of my first and second choices. The old tapes did pipe in a bit, because really I think it would be cool to play lead guitar, but honestly? I have doubts about how much the camp can really accomplish in two days--I fully expect to learn something but I also expect to look ridiculous at some point, maybe several points--and I guess I'd rather be slightly less conspicuous about it. Maybe I should have chosen drums? I just don't know..!). I know what the schedule looks like, and I now know that the Showcase will be held at the Satyricon which excites me no end. In days of yore, the Satyricon was a punk institution--I've seen shows there myself. The club was the site, supposedly, of Nirvana's first paying gig.

I should be hearing from them any day now, to get the detailed information in advance of the camp (actually, while this post has been sitting in draft limbo for finals week, the LETTER arrived, but I'm going to make that another post). I'd like to document it all somehow, but I'm not sure, with school and all, how thinly stretched I'll be over the next few weeks. At the very least, though, I'll try to keep up with this blog, try to do a few pictures and perhaps some video to go with. We'll see. For now, the countdown has begun: 30 days.

Anticipating...what?

New beginnings perhaps. Being so close to the end, I find it difficult to be patient. My mind is chaotic with all these possibilities of what I might do when my time, energy, and finances are no longer tied up with school.

I might...

travel

build things

create

activate

Thinking:

My degree won't change my career. I like the library, like that I am surrounded by books and get to play with technology. The degree will allow me to step up a rung perhaps, but the information I'm gaining...it's for me, really. It's an attempt to gather tools to engage, make a difference if it's possible in those areas that matter to me: poverty & diversity

I'm going to need to rediscover those things that were important to me before I started all this, the interests and hobbies. Cooking real food, tending plants, reading books just for the pleasure of them. Technology: Feeling inspired to build things, mix art and technology. My thinking's been so narrow, that if I can't draw (and in all honesty I can't) I can never really be creative.

Hiatus

This blog is currently taking yet another break while its owner determines a reason for its existence.

About three years ago, I made the hare-brained decision to go back to school. Through the years, I've accumulated a large number of credits, in quantity probably enough by now to have earned at least one advanced degree, but not the proper combination. It's a jumble of credits: art, science, technology, even some Japanese. Apparently I am indecisive and wary of commitment.

It makes an odd sort of sense that the twisty path would somehow lead me to a full-time position working for a public library. I'm a library assistant, hired out away from the City's I.T. department for my computer support/web skills. Everything was fine, is fine, and most likely I could do okay without a degree and retire someday as a municipal employee, maybe even bump up a level, but something really bothers me about not having a degree, and I don't know why. I admire those people who have direction, whether they have a formal education or not. Maybe I just need direction, and, lacking that, a degree, an accomplishment, is the next best thing?

Today, along with the library job, I'm enrolled half-time at the land grant university I'd enrolled in full-time just before the library hired me, although this time instead of commuting south, I'm attending at a distance. I think time-wise it works out to about the same. The commute time turns into a lot more reading time, interacting with the instructor and other students. There's no sitting in the back of the class, passively absorbing here: participation is a major part of the curriculum. To be sure, I feel as though the online courses change me just as much if not more than the traditional classroom offerings, although at times I really miss the human face-to-face interaction.

I spend so much of my time outside of work now reading for classes and writing for classes that it really feels like my brain is overflowing. By the end of a semester, I have a hard time forming cohesive sentences. The stuff that falls out is the surface, day to day stuff. The intelligent stuff is buried somewhere, or turned in to be graded. I cannot think beyond what I did, what I'm doing, what's coming next. I'd created this blog with the intent of a theme, but it has yet to come to me. My 5 year old LiveJournal account has become the site of this brain dump. It's not quite to the point where I discuss my breakfast, but it's an airing out of all the cobwebs, pretty formless, pretty random. There is otherwise no room to move around my head, to have a creative notion, feel inspired.

I'll graduate in December 2008 with a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology/Human Development. I don't believe I will leave the library, but the education is giving me knowledge and skills that I'm hoping will help me make a difference, in issues of diversity, poverty, and human welfare in my community and beyond. While I'm incredibly fascinated by all the knowledge I'm gaining (very few classes have felt even remotely tedious), the all work and little play thing has very much been wearing on me. The human connections, while never massive, have dwindled, and a few very important ones are becoming increasingly strained. I feel like that kid stuck inside learning the violin while all the other kids are outside playing in the sprinkler. I willingly made this choice, and I'll see it through because I truly feel it will be worth it in the end, but god I'm exhausted, and I'm lonely, and it's going to be a long, long winter.

