If You Don't Keep Your Feet

It's been a while. So what's the point in coming back?

1.Going full circle.
2. New perspectives of the beginning and where you are now.
3. Never leave something incomplete.

Really, that's three ways of saying nearly the same thing.

Returning to the beginning always brings fresh perspectives which, when you're deep in an adventure, whether it's physical travel, a mental goal post or something else entirely, it's very easy to forget about where you are going. Your feet get swept off.

In other words; sometimes you are so close to a particular situation (your life) that you cannot see where the road is going, or where you actually want it to go, or where you had originally intended it to go.

Since I last wrote I've had a bit of that. Loosing my feet, getting some perspective, going back to the beginning (when I went home for a visit) and loosing my feet some more, getting more perspective and currently still existing in a state of slightly lost feet as the clock ticks on this particular experience.

I've been calling myself a writer and a photographer for a long time now. People give me envious looks. They cheer me on for being a creative individual. (As if it's some sort of select cult that only those with an intrinsic gene can enter. Ha. I'm creative because I like expressing myself differently and I've done it long enough I've had oodles of practice). 

Yesterday I just told someone I am an imaginist. As in, my job, my career, my life. All in one. They looked at me oddly but with envy again.

The ability to freely choose your identity, your time, your life. That's the ultimate for all people (dictated by society to keep us unsatisfied), and yet, very few ever step onto the road and let themselves get lost in the imagination, the wonder, the "who knows what will happen next week or next month."

Letting go of your feet is one of the most frightening things you can do. And this is coming from someone who has only done that halfway. To fully let go of your feet, letting go of friends, family, home and belongings for a time or longer would be more true to that way of life but, despite the ultimate (dictated by society to keep us unsatisfied) belief of freedom to choose your identity, time and life, you really don't, and don't want to, because certain things exist, such as cars, buses, trains, airplanes, theatres, restaurants, parks, pools, books, films, chocolate and computers, that most would not give up.

Thus one must play into ladder of employment, of government documented identity and a life rotated around mental misery because "freedom" and "happiness" are untangible and definitely individual ideals but also, ones which, if you've been born into society, you'll inevitably be influenced by the definitions which society formulates. Even if you scoff at the current ideal of "high-paying job, marriage, car, house, kids" thing which has been around since the early 20th century.

Oh please. All of that is desperately passé. Also, it's the 21st century. 'Bout time we made our own ideal. And it's there. A bit. Struggling along with most of us millenials who saw the lives of older generations and put our feet down. With a stomp.

Thing is, all that stomp is still very much just the moon rune riddle on a map. Not even the map itself, let alone a decent trail.

The first step is solving that riddle.

Start by testing your limits. How far can you give things up? What can you give up? How much control do you want over your freedom, identity and life?

Freedom being defined here as: The ability to create a living.
Identity being defined here as: The overall image you associate yourself with. (Yes we all wear different hats, but ultimately, everyone can boil their identity down to one word which encompasses all the hats. Try thinking of emotive language, of active language; a maker, an inventor, a saver, a helper, a planner etc).
Life being defined here as: The event you choose to make up each day, week, month and year.

Spend an hour this week making a list of all the things you could give up and all the things you could not. Give a reason for each.

Think too about what single word defines you. This is your job. This is what you are here to do and be. Not a chef, not a manager, not a lawyer, not a archivist, not a customer service agent or an artist. No, you are more than that.

You are also your feet. Take a look at where they have taken you this past year. It's autumn and nearing the best time of the year to curl up in a chair with a cup of tea. This time to reflect on where you have been and where you are going.

Don't let your doer feet get wild, don't let your inventor feet get distracted. Focus next on your freedom and life.
Can you create living with at least some of the events you fill your time with?
Do the other events support this living by expanding a part of your identity and freedom through knowledge, connections or other faucets?
Does frustration play into any of your answers? If so, why?
How will you cope with the frustration?
Where will you go from here?

Everything out there means something if you look at it hard enough but also, sometimes a leaf is just a leaf and the wind just blew it in a direction which made it hit your face.

When you step out your door today, don't be afraid to look away from your feet, but know that they will sweep you off toward directions you might never have planned for.

When you step into your door today, look down at your feet. Thank them and then get yourself a cup of tea, a writing implement and get on with drawing that map.

Moony

Un-Becoming

I wish I had a photo of the grove I found today. I wish I had a photo of a lot of things, but sometimes your camera battery runs out, you think you left your mobile at home and you accidently delete the photos you take, anyway.

