I ripped off a good portion of the nail on my right pinky finger yesterday. Typing uppercase letters of the left hand is not so fun at the moment. Really, it’s quite unpleasant every time I go to shift. It’s not the good kind of unpleasant either. There is no masochistic pain, no satisfaction in the experience. Just a frustrating jab of discomfort, sometimes pain. It’s distracting. It made typing at work yesterday and today less than fun. It’s not quite as bad on the laptop, I think I’m hitting the shift key with a different part of my finger on a standard flat keyboard than I would be on my ergonomic keyboard at work. Or maybe it’s just healing. Either way, it doesn’t seem quite so bad now.
I have been spending a lot of time thinking about my sex life lately. Rather, my lack thereof. I’m not going to start ranting about my lack of a bed partner at the moment. That’s one thing that I feel pretty confident time will fix. But I have been thinking about who I am, and why my sensory experience has the weird quirks it does.
One of my oddities makes perfect sense. I’m synesthetic. I perceive things perceptually with more than one sense. For instance, I hear light. I don’t mean that my ear-drums are sensitive to photons, and that the light activates my sense of hearing. I mean that things I see register as sight, and regularly as sound as well. Most of the sound registry is entirely ignorable, but if there is no other sound, or if the light is particularly bright or concentrated, I hear the light very distinctly. Synesthesia makes sense, because I’ve spent years developing it. It wasn’t really intentional, but it is a common side effect of trying to hone all your senses. They begin to work in tandem with each other. As your senses become more keen, and aware of the subtleties of the world, they also join one another, working in harness together. I know other people have had similar experiences, but I’m not sure how common it is. I suspect lots of mystics get it, but that’s really just speculation.
But what about my sybriantism? ( adoration of physical sensation ) I love touch of any and all variety. Any contact is powerful to me, meaningful, and beautiful. It doesn’t matter if it’s conceptually pleasant, or conceptually unpleasant. I revel in the activation of my sensory receptors. When someone meaningful to me touches me, I feel alive. And it feels good even when it hurts. In fact, when it hurts, it feels better usually.
More when I have time.
This was written am of 2008 02 14 — got lost in the confines of my computer and lack of time to post…
I took the night off last night. I didn’t do squat. Well pretty much. I stopped at Walgreens and rented movies. Then sent George back out to rent Elizabeth: The Golden Age when it suddenly became available. It wasn’t nearly as good as Elizabeth was, but it wasn’t bad. I enjoyed it thoroughly even if it was kind of long, and a bit overdone with the fistorical aspects.
I took a bath and a long shower by candle light. My hair feels great, and the rest of me does as well. I feel almost human again, as if the worries of the last week are nearly over. Of course I should start preparing for Saturday, and for all the chaos that will ensure later this month and all of next month. But right now I am not worried about much of it. I’m relaxed as I ride the train to work.
I’m listening to Fall Out Boy and typing on the laptop that my place of employment so generously acquired for me. The red line was express from Bryn Mawr to Sheridan. That was nice, it was quick. Kind of like the speed it should go all the time. If it weren’t for all the pesky stops it would be a much quicker commute on a regular basis.
I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about branding lately. I realize that the design of this site isn’t good enough. I’m using WordPress and a stock theme that I found. It’s pretty, but It’s not great. I am going to design my own. It will be a good exercise in learning PHP and js/ajax. I need to get better at web-coding for certain. Once I do I’ll dev a very simple content engine in php and go from there. It’s a little frustrating. I have all the pieces and architecture in my head. It’s not hard to build or implement. I just don’t have the faculty or experience with the interop between html, php, js/ajax, and mySQL to dash it out in a week. I’m going to need to do a lot of study and work, and I feel as though I don’t have time for it.
There never seems to be enough time for everything we want to do does there? We all have lots of responsibilities. And I value my projects and work, but I also will not overwork myself like Matthew. I’ve modeled him for years. He’s an inspiration, but part of taking someone else as a model is to determine the aspects of their behavior that you will find beneficial to you and model those, leaving the rest behind. I can’t find his habit of overworking admirable. I can’t run myself ragged the way he does, it seems anathema to me. He feels that trait is acceptable for the work he chooses to do. That’s not a sacrifice that I’m prepared to make.
