I don't know why, I don't know why

Salutations, reader.

Heartfelt, because it is the way I experience life. This mental meandering finds me kinda bummed out. For friends who are concerned, it's OK, life is sort of like that ups and downs. It helps me to thrust my feelings into the virtual stratosphere, so know that at least by reading you are in a small way aiding my ailment. 

Burpa doo.

This weekend I went to the coast. I walked along the beach dicking around taking pictures of the water, hopping across foamy shores, poking jelly fish carcasses, and watching dogs poo and then calling them over to me while the owner was picking up the doodoo causing my happy chemicals to surge from sweet puppy love.

I actually did notice that I had to scuttle a bit from Alexandria Beach, where I had left my car, over to the Cannon Beach to avoid the incoming waves. I wasn't however, sure what way the water was going. Maybe I did know. Maybe I just wanted to keep walking, knowing the whole time that I would have to get in the water some when I got back. 

I didn't really think about it that much till I realized that I had walked a full hour and a half and it would take me just as long to get back. After a bend, I recognized a couple of huge rocks in the distance and thought that I was parked farther away than it looked. As I approached the spot where I had crossed it seemed to me that the waves crashing on the rock were higher than waist line.

I looked to the left away from the water to find mountain with no certain trail upward, at no moment did I question the decision of getting in the water. I took my shoes off and started in.
It was reallly fucking cold and within a few moments I lost my footing and was wading, my hand with the shoes fell down against the rock to support my weight. Soaked those through. I pushed on and my feet scraped some rocks and barnacles, then finding sandy shore and I followed that till I was able to run out on the other side. 

Coming out of the water, I was acutely aware that no one was around. At first I thought it was funny to be concerned with potentially being embarrassed at a moment like this until I realized I was actually thinking I could have easily drowned in my foolish feat. No one would have noticed for at least a few hours, if at all that night. How would have they identified me? Who would they call? What would that whole process look like?

I was totally soaked, no extra clothes in my car, at least an hour and a half away from home. At least I had remembered to pack a towel. I noticed my shoes were still in my hands, and they were much heavier than I remembered, I flipped them over to release a mini deluge onto the tan sand. Oh well I thought, at least they didn't get swept away by the water, those were my only hiking shoes, looking tall, granola, and sturdy in a sea of lanky slacker converse sneaks. I ripped off my water repellent (ha!) pants and the under regular pants were also soaked through and through. I put the water shoes back on to go to the bathroom cause gross, splish slash sloshing to the porta potty, to pee and change into my bright yellow hoodie that I miraculously had left in the car.

When I finally got back to the car I remembered that I had my phone in my pocket the whole time. I fumbled my way through the wetter than I though blue coat. I was able to pull it out and see the screen flash a couple times before it blanked out forever. I was able to distinguish in those couple flashes that I had a twitter favorite notification, a new instagram like, and that Will from TInder was cancelling our date that evening because he had to "pick his friend from work". I thought that is a fucked up reason to cancel on someone. Then the phone went out and I spent the next  few minutes trying to resuscitate it. Well, to be truthful I spent about fifteen minuted soaked, sitting on a towel in my car struggling to open the goddamned kid proof case. I finally get so pissed I just tossed it in my passenger seat and turned the car on and sped off.

Picking up a friend from work? WTF is that shit about. What does that even have to do with me? Like, if a friend of mine needed to be picked up from work at the same time I had a hot date I would be like "fuck off dude, I have a hot date, your ass can take the bus home". I sped  through the beautiful towering trees, flicking up little leaf gusts with my little car, rolling into an uncertain but hopefully drier future.

The losing the phone and date combo was a lethal one to my emo side. I totally sunk into uber sad thoughts. Thoughts about my worth, my future, social status, creative funk, my family so far away from me in Florida. I thought about why my ex who hadn't contacted me in over 6 months sent me picture of our first apartment together. Before we moved into his parent's basement, where we stayed till we broke up a year or so later. That was back in 2007, why was he messaging me now? Where do the mythical figures of our past go to rest finally? Are we always to be haunted by the specter of our sordid pasts at any moment?