One from today which did not happen to disappear back into the space of pixels.

Those are just wishes and mistakes to do with photography and searing this adventure into my visual brain. Though really, it's more the minty after-taste of memory which you remember. I mean, how often do you actually dig back through your 5000 plus photos?

When I'm in dire need of some photoshop entertainment and I am lacking in current images to play with, yes, but generally, no. You move on with life. Every day has something different happening. Even if you did have a picture for every second you stepped, you still would just have a minty after-taste of memory. Nothing is the same as sitting on that wood bench that is so far off the ground, a height of 5'7'' still leaves my feet (being rather a bit sore from a four hour hike through parks, side-streets and a highway halfway to the nearest village), dangling in contentment. The ground is literally a blanket of leaves, dirt and acorns, plys five or so squirrels hoping in and about the scenery. Green bark trees stretch and scraggle their way into a yellow sky making it look as if their branches were a Japanese ink painting.

Today I learned the real meaning behind "going on a journey." I meant, when I stepped out of my door, to go to a particular nature park that sits a couple miles outside of Bury St Edmunds which meant it would take around an hour and half to walk there, so long as I stayed on the right path. Just past the centre of town, as I slowed my lopping walk, I panicked. I had forgotten my phone. Now, note that I dug around in that pit of receipts, notes, 20 pence, used tissues, a jacket, camera, tangled earbuds and other odds. I did not upend the thing or properly dig about. I sighed and went on. I did not want to waste time searching for it, and hey, I knew the general direction, right?

Wrong. Well, not entirely. I came to a five way which terrified me, as most multi-way stops still do around here and I judged the sign pointing down the street I was meant to turn too. I waffled. These signs are not very clear and streets like to change names halfway down them. I convinced myself it was up one way and not continuing down. My inituition twigged. But I trekked on anyway. I eventually found myself in the direction of another park and I knew I had gone off course. I could still backtrack though, just lower down and through that park. It would work out. I discovered bits of amusement, like a field of sheep and perfect paths with tree tunnels. I ended up in a residential area I had gotten lost in back in September but I knew I was still moving in the right direction. I kept on.

On and on. Until I passed a sign stating I was leaving Bury St Edmunds and I began down the highway, which, in general are never the best places to be walking. In England it's just as shifty as any other place where vehicles are allowed. Except they can go faster here. Also, it was open farmland, few signs and place names I recognised but wasn't comfortably familiar with. So I turned back. And I walked and walked. Up and up. Into more residential areas but I kept on because I knew I was back in the town, I had passed the River Linnet, which marks the south end of the area and eventually I should get back to familar territory. Thing is, when you map something out. Look at a map. Or even picture paths in your mind, they always, always look a lot shorter than they actually are.

On and on. Up and up. The only thing that vaguely consoled me that I wasn't getting caught in the tangled masses of residential side-streets, alleyways and walking paths was the water tower in the distance. I couldn't see the abbey though and that's been my main compass point until now.

The houses, as character-driven as they were, still left me on edge.

I was biting my lip and checking my watch, it wasn't anywhere near dinner time, but when wandering off my track, I get nervous.

There I was, in the astoundingly hot 17 degree sun of October, distracting my mind with "what a pretty garden...oh a castle."

A castle.

On a side-note I'd like to mention how, since coming to England, there are certain things that are still so amazing but so common that you cannot wrap you mind around it, and so, like a character thrown into a chaotic battle in a fantasy novel, you just go with it.

Whatever. It's a castle.

Que me zeroing in on the building.

Wherein I found a sign pointing down the road from it stating "town centre," finding the castle to be part of a university I didn't know existed here and then the aforementioned bench in the middle of a copse of trees where I spent some time chatting to the foliage and musing on journey's.

I wondered where that street that went down from the five way stop would have led me if I had gone on it. I wondered if I had kept trekking down the highway going away from Bury, where I would have ended up.

Then I realised all that wondering did not good. I could wish, wonder and muse all I desired but nothing would change from how things went until that very second.

I have always said I love to explore and wander and yet I always find myself, even when I leave full days for it, getting nervous, worried and concerned when my directions take me to entirely unexpected places.

Ironically I later realised I had my phone in my purse the entire time, and I had kept going on the highway, I would have ended up at the 200 acre nature park I had originally been aiming for.

Instead I wandered in another park and through the west side of the city more.