I’m struggling right now, trying to figure out how to strike a healthy balance between all the things that I want to be doing with my time. I think I’ve got the conceptuality worked out. The primary issue remaining is implementing it. Which is of course far harder than coming up with the process itself. I tried this week to begin a slightly more planned lifestyle, because I know that better planning is what is going to help me get things done. Instead stress exploded me before the week even truly began. I spent Tuesday dealing with stress, yesterday trying to cope, and last night moving into acceptance of my situations. Today I’m fresh, but I slept in because I needed it badly.
I have been managing to do the first part of the grand concept. I’m keeping a log of the things that I do during the day. The time-wasters as well as the important stuff. Keeping track of it will help me look at patterns. It’s a lot of work, but I think it’s a good start to getting things to the place where I want them to be.
It’s 10:41 pm as I write this. As is often the case, I am alone in my bedroom, lit only by candles and the ambient light pollution that is inescapable here. Vivianne is sitting on the floor at the foot of the bed, alert to all possible foes. I can hear the dishwasher going in the kitchen, and the toilet flushing as the lesbian takes a late night pee-break in her much needed sleep.
I spent a couple hours sorting files today. On the floor of the living room. Real files. Actual paper. Much of it was important. Some of it went into the recycling bin, but the vast majority of it was things that I need to keep. Over half of it was thing I’ve written. I found myself struck by the sheer quantity of words that I’ve put to paper. The sheer volume of it is amazing. And none of it is really complete. It’s stories, and concepts. First pages of much longer works. Tiny vingettes of whatever was taking my interest at the moment. I estimate at least 400 hand-written pages, much of it never placed on electronic media. This doesn’t count any of my journals, or the lengthy diatribes I have written here or elsewhere on the net.
Suffice it to say, I am realizing that I’m rather prolific. Laurell K. Hamilton likes to write 8 pages a day. That’s her goal. I wonder if I could write that much, or that frequently.
Anyway, the whole point of this is that there is a lot of that work that I want a digital copy of. The originals will of course be put into storage. I have no plans to let them go. What that means though, is that I have a lot of typing and review to do. I’m okay with that. It gives me some busy work to do when I’m bored. Something that is meaningful. It will also give me a chance to practice Dvorak. If I commit to doing transcription in Dvorak I’ll learn to type at a reasonable pace much more quickly than I’ve been able to do so far. I’ve already lost most of the Dvorak I learned last year, but I truly do want to pick it back up.
I’m going to try and post pieces of what I transcribe to the blog, perhaps they will catch the fancy of someone who will contract me for a book based on a piece in progress or something. :) — or perhaps I’ll find that I’m happy being able to look at it online.
The eclipse is almost over now, and I need to read and get some sleep before tomorrow. Blessed full moon all.
Those who know me know that I’m not really into Democracy. In truth I think it’s a non-functional system. I don’t believe it functions in the US. Not having first hand experience of it in other countries of the world I can’t speak to their implementations, but I doubt it works anywhere else either. I believe that the most effective method of government is beneficent dictatorship. And even that breaks down in groups larger than a hundred. That said, I believe that democracy is as good a system as most of the others, better than many.
I also respect the will of a body of people, deeply and profoundly. That respect is not always made vocal, because too often I find that masses of people are stupid. But they have a right to their stupidity, as much as I might like to take it away from them, and they do not deserve to have their stupidity over-ruled by a well meaning overlord. It is an offense against their chosen path and the nature of their right to choose.
I’ve been thinking the last several days, about democracy and tyranny. What makes either of them functional? I’ve been thinking about how that applies to smaller units, like families and groups of friends. Take Ceann Uide. We practice a form of consensus in our household meetings, and in general development of our family. We use consensus to invite new housemates to live with us, and consensus to determine when a housemate or guest needs to leave.
There are times when I feel that’s a terrible idea. Usually when the consensus takes a turn that I’m not entirely comfortable with. This puts me in a very tough position. I’m sort of the unofficial patriarch of our family. My words carry a lot of weight, and I can be extremely persuasive if I put a little effort into it. When our discussion goes towards a river that is not to my preference I have to make a careful judgment. How forcefully do I speak out against this? Do I force a halt to consensus by refusing to explore the territory at all? Do I share my opinions strongly, or more fairly, as one member of our community.