It's fine, I am okay with my pasts and all, it's just maybe I am not on a solid emotional footing that week. It's like summoning an avalanche of emotional snow. I just didn't pack my winter gear, ya know? I just try not to think about it, I have dealt with all the things I needed to deal with, I just don't see the point in dwelling in it anymore, I did that for a long time. Held these sort of delusions about these characters concerning everything from prolonged emotional and physical entanglements to amusing notions of keeping up an actual friendship (even though all signs pointed to NOT FUCKING LIKELY).

I wasn't able to listen to any music on the way back home, on account of my broken phone. The radio stations on the Oregon Coast are hella po dunky, abundant country songs in which fellars are talking about their trucks, making margaritas, and going fishing. Maybe one or two, but just a little more of that shit makes me go off my rocker. I had listened to Lonesome Crowded West on the way up, so I was a little butt hurt I couldn't listen to more MM on the way back.

I wish people said butt hurt more. It would give us a nice excuse to think about anal sex. I mean.. uh, not think about it and pretend that we had.

Anyway, I sat in traffic for like an hour during which time I had calmed down enough to think of using a plastic card to pry the otterbox case off of my moist warm brand spanking new now obsolete hunk of pretty rose gold plastic. I finally got it off and it wasn't any better on the inside, some more water and no response to any sort of stimulus. Like me at night on the couch about thirty minutes into Interstellar.

I was bummed about the guy cancelling the date, though not incredibly surprised. That fact almost sadder than the actual event because I am now desensitized in such a way. Maybe that brings with it it's own joys?

Most everything else is pretty good.

I don't have any wise ending words tonight. It was Halloween today and I ran some errands and had pho with a friend. I just feel like hugging someone who loves me. I am ok though. You can't always have what you want and my arms wont forget how to work. 

Until next time you beautiful person you, expect great things.

responding to the waves as they fly by

Salutations!

I was inspired to produce this blog post by something that was in the news recently, not because it is directly related, but because I am trying to become better at recognizing revolutionary thought when it happens and taking the initiative to think it through. The news that inspired me was the reorganization of Google into a new parent company called Alphabet. I was really pleased by the shift, mostly I think because of the approach of the CEO. He approached it as a rethinking and refocusing of energy towards a new venture that was more nimble in terms of action and more able to take risks. Implying, I think that this shift would really catapult the company into a new category of innovation and possibility in modernity. Or, perhaps that is how I am interpreting. The ability to take risk is a scary and sometimes a foolish pursuit, shaking up the status quo does not come naturally to many.

What drives us if not the volition to exeed our expectations of ourselves? What would we be capable of if we had wings to fly? If the boundaries to our landscape were lifted, would we spill out of the corners of propriety? 

There are the physical boundaries, and there are the metaphysical. In many ways I am talking about both. Where is the realm of our minds? Where the unenacted possibilities? 

There is much to cloud our perception. 

The pressure of our quiotidian lives, the ever more perturbing news headlines that truly make it seem like we as a society are walking backwards.

But what about me?? 

This is, my blog after all, how do I feel that all fits into my scheme of things. Right?

Well, only as much as I can will it to. How much does the individual will affect the collective consciousness? How much should it to matter to me?

The words rumble so quickly past the mental cavity it's hard to fit it into the keys and in between the spaces. Our universe is dying too, did you know?

The way we share is transforming, the way we love? Will that stay the same? Because I am not elsewise occupied does that mean i am more driven to create something enduring? 

As the crooked roman nosed homosexual turns his face into a slow shake, I can't tell you why I am ridden with more swiftly moving questions than barreling down the pike. Words my lovely companions through the wrought, also my slight arch nemesis as they drone on intangible yet  indelible in their hold. They are vehicles for my expression, you understand, the stuff of mind transferred to the outside world like it matters. Cause it does.

And that is why I am here, but even still I don't acknowledge it to the most of it's potential.

How close am I, I wonder. If the whole of possibility was a  color spectrum, what side would I be on? Are there those who are color blind? Who cannot see the breadth of it? What of the insecurity and the words left unsaid?

I am honestly more interested in myself, in the articulation as faithful to the grey matter as I could hope to get. I want to PUSH, i want to get to the boundaries, but I don't understand what that means, only that it exists.

How can I be sure of that? I feel it.

Brushing past my brow with voracity.

I am at a bar currently as I write this.