I was somewhat disappointed. And yet, had I not ended up doing what I did I would not have found that glorious bench, in that entirely deserted copse of trees on that universe campus where I had the revelation that no matter what I do, it does not deserve or receive fantastic fanfare. No matter what I do, it is just stuff. No matter what I do, it is just another day. Nothing is special.

I have always been so concerned about making things count, of making the most of situations, of being curious and adventurous and pushing myself to extremes, all in the name of building foundations toward something great.

The thing is, nothing I do is anything better than anyone else. Nothing I will do will be better. The key is how I live it.

I haven't quite figured out who I really am, under all the things I have become, but hopefully I'll dig it up one of these days.

I was told recently by a fellow teacher that the best way to get anywhere with some of my struggles with the students' behaviour is to act. I need to practice the art of putting on a character in order to better control the situation.

And yet, today, the earth-bound character I am, attached to a phone like it's a life-line and attached to accomplishing certain things, or else a day is considered a waste, is not who I am. Not really.

I am an imaginist who sits on benches and has a conversation with the trees while feet kept snug in lace boots, swing back and forth and I feel like I am ten years-old and pretending I am everything from a detective, to a secret agent, to a space explorer or a faerie.

But is even that who I am?

After all, that is I when I am alone with myself and me. Who am I when it is just I?

Brain racing faster than the Orient Express,
Moony

How to Make Good Days

Today was a good day. Though you might have already guessed that. Bad days do not coincide with much more than me feeling miserable and burrowing from the world with a book in front of my nose and an inordinate amount of negativity and snark to anyone who brushes my metaphorical (and literal) shoulder. (Though I can't stand shoulder brushes on good days anyway).

What constituted my good day was, after the morning work/school chaos, getting the entire house to myself for the next three hours. Absolute heavenly bliss. The only sounds were the ones I chose to make. I got to finish reading the amazing Tom Stoppard play "Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead" and then mull over the Meaning of Life while staring at the cracked paint ceiling (there is a whole universe of stories up there).  My wrist is finally healing to the point I can play mildly intense piano pieces and I ended up in musical flow which lasted for 45 minutes before I had lay on the ice and ibuprofen.

In short, I had a brilliant morning. And to anyone reading this, yes there was a point to me possibly boring you with all the things I did earlier today.

You're good sort of day might not have anything to do with existing in a quiet space where you get full control of the type and volume of sound produced, mine however, does. I've always wondered if my oddities/issues could be explained by various psychological labels, beyond that of an extreme Introvert but then again who's to say I even have problems? Maybe I am just a nasty grump who gets irritated by people easily and finds touchy/loud children to be especially upsetting? At least, that is how people who occupy a significant portion of my life see it. Thereby I continue my process of believing myself to be an abnormal and potentially bad person who doesn't get to have tidy psychological explanations for drastic mood swings and extreme sensitivity.

Maybe you have or do feel the same? Maybe?

Well, regardless of where you are on the spectrum of what society deems normal, what society labels as abnormal and what society labels as just unpleasant individuals who cannot get along with others, I did want to share how I am working on making Good days out of my larger portion of Bad days.

A Bad day for me? 

Cue a blare of little kid television shows, the bass to all other sounds. Over that, lays the shrieking/shouting of two year olds and a four year old. Now add an augmented melody of any person trying to stop or tame that chaos. The drum beat of this symphony of chaos comes in the form of the general noises of shutting doors, cupboards, dishwaters, dryers, talking, cat meowing, or stair-stomping that comes from having nine other people under one roof. Add the piccolo solos of other people practicing their music or blasting from their computers/iPods, and there I am; hiding in my room at every interval to escape it. (And that's not even really Bad, just an everyday one).

Well, except for the constant interruption of being yelled at to let out a cat, crying downstairs somewhere, to watch little children inside or out, to deal with whatever issue is not getting resolved, or to come help with whatever current cleaning project needs to be done (because spring cleaning doesn't end until winter, and then you get winter cleaning).

A Bad Day: A bit like this endlessly repetitious and overwhelming image of ivy. Except less pretty.

Alright. Fine. So it doesn't seem half so bad as I read it back here on my laptop, however, at least to me it's all together too loud and too busy. Like headache inducing extremely.

Give me a tidy list of things to be done, or very direct orders, and I'll happily do them around other people. Ask me to navigate the same things without a tidy list and in direct fire of the chaos of nine other individuals; not happening. I'm going to hide in my room. 