I don’t believe I’ve ever chosen to halt consensus, but I know I’ve made forceful pushes in one direction or another. Normally though, I choose to allow consensus to do it’s work. I accept that though I have the power and influence to push our thoughts in a single direction, it is not my right to do that. It would be a breach of trust for me to override the consensual will of the group. And I have too much respect for the members of my family to do that. There comes a time when you have to cut the apron strings.
I began building this family on accident. And then with intent, strong and clear. And it has taken on a life of its own. As a result, I need to let that life take its own course. As with any parent, I will worry about the courses it takes from time to time. I will even be tempted to put my foot down and demand that something occur, or not occur. I hope that I can restrain myself though, because the family we’ve created deserves the chance to live it’s own life and make its own mistakes.I would like it to survive on its own, without me or George or Lizzie.
I would like it to be strong, having learned lessons from its mistakes, and it will not do that if It does not stand upon its own now, while it has a strong foundation and the ability to recover from injuries with a child’s speed of healing.
My friend,
I love you.
I honor the life that you live,
and each moment of your glory.
I honor your strength and sincerity,
and each wound you suffer wounds me.
I love you,
and will never leave, though you may
push me away in anger.
I love you,
though you may not wish my hands or hug,
and may turn on me today.
I love you,
quietly, in the darkness where
nobody can see.
I love you,
loudly, against the naysayers and
doom-sayers and hatred.
I love you,
In your sorrow and suffering,
and In your joy and celebration.
I love you,
I will not turn away from you.
I will face you, armed only with my love.
I will honor you, bare chested, with open heart.
I will counter you, and provide the foil you need,
though it wounds me.
I will touch you, though my hand may be burned.
I will love you, even in the long night,
when we cry and suffer.
I love you.
The last thing I remember is her smiling face. It was terrifying. Her light hair hung down around her triangular face, bouncy curls wavering in my fading vision. Whatever was in the syringe had worked quickly. There was excruciating pain. I lost control of my muscles and fell to the floor. She bent over me, her slender, precise hand curling to hold the pulse point in my throat.
I knew I was dead. I had to be dead. There was no breath in my lungs. I watched my body be taken to the morgue, and felt myself dragged along after it, unable to move more than a few feet outside of it. She wouldn’t let them preserve or dissect my body. I was buried the next day. The earth is a comforting dark place. A place where you can rest peacefully. I began to wonder if there was some way to move on. I was trapped, unable to move away from the slowly decaying hulk that was my body. I tried, but it was as though the universe were less than a yard in radius. There was nowhere I could go.
I felt a shock of electricity. A blast of force, and my consciousness, if a dead person possesses consciousness, rippled around me. I blinked. I was in my body. I blinked against the dark, but it was still dark. I began to beat against the lid of my coffin. I screamed. It occurred to me that for whatever reason I was back in my body, I didn’t have much air down here. I stopped moving. A few seconds later I heard a thump, coming down through the ground. Another, and another. The thumps grew louder over the space of a few minutes. Then there was a hard thump against the coffin. I jumped. A few more thumps. The coffin lid opened.
to be continued …
Have you ever wondered what it would be like to be someone else? To trade lives with someone you envy? Or someone you despise? The Prince and the Pauper (the book, not the movie) covers the concept well, and the gist is that the grass is always greener.
But it’s a source of constant fascination to me. It’s also one of the reasons I write so much. Writing helps me discover myself. Not just who I am and what my feelings are. It helps me learn about the way I’m living. Writing informs my understanding of myself and everything I do. It also helps me learn to describe my life to people who want to know about it. So what do you do theo? Why are you always so busy?
I’m busy because free time is less important to me than the work that I’m doing. I work 40 hours a week for a hedge fund administration group, developing their internal applications. I write between 30 minutes and 2 hours a day. I spend between 1 and 6 nights a week doing work for the Brotherhood of the Phoenix. I spend time meditating, and journeying. I spend time sitting on the floor in the living room, or on the counter in the kitchen, talking to my friends and family. I’m not ordained yet, but I seem to be becoming the family priest.
In a couple of months I will no longer be a member of the Brotherhoods Board of Directors. I’ve been an administrator for three years, and I am taking time now to focus on my own work. I need to put in some career time to develop some new skills and make a name for myself as a developer. I also need the time that this will free up to focus on being trained as a clergyman, and prepared for ordination sometime in the next year and a half.
So while I anticipate some more free time soon, I don’t really anticipate that time being free. I have lots of things I can easily use to fill up that space. I am greatly looking forward to doing them though.
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