I am thinking about the dates that I have been on here. The lives I have touched, however briefly. What yardstick do we use to gauge our significance? Could I have mattered in a profound way?

I just feel like I am deep. But, what does that even mean? And why do I value it? Maybe I am just on an unaided quest to elevate human thought. Ha!  

Maybe I need more hobbies. But, like, what if it's true?? What if this inkling is suggesting at something higher? 

It would be nominal. That is bashing, but really even I was thinking the most epic, progressive, forward moving thoughts, that would propel existence to new un hitherto known levels I still wouldn't have the bandwidth to get it out. Or, maybe I am more selfish than wanting to expel that energy.

It'd be funny if someone I went on a date with once would come in here on another date, a whirly twirly merry go round, we all pick a horse and GO!

I want the sea unicorn.

Oh yea, so how is things Ivel? (you may be asking) Well, I can tell you.

Things are pretty fine. 

Portland is Portland, and I am trying to take advantage of the openness of it all. The simultaneous din of it all. It's a beautiful thing, for all my loneliness and sadness, I totally recognize the blessing that it is to be here. Working my job. Living in my apartment.

I just need some fucking milestones.

I am uneasy with the lull. My restless personality makes it difficult to acquiesce to the temptation of living day to day. Improvement is the prime directive, it is not an optional occurrence of happenstance.

I have decided that age is as good a mile marker as any and that 35 will be the one.

So. I am just at the cusp of 33.

WHAT OF IT.

A couple of years. To dick around, to figure "it" out. Again again again.

For better or worse it seems that Portland will be the formative years of my thirties, I think it's not as "easy" as other places that I have been. And while that has caused pause in me up till now, what the fart! When have I ever backed away from a challenge (real or perceived)? 

The loneliness is, admittedly, taking it's toll.. Fuck it though. I can't let fruition of self be dictated by the inability of the male folk of Portland to get hip to the amazingness that is moi.

Shooooot.

So, that leaves me here. And here is just fine.

For one because of the options, and for two because I am a creature who makes the most of where I am at.

I fucking thrive, godammit.

I think, honestly, that I had envisioned having the whole shebang more or less dialed in by now. In some ways it's really shitty that I haven't. Mostly because of the mental work I mentioned earlier, because ideally whatever situation got me feeling "settled" would also have been conducive to growth. Right now, I am in charge; of all the bills, of all the medical shit, of all the health, and most poignant, of ALL of the thoughts. They over floweth, my dear readers, I just have to figure out how to sort, catalogue, and implement or file away. That is not as complicated as it sounds, just more work than I had anticipated, and at a time in which I might very well rather have alternative focuses, stayin alive does take up a good bit of energy, my friends. Especially when your penchant for shaking things up continually rips you away from any semblance of community or people who give three shits about you and thrusts you into the unknown.

A writhing, squirming, larvae. 

:D

I think that's it from the front lines, dearest kittens. I didn't move the needle as far as I wanted, but i started to at least and that is what matters.

Until next time, Be Well and....

Expect Great Things..

Did I build this ship to wreck?

Salutations dear readers.

Whashappeningg??!

It's been Months and Months since my last confession. Why's that you ask (or, really, probably didn't ask, let's be real)? Well, shit has been going down, both the well and the unwell and I have been a little bit too preoccupied to sit down for a mother loving minute to jot it all down. Also, truth be told, I was being courted by a strapping young buck of man and had my hands full. So, I wasn't rushing off to the presses to tell you how in love I was and how everything was going to peachy keen up in the PNW. 

In truth, it wasn't doing either of those things. 

I had a falling in with a feller who elicited those sort of feelings that make you want to want to think about forever, one of the reasons I stalled a little bit more on the falling out than I should have, but more on that later.

Work is workish.

I am doing really well in my job currently! Yay! Blooming still feels like an everyday struggle though, so I guess I am doing something right. I don't think I would ever be satisfied by a career where I knew everything, or in which I wasn't continually being challenged to think of things in a different way. I am a creature that yearns for challenge, that is stubbornly indignant when out thought, and that needs to be pushing against the limits of my breadth and depth constantly, and in many ways.   But, anyway, people are noticing, which is swell. I am trying to keep it up, which is hard. We will see where all that goes, nothing in life is static, and growth necessitates new environments to flourish. I am not sure how that will manifest but I am keeping an eye on nourishment and doing my best. Or trying to anyway...