I'm still horrible at the whole, making those Bad days good, or trying really, really hard to keep the Good days good. (The post-naptime, pre-dinner time is probably the most difficult time of the day, aside from attempting to wake up in the morning). Nonetheless, as the overused saying goes, nothing and no-one is perfect. If it was, we'd all be in a play, following a predetermined plot line that allows us nothing but heads, no matter how many times we flip the coin. Cheers to Rosencrantz and Guildenstern for that new perspective (Reference). And even then, in a play, we have utterly no control, and thus, that is why, despite having Bad days, at least we have the power to make them better ones.

So what do I do to make my Bad days better or keep my Good days, happy?

I go through a series of steps; starting with one or all of the following four options throughout the day. Call them my coping mechanisms.

1) I imagine. A lot. Sometimes I'm wandering through a thick forest with fog pinpricked by shafts of sun. Other times I'm floating through the sky in a hot air balloon or dirrigble. Because everything is better with steampunk. Sometimes I'll imagine my characters and think about what they might do next. Other times I just have to imagine little dancing numbers and do something mundane like counting in French.

2) I hum a random melody in my head or it's really bad, I'll sing under my breath.

3) If I'm near proper music, I'll turn it on. If I'm doing it to drown out other noise it'll usually fall some category of epic, metal, or steampunk; though I never quite drown out the other noises otherwise, I'd give myself a headache. If I'm doing it to fall asleep however, the music will probably be a soundtrack or Baroque/Romantic piano music.

4) If the above fail, or I know it's going to be a bad day that isn't going to turn sunny any time soon, I'll wear ear plugs for the day (and still manage to hear everything going on anyway, but it's less headache inducing).

To actually make the Bad day a better one, along with the coping mechanisms, you need to find and hold on to the things which will make you happy. For me, as you probably have guessed, those things that make me happy revolve around a lot of solo time. I might do things such as:

1) Writing and finishing something in a short period of time (like writing prompts or these blog posts).

2) Grabbing a fanfiction prompt from Tumblr and writing, or reading what someone else wrote.

3) Editing the multiple year backload of photographs, fiddling with Photoshop and perusing DeviantArt.

4) Going for a walk or going to the gym.

5) Eating chocolate.

You'll notice with those five things, I did not include lliterary reading, writing longer works, poetry, watching movies, tv series or anything that I need to give my full, uninterrupted attention without impulsively shouting at the person/thing interrupting my flow. Those above things are short, shallow or silly  (in the case of the fanfiction or chocolate) but give instant, quick gratification that later help in self-reminders (or sign-posts as I like to call them) when I find myself labelling the day as one of my "Bad" ones because of all my negative lash-outs and how people respond to me in turn. Instantly, the "Bad" day, looks brighter and I try to hold in any further irritation.

It doesn't always work. A lot of the time it doesn't. Lately, I've really failed at not having Bad days, but I put it down to the rhythm and schedule I got used to in the past two months, being turned sideways by my mom taking on a gardening job. Meanwhile I still remain an unemployed creative person who really should just leave for England to live for a while, as I've been wanting to; without planning things to the tiniest detail for once.

So in that, and those lists (of sorts), all I can say about how to make Good days, comes from a character in a movie who has since become my Good day avatar with her catch-phrase of "just keep swimming, swimming, swimming." In other words, carry on wayward child of the universe, keep trekking, get through the day, but make sure you don't miss the sign-posts telling you how long you have to travel, the places you could go, or what's coming up ahead.

Also, sometimes, all you have to do is step outside, take a deep breath, bend down and touch your toes (or at least do the latter bit if the weather's bad).

In the end. Making Good days is all about noticing the sign-posts the universe makes for you and making a few of your own (like eating a bar of chocolate).

Currently snacking on dark chocolate with almonds.
Moony.

Don't ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, encourage a Rambler

Today marks a New Day. A Lemon-Squeezed Candy Crown Day. The sort of day that makes one think of the following street-side attraction located somewhere in San Francisco (I think)...bit of a blurry trip that one.

Be Aware. Silly Hats Don't Care.

Lack of caution in this instance might initiate an explosion of silly hats. On the other foot however, too much caution might initiate an explosion of the following; a mosaic which is really just an artist's way of saying "organized insanity." (This is especially evident in those which take the trouble to point out different directions you might feel like trying as seen in the image of a Greek side-street below):

Which path will you take? A Conveniently Labelled Spot of Five Choices for your Patronage.

Perhaps if you can just take caution somewhere between the flavour of a potato and a peppercorn we can move on and I can explain to you just what the monumental moment of Awesome was which occured today.