Perhaps, when I come back, all edumacated, with the free time to cook and create and read and travel again, this blog will have some sort of a purpose. 'Til then, I'm trimming back, shunting my resources. I can be found at Flickr (link over there somewhere to the right, I believe), and, if you're up for inane babble, at the LJ link above. Happy 2008!

Crickets, Spiders, and allergies. Oh, my!

Yes, it's that time of year again. A walk outside gets you a face full of web, the hobo spiders look menacing (because the ARE) in the garage, the crickets twiddle their knees and try to drown out the howl of the freeway, and I'm a prickly pile of sneezes and sniffles. It's the most wonderful time of the year. Truly, fall is a favorite time. I feel recharged...I want to make the most of these last days of sun and warmth. Everything's golden. I just wish I wasn't in school, so that I had time to make use of the physical energy. And that I could breathe.

The season and a video I saw on Running Commentary a few days ago made me think of the Cedar Creek Grist Mill. In this age of high technology, there's something comforting about machinery that I can easily understand. The grist mill is maintained by a non-profit group, kept operational by volunteers and donations. Visit on the weekends, and you'll see the mill in action, grinding wheat and corn into flours, scooped into brown paper bags for visitors to take home. The last Saturday in October, a apple presses are brought out and 4 tons of apples are pressed into cider. Volunteers wanted! I think I might sign up.

It's funny because even though I've been there before, I pictured the mill with the classic wooden water wheel, but at the time the mill was made, the advantages of iron turbines over wooden wheels was well established. So...no water wheel, but still quite impressive, especially as the pulleys and leather belts get going.

Random things seen today:
Hula girl swaying on the dashboard of a convertible Geo Metro.
Young woman with a Holga at a grist mill.

Recent Addictions:
Harbo Gummi Bears*, Twitter, Odwalla Quencher Summertime Lime Limeade!

Must do:
Lop my hair. Call about volunteering for next feral cat clinic. Gather info for research paper topic: relationship of child abuse and animal/pet abuse.

Listening to:
Morphine, Cure for Pain


*Where can one find the gummi bears (Ya?) that were used in Hedwig & the Angry Inch?

Enough Said? But then again...

The old cat is terminal. ($48, office visit + antibiotic to stave off infection, delay the inevitable).

I hit some unidentified metal object on the highway which cracked my bumper, pierced the grill, dented and pushed back the A/C condenser ($500 deductible).

Discovered a flat tire leaving work on my late night (Free @ Les Schwab, remove nail, patch tire).

Fall Semester began ($1924, tuition for 6 credits--Child Abuse & Neglect, Methods in Behavioral Research, textbooks purchased/paid for last month).

The gist? It's been ONE expensive, crappy week. I wanna take my marbles and go home.

=====

It's a late August night and the sounds of Hawaiian music are blowing up from the river. This town, out of the blue, decided it was time to acknowledge its Hawaiian roots...Homework is calling my name. So's e-mail that I promised weeks ago. So's a ukulele melody carried on the breeze. The only call I'll answer, likely, is that of sleep.

Stress has left me a little addled. I had the house to myself (sort of) and thought I might actually COOK, for real. I was whipping up some yogurt tahini sauce, a recipe I hadn't tried...thought, hmmm, it's not bad, but kind of ODD. Didn't dawn on me even then that the Plain Yogurt I thought I'd bought--I always buy--was not plain, but Vanilla. I didn't let it crush me...thought about it, yes, but then put my shoes on, went down to the store, the only one in town, the one that calls itself the shopping center. Little town. And half the town seems to be milling in front of the dairy section. My patience did not pay off...they have yogurt, but no plain yogurt. Isn't plain always an option?

My head feels as though it's been packed in fiberglass insulation.

I visited the ORG this evening specifically to pack up my corner of the pond, paddle off for good, I've no time to play, make no time to do anything more than snapshots, write only research papers and essays for class...but recent modifications meant things to see on the welcome page... Somewhere between some kid spewing cinnamon and lukku cairi's Axl Rose I was laughing out loud and I really, really needed that. And then there's other new toys...

Time's wasting away, though, and I must produce something commensurate with that passage.