I've been listening to a lot of Florence and The Machine lately, I have been trying to figure out why and I think it is because the tenor of the music and the power in her voice and lyrics really resonates with the way I feel about life. It's messy, its meaningful, and it hurts so sweetly sometimes. My emotional gamut stretches far beyond that which I am verbally able to articulate, and I am so grateful for that experience because it feels raw and guttural. It feels like the a chorus of angels are singing your soundtrack and every encounter is a holy experience. 

My white whale? My albatross around the neck? My red herring?

My crisscrossed stars are not impressed.

So yea, with this dude. It didn't work out.

I don't know what it is. In the sentences that follow I will try to fulfill at least an infinitesimal attempt at trying to describe, and truly, having to articulate it for this blog post might be the closest I have gotten to get it out all comprehensible like since they happened inside of my heart. Sure, I have told some people, but really it's not a complete story. Let's see what I can do here...

I have been told I am intense before, I never quite understand what people mean by that. I just kinda live my life, you know? When I think something, I usually think about it deeply, even things like being stuck in traffic, or cold brewed coffee interactions. I am emotionally in tune with the world around me and am constantly not only reading, but trying to make the other's experience better. Well, for the most part, in rare cases it resolutely does not work, then, ironically I tend to get annoyed with the person.

Anyway... 

I was seeing someone for a brief moment, and ultimately what caused me to decide that I needed to walk away was the fact that I could not emotionally connect with this guy. I was trying to be as giving and as understanding as I could be, but ultimately for me it was more important that I be with someone who is both receptive and able to reciprocate with a similar emotional response.   It's an important thing, a value that I hold dear; I need to be able to have deep and meaningful conversations with someone. Sure, sometimes about politics, but also about the nature of existence, comic books, Plato, what to have for dinner, and why wearing a plaid shirt and liking Modest Mouse does not a hipster make. Wax poetic. It was beyond emotional connection though, it has to do with being true to my expectations of what I want to mean to a partner. I am not in the business of settling.

Deal breakers: smoking (vaping counts!), and constantly checking your phone.

Beauty is not everything and I guess it's not a good sign if one masturbates more after getting into a relationship than before... Not that that happened to me or anything.

I love dark chocolate, but sometimes I am just in the mood for milk.

That's not like a euphemism for anything, it's just a bad segue. 

Deez nuts!

I have been thinking about how culture is related to dating and how one can convey something culturally innate to something as close as a partner will become. Honestly, part of me is slightly mortified of owning up to the possibility that being Latina affords me more of an access to a passionate and fiery existence; I think that is weird. I have always been of the mindset that you craft your own legacy, using in part what surrounds you and what you want to be. I know, especially as I get older, that my affordances are dictated by culture in mostly all respect, and that all of my relationships are inextricably somehow related to how I identify.

I think I was super lucky in my early twenties to run with a crew that was truly not paying attention to those issues, at least not in anyway that made me feel different. In my "coming of age" I was not preoccupied with identity, I was being in love and experimenting with worldly things. It was flipping great, and in many ways I am probably yearning to go back to that time, even though I know that time will never come back.

I like where I am now, I don't want to front like life outside of the cave is all terror and shit. It's just the amalgamation of the years and experiences has really created quite the powerhouse. With it, the recognition that it will also take some kind of man to meet that. 

I don't effin know what that means and much less what to do about it!

I am earnest and open hearted, which I am pretty sure just means I am going to be a lonely star wars role playing spinster.

Alright kittens, I am le pooped, and I want to make sure I get this out to you, I am sure I might do some rewording and tweaking later.

Until next time lovelies, expect great things!

The last dodo

Salutations! 

My deepest apologies for the lapse in posting entries. I have been bananas bonkers busy with work and have filled up my schedule to the brim once more.

Portland life is still lonely, but at least now I have a lot that fills up my hours.

I am doing the aforementioned things of art class (printmaking, which I really enjoy and want to pursue) and volunteering with the Oregon Humane Society ( which has yet to kick off in full force).

 My first set of prints.