As an Introvert (who also suffers from an acute fear of meeting new people). I don't get out very often. When I do, I do with people I know. Sort of like my own personal army of minions who do all the heavy lifting of introductions and mindless "how-do-you do's." (A social construct I still cannot bother to figure out the reasons behind).

Today I went out. I went out times a double chocolate cake. I went out to a writing workshop wherein I was one of two who sat with our local library's writer-in-residence and spent two hours working through the nebulous bits I had brought which I had no clue as to what I should constructively do with them. (That's the problem with spontaneous inspiration, you end up with writing which has no pre-concieved audience or forum).

At first I was flat terrified. I got better. Especially once I very carefully relinquished the pieces I had brought; a short story of which I had just completed an hour earlier and three poems that had been scribbled off on my tablet over a few days of bath tub soaks. (I have a case. It is quite safe. Well, as safe as I want it to be. Therefore, it is safe).

A nebulus vista? Maybe? The resident writer kept using the term after I dropped it.

The girl who was there with me read the poem while our resident writer read the story. She sounded enormously intelligent and had obviously been dropping in for every workshop the resident writer has been offering, plus emailing him for extra help. Yet, she loved the descriptions I used and had next to nothing to say, except a title suggestion. I asked her if it made sense because I have a tendancy to ramble. She said it did. (Later when we went over a memoir outline she was working on, I realized I know a lake's load more about writing techniques/methods/styles than she which made my usual lack of self-confidence have a moment of "oh. I do actually know things"). I felt like I had found kindred spirits at this point. Which I had. Writers. We are right together. Naturally.

The writer in residence asked to see the poem as well. After reading it he proceeded to antidote lecture me about how rambling was actually in vogue and if I had heard of a poetic style called ghazal. I had not. Nor had I heard of the journalist he recommended I read as reference toward my story's topic, a man by the name of Ryzard Kapuscinski and the book, "Another Day of Life" which apparently deals with the same concept I wrote my story on, except in Africa while mine was loosely sci-fi by being set on a nearly dead Mars. Also, he adored the ending. I just want to take a moment here to remark on the irony of spending so much brain juice and time on certain things which then usually end up okay or excellent, and then, those times you rush something off and they always get declared as superb. Irony.

I had mostly let him talk through the whole period, first when he went off on anecdotes to assure me that so long as I was respectful (how can anyone not be?!), my stories that mash Raven and Coyote next to Anansi, Eris or Monkey was perfectly alright. Then, when he went on about rambling, he definitely did so himself.

Sometimes I wonder if Maui painted that (on some Athenians house).

The case, in the point of all this exposition, is that I have finally had someone tell me it is okay to ramble so long as you know when to stop. (This realization equates to a moment of Awesome by the way). I grew up on Lemony Snicket and devoured Terry Pratchett. I still do. Douglas Adam's is one hero of many and I strive to follow Lewis Carroll's fictionally placed maxim "imagine six things before breakfast."

I have always made it my purpose to befuddle. A pasttime which derives partly from pure amusement (because I do love a good confounded face) and partly to determine whether an individual is intelligent enough to be worthy of association. Or, at the very least, whether or not they can put up with me waxing on ridiculous rambles and reconstructions of facts to fit my experimental purposes. I sawed a rubber duck in half with a butter knife once, just for the sake of a poem I was writing. I had a lot of plastic residue. It was the modern day version of sawing a human in half with barbed wire.

Oops. Apologies for anyone reading who has one of those tender stomachs. Moving on...

As much as I like to befuddle people, the world is honestly asking for it. Like the silly day-to-day interactions I mentioned earlier when meeting new people. Then again, many people have admitted to the ridiculousness of asking how a person is without actually stopping to listen, let alone here the truth. One most people don't think of (well I have yet to hear it), are fractions.

Fractions are xonstructs of the human brain which allow said brains to create what should be, according to humanity, the exact same product. A bit like a car engine assembly line. The problem however is that fractions involved, in the instance where they are most often used, substances and the word substances harkens more to chemistry than mechanical acuity. Thing is, because cooking is chemistry (yes that is what I was implying, in case I was being too obtuse), nothing comes out exactly the same. Everyone, even if they follow the recipe down to the same strength/speed/length of mixing, the same number of seeds, grains, fruits...whatever, the results might be similar but they will never ever be as exact as the mass produced constructs of factories.

Hence why I dislike fractions. Why follow something exactly that will not turn out precisely as some other person made it. Especially when you can take the general idea, mesh it with someone else's idea and perhaps a pinch of your own knowledge/preferences/experiences and make something that fits you. Not to mention the second way is more fun and certainly more freeing when you live like a student. Same goes for buying retail clothing. I do. Yes. But I have a goal to one day be able to sew my own clothes. (Though that day needs to somehow fit around my stuffing of reading, writing, reading, exercise, writing, piano, reading and writing into the hours, out of 24, not spent sleeping). 

Only a museum can make octopus's look mathmatically straight.

Anyway, so I like experimenting with things that are nonsensical. Like hanging upside down on red monkey bars at the tender age of ten and telling every kid that passes that "mayonnaise is 5% milk." I hate mayonnaise. Always have. But at the time it sounded like a true fact because I included milk, which every kid knows makes you grow big and strong. What followed was a lot of kids seriously thinking about the health benefits of mayonnaise. I still think it sounds rather pithy but who's going to take me literally nowadays?

That was grade five. Now, ten and some years later I am still a rambler of things most normal individuals consider nonsense. Today howevever, today, my rambling was recognized, not as silly humour, or utter rubbish, but a valid writing style that can be used to great effect, so long as the writer knows when to stop. So in honour of the individual who opened my eyes to the fact there are plenty more opinions than those of my peers in Writing Departments, English professors, or any one who has been inflicted with my work at some point. I'll actually name the indidual who has made me realize, in more than just my head, that as a writer, so long as I can create a compelling conflict, torture some characters and begin and end in a manner satisfying to tale tongues, then however I do so is up to me.

The great inspirer and imparter of the moment of Awesome goes by the name of Harold Rhenisch. You may find his contemplative, insightful and rather humourous blog, full of lovely photos, on the following address: http://haroldrhenisch.wordpress.com/

I must ramble my way off to the millions of writing projects that might amount to more than taking up harddrive space upon this realization they might actually be acceptable to esteemed venues like the CBC along with my favour Analog.

Always rambling. Nebulously.
Moony.

Try Again Try: The Musical

From the Director of "Once Again Today!" and "Why Me?" comes a celebrated classic.

A tale of tremulous trouble, dreams upon stars and a heroine who cannot help but push even the doors labeled "Pull." Follow along in the adventures of Moony as she works toward her dreams of becoming a pianist worthy of her family.

Will Moony get through her final performance without a hitch before the evil genius, Pressurizer, strikes again!?

Coming to a theatre near you, August 12th, 2014.

Keep on Trying!

(Also) Keep Stair Climbing. It's good for your health.

***

Aright. Enough of that. Though sometimes I do wonder if my life is actually some deranged directors film in some alternate universe. It certainly feels like it more often than not which is why I am here, blabbing. Again.

In actuality I am here to blab about a single word: Try.

Taught to children as a valuable life lesson. Never give up. Never give in. Keep on trying. Try again. Eventually you'll succeed.

All well and good. Sure. Or at least that is how it appears.

Perhaps it is time we stop saying try and start saying: Be. Just be.
Thinking things through and practice, practice, practice are so pushed in society, I for one, at least, am to sort who pushes doors, always, never realizing they actually say pull.

This is also known as: making life more difficult than it actually is because I am so caught up in trying (there's that word again) to succeed.

What is success? What is happiness?

Is it just being in flow. (Another words which is becoming a bit of a buzz. Even Deepack Chopra and Oprah have jumped onto the wagon. Their latest 21 Day Meditation is all about "Finding Your Flow."

Then again, maybe that is exactly what we all need? Learning to live in flow. Learning to just be. Instead of getting so caught up in "trying" to succeed. Or "trying" to be happy. Generations upon generations have written and spoke billions of words over what is means to succeed or to be happy. What they are defined as. Maybe. Maybe all we need is to live in flow.

Either way, today happens to be one of my good days so who knows if that is the answer.

Either way: Just be.

(Which is also about the most infuriating, simply complex phrases in the English language).

Just bee. A pun. With my most stereotypical photo.

***

In other worlds, this blog is going to attempt to fly in the direction of how to live a life of greater imagination. How to be an Imaginist. Apologies to anyone who has actually followed my last few posts and I bow to you for sticking around for those rambles as I located my footing in terms of what I actually want to bring to this corner of the internet.

The Creativi Tree.
A place where you only have to be.
Coming to theatres April. 7th, 2014.

Stumbling about with more grace than usual.
Moony.