For today's post I am recycling one of the pieces I wrote for my writing project with May.

The theme for this one was "I Am Bird". I really enjoyed writing it.

:)

The Last Dodo

Ophelia looked around and thought, "Well, there are worse things that can happen". 

But really what could be worse than being the last of your species? We all die, eventually, she thought. Seeing her brethren go the way of, well, the dodo didn't come as a surprise or a shock because it had been a slow wane instead of a fell swoop. As more and more of her friends and family disappeared into the earth from whence they came her thoughts dissolved into the murky indistinguishable realm of trying to decipher the meaning of existence. To no avail, try as she might there was no reasoning that made sense, and being qua being, or existing for existence’s sake seemed just about as pointless as any of the other options.

Her gizzard stone rumbled about in her belly, it had been hours since her last meal. She was hungry but also still mourning the loss of her close friend Clyde, who had died just four hours ago. She decided to go for a walk on the beach to clear her thoughts, and maybe find a snack crawling along the shore rocks. Ophelia had always enjoyed the ocean, something about it made her feel insignificant in a comforting way.

The clear blue skies were always just slightly out of reach, sparkling with the promise of freedom from gravity. A promise broken by a few dark quills on her back, what a cruel joke it is to be a flightless bird.

Bitterness did not become her and with the demise of the rest of her kin she had resorted to thinking about all the ways that things had gone wrong for the dodos. The continuous shift in settlements had made it hard for them to take root in any one place, and their contested relationship with the ravishing sailors who thought them nothing more than tasty tidbits didn't abate the situation either. Even those who had tried to rally for unification and the stability of settlements had been met with resistance movements from factions who believed that constant motion was the only way to evade extinction.

Clearly, they had all been mistaken. There was no way of knowing, of course if it could have been avoidable at all. Once the wheels of destiny are set in motion in a certain direction it would take an act of a super natural force to dissuade them from their course.

She skipped along the rocks until she found an unlucky crustacean scuttling about in a crevice, she scooped him up with her enormous bill, and thought "it's already over for you little dude, I’m sorry".

At 14, Ophelia felt that she had lived a full life, so now that the end was palpably close, it didn't really feel so harsh. She was never one to fear the unknown or the inevitable.

She did miss her family sometimes though, and no logic could think her out of feeling her emotions, and even though she was a simple creature, she fancied herself particularly discerning. Her eyes drifted over the white foam of the surf, the air was cool, and her feathers bristled all of a sudden, the stark absence of companionship washing over her once more.

She thought about the loneliness, really poured her mind into thinking about purpose and reason, and why communities matter so much for a worthwhile existence. Love is the meat of life, it fills us with meaning and aim, and without it we are adrift. A collection of fragmented sentiments floating like flotsam, circling around the emotional stratosphere, yearning for a beacon. There was more to fulfillment than she could explain or even understand, but she recognized its absence. The beauty of the flowers, the crisp of an insect, the wet grass between her toes in the early morning, it all felt empty without someone to share it with.

She thought about Clyde, her friend of so many years. She had never made a connection with someone quite like Clyde, he listened to her and understood where she was coming from. There was never any awkward moments between Ophelia and Clyde, they had known each other only a five short years, and he was a few years younger than her. There was something special about the fact that he had made it through all the suffering and loss with her, by her side, her ally and touchstone. She still couldn't believe he was gone.

There was no way to hold the overwhelming feelings of sadness that engulfed her, she looked up, fixed her gaze on the horizon, and walked into the ocean. She was scared but she kept walking until her three pronged feet barely grazed the sea floor. She had never learned how to swim and found that she was floundering and gasping for air in spite of her intentions, she turned around and found her footing. She waded back to the shore and plopped herself down on the beach coughing and shaking her head. No, she wouldn't do that, nature would take care of it for her, there was no need to fight against the instinct to survive, knowing that she would be crushed no matter what happened.

Ophelia looked up at the setting sun and saw a flock of seagulls flying into the sunset.

What if, she imagined, I was a bird?

I am a bird, she replied to herself almost instantly, and I am the last of my kind.

She took some comfort in that fact now, and as the sun slid into the rims of the mountains in the distance and skies turned flaming shades of orange and pink, she felt lucky and grateful for being a part of the whole mess. She was concerned for those who would live their lives after her, unsure of their futures unlike she had held hers in complete certainty.