Death by Bookshelf Part 3 of 3

In my last post I lamented how my love of reading has potentially become a crutch excuse allowing me to hide from the world rather than going out and being social and fearless. Thing is, I am an Introvert. There is nothing wrong with enjoying my own company and that of a book over the mindless chatter that comes from most social interactions, and that is even if you are socializing in a place where you can hear each other talk. Hate pubs. Never been to a club and intend to keep things that way. 

So really, that entire last post means almost nothing since I really shouldn't care what society says I should do or not do or be like. When I finish it (since non-fiction books, even chosen by me are not my first choice for enjoyment), I will be doing a post on Susan Cain's, "Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World that Cannot Stop Talking (link). Brilliant. It's the first non-fiction, semi-self-help book that has not been foisted on my by someone thinking said recommendation will make me a better person. I sigh. Dramatically. 

Anyway, what this post is all about is celebrating being buried under a whole list of books which have influenced me for various reasons and in various ways. Some are books that I return to year after year, even if the book was one I read at the age of 10 while others I have been happy to only read once. It's also mostly a post in which I get to be more self-centered than I already am being with this blog and shout to this corner my lists of favourite/influential books. (As if the universe didn't already have enough of these...*cough* GoodReads *cough*).

The Baklava. Consumed once Per Year.

In case you cannot quite read it, the books that have sat on my list of yearly reading (anywhere from 10 years to 5 years are as follows (top left to right): "The Silmarillion" by JRR Tolkien, "Howl's Moving Castle" by Diana Wynne Gabaldon, "Ella Enchanted" by Gail Carson Levine, "Mossflower" by Brian Jacques, "The Golden Book of Faerie" Omnibus by O.R. Melling, "Crown Duel" by Sherwood Smith, "The Princess Bride" by William Goldman, "The Hich Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy" by Douglas Adams, "The Hobbit" and "The Lord of the Rings" Trilogy by JRR Tolkien. I could expostulate on each for a whole post so instead, as I get around to reading each one again this year, I'll do an appreciation post then. Currently I've been a bit wrapped in piano practice and reading new things but there is alway room for these special friends. Oh, and I should mention, these are Baklava books because I find cream digusting and I consume other favourites like cinnamon on a ridiculous daily (or twice daily) basis, I eat chocolate rather regularly, peanut butter as much as cinnamon and even carrot cake happens on more than just my birthday. Baklava, however, being an anomaly, I had never heard of, let alone tasted until travelling to Greece, is something so mythological in its divine honey-cinnamon flavour that it usually only happens once. Plus, it was hard to find, though I did learn how to make it two weeks ago. I may post up the recipe and the ensuing results later this week.  

Now, for the rest of the lot, the "influential" ones. Not that the above Baklava Books aren't influential. Far from it. After all, some of them I have been reading once a year for the past ten...If that isn't influential then I might relocate my corner to Mariana's Trench.

Oxidant to Outrageous Bits of Influence

Again, since there are definitely some missing/hard to read titles, the books are as follows (top left to right): "Swordpoint" by Ellen Kushner, "Symphony" by Jude Morgan, "The Birds" by Aristophanes, "The Histories" by Herodotus, "American Gods" by Neil Gaiman, "The Old English Baron" by Clara Reeve, "Agatha H. and the Airship City" by Kaja and Phil Foglio, "The Odd Women" by George Gissing, "The Iliad" attributed to Homer, "Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell" by Susanna Clarke, "The Fox" by Sherwood Smith, "The Importance of Being Earnest" by Oscar Wilde, "The Lies of Locke Lamora" by Scott Lynch, "Going Postal" and "Thief of Time" by Terry Pratchett, "The Golden Compass" by Philip Pullman, "His Majesty's Dragon" by Naomi Novik, "Lysistrata and Other Plays" by Aristophanes, "Society at Cranford" by Elizabeth Gaskell, "Complete Works" by Tennyson, "Bleak House" by Charles Dicken, "On Fortune's Wheel" by Cynthia Voight and "Jude the Obsure" by Thomas Hardy. 

Frankly, this list could go on and on with books that I do not happen to have sitting on my bookshelf or somewhere in storage but for now, these are those which I am identifying as having influenced me in some way. A number of these I adore and have read more than once, a number I have read once and either spent a lot of time with them because of a university paper, or, just because I was off camping. Regardless, each of these books, some better than others, have taught me something, made me think or inspired me to try something. That is why I said this list could go on forever and it would probably be phyically impossible to collect together all the books I have ever read that have influenced me (and I mean this in a profound sense, otherwise you could argue everything I have ever read has influenced me, which it probably has). 