An end is at least, a place. A place we are all headed to.

Just like you are now...

Until next time my babies... Expect great things..

Aren't you cold, Finn?

Salutations! 

Here in find the fourth installment of my Writng club pieces. It has definitely drained my writin energy these days.

In a good and bad way,

Anyway, enjoy! 

What is Most Hopeful

 

Hope

Noun

1.

A feeling of expectation and desire for a certain thing to happen.

Synonyms: hopefulness, optimism, expectation, expectancy;

2.

Archaic

A feeling of trust.

Verb: hope; 3rd person present: hopes; past tense: hoped; past participle: hoped; gerund or present participle: hoping

1.

Want something to happen or be the case.

 

So it’s not the best place to start. I guess it’s just ironic happenstance that I am feeling kinda down on the week we are writing on hope. I am determined to stay on topic, and I am reminded of that Emmerson quote “When it’s darkest, men see the stars”. Not that I am in any way in my darkest days, they are pretty darn cloudy though, let me tell you. Where do I find hope then in the times when the sun won’t shine? Sometimes I look to kindness in others, sometimes I look to babies because they are the epitome of hope, and sometimes I look to the gutter.

People show an extraordinary gamut of emotion at any given moment in their daily lives. If you watch people closely they will sometimes display the most haphazard emotional reactions in the course of just a few minutes, a complete maelstrom of intent. To be honest, most of the time I am not impressed by the interaction with the average human, rarely am I really greeted with the kind of kindness I espouse. To be fair, I don’t think people are ill intentioned innately, I do think that they are very often too caught up in their own goings on and emotional upheavals to really see the people around them. Sometimes with really good reason, and sometimes because they were never exposed to empathy and have no internal correlation to what it’s like to think of the other, no matter who they are.Most often I feel I am exposed to this in service industry applications, a circumstance that I am particularly sensitive to. I think people have very particular thoughts about those that serve them, thoughts that often discount the server’s life, goals, past, and intentions. It is folly, and it drives me batty. So what gives me hope about cranky people? I guess it’s the way that I see little glimmers of understanding and mercy in people too. People can be kind, and even if it’s not the majority of the time, the fact that it can happen even at the darkest of times gives me enough hope to believe in the power of humanity.

Hope does not just spring forth from humanity, and I find that babies of any sort are one of the most beautiful and assertive ways that Mother Nature proclaims her victory against despair and all that which is forlorn. There is something about that newness of existence, that proclamation that the future doesn’t have to be as fucked as the past, that this fresh piece of flesh has the potential to make things better, make things different, make things right, without even knowing it. It’s helpless without care and nurturing, it needs love and attention to grow, as do many adults. Even in the shittiest of circumstances, most mommas will ensure their babies will thrive. There is something powerful about the unknown future of the spawn of today, how will they react to the perils of the world we have left them? If our species has taught us anything it has shown us that we will prevail even in the most gruesome of circumstance. I am curious about the babies of today and what the future will hold, when I look at them I am indeed hopeful, if also a little worried and wary of the path they tread.

Which brings me to the gutter. What is it about looking at our most blighted hours that makes me look up to the stars? I think it brings me back to something my dad used to always say, “Never look at people who have it better off than you, always look towards those who have it worse off”. Though I know he brought it up when I was moaning about wanting a new Sega game, or being mopey about having my braces tightened, it has stuck with me throughout all of the years and made me very earnestly appreciative of the life I have before me. Truly the chasm of dichotomy between the haves and the have nots has stretched ever wider in my later years and this adage still holds steadfast. I know it is part and parcel of keeping people in line and keeping that one percent above the rest, I am not dumb. I am also just not too concerned, perhaps because my reality allows me the luxury of not being overly preoccupied with overthrowing the status quo. I am confident I am doing my piece to make the world better and in the meantime don’t get caught up in worrying, because I don’t think it’ll do any good. I have come up with a saying of my own: if you can change something, stop worrying and make efforts to change it and if you can’t change it then why waste the energy worrying about it. It’s a kind of content call to action; I have come to peace with the dichotomies that surround me.

Sometimes hope is found in the most unexpected places, especially when you aren’t looking for it. I am for the most part, a positive person, thoughtful and kind, so hope is never too far off. I must say that I am also glad to be away from it also, because it is then that the stars shine the brightest. I know I will always be a beacon, until I die, there are few ways of fighting ones fate, not like I would want to anyway. I hope I am always able to bring light to those around me, even in my darkest days. The light you shine, shines back brighter.

 

Until next time my kittens, you know what to do, 

Expect great things!

 

Vestige of a Lingering Past

Salutations! 

Today's post is part of a writing exercise I am working on with a friend. We came up with some topics, tossed them in a bag, and then chose one to write about.

The first topic was: Modest Mouse.

I didn't write that topic, but I guess you could say that I might have some thoughts about it...

Here they are:

Having a favorite band is a cheesy thing. It’s the kind of thing kids judge you by in middle school, a time you haven’t quite acquired enough lived experience to garner other markers of greatness. In that era, the choices were more based on what we wanted ourselves to be, musical prophesies portraying our most desired selves. I was pretty punk in those days, a fact that can now retrospectively read as a bid for power and a sharp anti-authoritarian streak. Most likely this was born of my aversion to organized religion, or a penchant for skater boys, both pretty important life choices if you ask me. 

Favorite bands come and go with the years, often matching patterns of upswells and downward spirals. I would say the signature greats of my youth still remain pretty significant to me today, they instilled in me a sense of questioning authority that is a marked personality trait. More importantly however, they prompted me to think. I found solace in the chords and ramble of politically charged lyrics, I found comfort in the notion of a societally disenfranchised minority.

The older I got the less important music became to me. I was introduced to nerd rock by a boyfriend and music became less about angst and struggle and more about fun and light heartedness. The bands of that time in my life were never to become my favorites. They were a way to pass the time but never something that resonated with the core of who I was. I began to think that music was not something I was terribly into, just something to place in the background while life was happening.

Then I met my favorite band.

Modest Mouse isn’t an epic band. At least not in the way that most people would categorize or conceive such a thing. They weren’t particularly revolutionary in the way they played or the things they sang about. Truth be told I actually had an aversion to them for a few years because I thought their name was dumb (beacon of understanding, I know). When I finally got around to listening to them it hit me like a ton of bricks in the face, I was hard crushed by the beauty of it.

I would now say that I am certainly lyrically driven. There is something about the blue collar poetry of Isaac Brock that brings me to me knees emotionally. It resonates deep in my being, expressing thoughts I had not yet managed to conjure to the surface. Truly part of what was attractive to me about the music was that he was, in a way embracing not knowing the ultimate purpose, acknowledging being an asshole, and making it ok.

It must be said now that there was a time in my life in which I thought I was no good. I felt that deep down inside I was a callous, disconnected, and cold person.

This may be surprising for you to hear if you know me now. Or even if you knew me back when I actually believed it to be true. I am a characteristically warm person, I smile all the time and am very concerned with the comfort and well-being of others. When I was in my early twenties I was hung up on deserting my family in Florida, especially my mom, who has epilepsy and narcolepsy. I don’t think I was consciously aware of feeling this “hung up” on my decisions to leave my house. Quite the contrary, I think I would say that I was very empowered by my choices and volition. Especially because in many ways I was flying in the face of everything I had been brought up to know as my historical, though admittedly latent, cultural ties back to Cuba, where my family is from. 

I was a rebellious kid, as you may remember from my punk rock days, but not because I hated my family or wanted to be as far away from them as I could get, as they would guilt trip me into believing. I was rebellious because my thoughts didn’t follow any particular convention, because I was stifled by a state of affairs that would dictate my future before I had a chance to fuck it up all by myself.

I always knew I wouldn’t. I trusted myself and my choices, even if I felt like I was a bad person for putting me first, that wasn’t going to stop me from moving forward. It never has. The consequence of that way of thinking was that part of me always felt like a selfish asshole. I think in some ways this was detrimental in me creating healthy, positive relationships with the people in my life. In a part of my mind and in the way I related to them, they were always dispensable, and I knew that I had to be ok with removing them (or myself) from the equation if it became necessary to protect my free will and self-directed trajectory.