Either way, there you have a bit inside my Bookworm life. What can you deduce about my personality from these collections? 

I am me and thus not the most realiable to deduce my own spirit but I will attempt a summary in a sentence:

I am a dreamer who sees reality in the fantatical and strives to live it. 

OR

I am an old spirit who contemplates things more often than actually living them. 

OR

I am an adventurer who lives the paths few have bothered to explore. 

Not sure which is more accurate but I am terrible at summaries so there you have three different perspectives on the same sets of books and a shadow individual. Instead I urge you to check out your own collections. Maybe try this exercise. Group your books together in piles of those you could/do re-read, those which influenced you and maybe go further than I did and seperate them into different piles of influence (ie: influenced your writing style, your genre tastes, your subject knowledge, life lessons etc).

The road goes ever on and on, for this one. 

Moony.

P.S.

My tidy bookshelf that used to be double stacked and piled but is suffering inadequacy due to the house potentially going on the market. (The less favoured minions are suffocating in cardboard darkness next to the Christmas decoration boxes).

EDIT: Apologies to all who hoped I would get into the dangers of reading too much and the value of moderation. Frankly, as I have done these past three posts I have realized so long as I enjoy what I do, who is society to say how I spend my time? Yes, I do need to practice getting out in public and facing fears of speaking in front of unknown persons, but all in all, what I read, how I read, when, where and why I read, are all up to me. Much like those people who choose to be vegan, paleo or drink a glass of red wine with dinner. 

(Tidy aside from "The Hobbit: Creatures and Characters" and Vikram Seth's "An Equal Music..oops).

An Avalanche of Detour Signs

Into the West we will all go.

"You are not seperate from the whole. You are one with the sun, the earth, the air. You don't have a life. You are life." Eckhart Tolle

I like to think I embody the pastel colours of the above photograph, taken on an equally pastel temperature sort of day, mid-February, three years past when some things where similar to now and other things were mostly different.

Taking the above quote into account (and herein excuse my intentional misuse of it), I assume I am mostly different, but not entirely, from three years ago because I am part of the whole. The whole of yesterday, yester-year, tomorrow and two years from now. In reality the quote means you and I are, in alchemic terms: One and All. All and One.

Frankly that gives as much comfort as the night I deluded myself into hoping the frog (brought into my bedroom by one of my cats) that hopped into and knocked over the beside lamp before disappearing under the bed wasn't going to do any more hoping until I woke up in the morning more prepared to return it to a habitat with more water than the glass on my desk.

I have to wonder, as I sit down from the high of yesterday's celebratory day of birth (and leftover homemade Greek food), if I am life, are the ups and downs of my life so far meant to mirror the dramatics of volcanic eruptions, tsunamis and tripping over the sunbathing cat sprawl of pine tree roots? Probably not. One, tripping, on the scale of a potato beetle to the Eiffel Tower, is about as important as the stink bug. Two, why does tripping matter when a billion people are suffering the aftermaths of an earthquake? How do you reply to that?

One, everybody trips. Even your cat, or your neighbours cat (if you don't have one), or your neighbour's neighbour's cat. Two, if everybody trips, then everybody is life and life is tripping. Therefore every time someone trips a domino falls and knocks the next one over.

(This is the point in time when we reach me explaining the title of this post and purpose of this blog because why else would you bother coming here? Okay, maybe you get perverse amusement laughing at my naivitie, rambling, hideous grammar, or something, because like tripping, there is complaining, always). This tripping will manifest itself as a life resembling an avalanche. An avalanche of detour signs. This blog is both a reflection on the detours I have made in my domino track of tripping and what sort of impact I have made because I may be a potato bug on the scale of important humans but I am a perfect little bug, rolly polly tripping along as I navigate my next set of detours toward, maybe, just maybe forming one of those brilliant domino picture constructions you can go look up on YouTube now. 

Okay, not now. Almost. See, I just have one more thing to say before I let you run off into the purple. I am a nearly mid-twenty-something Introvert, Geek, Bookworm, Pianist and numerous other labels. Mostly though I am, as much as I would prefer not to admit it (so cherish this moment), human. A human who is simply trying to trip her way brilliantly through a series of avalanches that make up her Coquihalla Highway of Life.

Now, run off, gorge yourself on brilliant domino displays and think about how your detours have made an avalanche somewhere, somewhen, somehow.

Always adventuring,
Moony.

What is your impact?