When I think about it now, it’s not an absurd premise or reaction to have, you grow up in an environment that squelches individuality and inculcates you to be unequivocally beholden to a paradigm that you believe is stifling and fundamentally full of shit and of course you are going to be an asshole. It’s more about self-preservation than it is about the outside world. I know that now, I didn’t know it then.

These days I am more prone to pop music. My happiness is brimming from my psyche and spilling out onto the radio dial. While I still prefer the more solemn choices I find myself also more open to other more conventional outlets.

That all said, I always come back to Modest Mouse. I fluctuate in which albums and songs I prefer, but there is always one that is appropriate to every moment. I think, as happy and positive a person as I am, my thoughtfulness will always set me in a place of understood sadness.

Because, nothing means anything, really. At least it’s nice to know that I will always have a favorite  band to come home to. 

Till next time, my kittens, you know the drill...

Expect great things!

Like that time I started to say things then stopped.

Salutations my dear readers,

It's been a good while since my last confession, er, blog post...

I guess I have been keeping busy, things have been bustling on the friend scene (surprise!), including but not limited to weekend getaways with new friends, multiple visits from old ones, and outdoor excursions, all nestled in dates and going out in general it's just been a regular ol' life.

SO.

What of it.

I stopped seeing my shrink cause I realized (succumbed to the fact that) those kinds of things are for the bourgeoisie and not for poor folks like me who have things like sanity and student loans. It's fine, at this point in my life it's not like I don't *know* what are the things I need to do and how I need to get them. I am not saying that I can't use some help, I think we all can, but at present I am definitely not in a position that places me in a situation in which that recourse is economically viable.

That's cool.

I think I need to find my own bootstraps so that I can pull them up. Which, is easier said than done, but now that I have been living in Portland for a year (almost) I feel like I am in a better position to figure those other bits out. It's so friggen difficult when you have this enormous goal you are working towards and then you get there and you are left looking around flummoxed, trying to pin down what comes next. It's a process. All the time.

What do "adult goals" look like? 

Is it money? Is it other types of career related markers? Is it family? What elements are within my control and which ones are not? Am I at peace with those parameters, whatever they may be?

I think what I have to focus on now is how I am going to leave my mark on the world. Is that mark is going to be my next goal or I am content to "work a job" and then come home and have other interests I am cultivating. A mark can/will be made either way, I guess what I am reckoning with right now is how much energy I have to devote and how I want to direct my efforts. Sure, I am poised to "make a difference" where I am right now, but how is my work now laying the groundwork for my future self.

It's really meaty heady stuff to consider. One of the nice things about getting older is that you realize that there is a certain pace to life and thought process, and you begin to become patient (not complacent) with the unfurling of the future. In some ways we have a lot of time, and in others any moment can be our last. Finding the balance in living a fulfilling life is, in my estimation, acknowledging the extent of your volition and the reality of your breadth. 

Whatever that may be.

For now, if  I listen to the pleas of my past self I need to get on the ball with the volunteering thing. Truly, I am ingesting the landscape of life right now. It's nice, I am all like, settling in and stuff. Coming into my own and whatnot. 

Properly transitioning into my 30's!!!

Huzzah.

Anyway.

I am still single, surprise surprise! OI...

Nothing to be done. I am at the more peaceful side of wits end. I know I can't actually do anything about it. I killed my facebook a few months ago (it's going great!) and kept the Tinder and OKC to sort of mitigate my pangs of desolation. But really, I am crazy! I will block a bloke because they don't reply in a day and I will write someone off because they have bad breath (who wants to swap spit with stinky?!). 

I am so far gone on this tirade of love that I have lost all semblance of what "organic" or "holistic" could connote in this circumstance. I am really thinking I need to just cut off the online thing all together, consider the rest of my life and just throw a big ol' fuckitall in the face of my demons.

Getting there, don't you fret, Self.

AND

That is an update my dears!!! I hope it satiates your palate in terms if Ivel.

Oh, I was in a magazine! 

Here it is: http://www.portlandmonthlymag.com/news-and-profiles/science-and-technology/articles/the-mad-science-behind-omsis-greatest-exhibits-october-2014 

That was rad.

Otherwise, as in all in life and for the nether my dears, expect great things...