now listening to: bonobo – dial ‘m’ for monkey
now reading: walden
Walden! WALDEN! I would have never guessed that Walden was the book that at this time in my life, would make me so happy, that would reaffirm my faith. I really think this is why. I read it when I was very young, before experiencing sex. I think when you read it after having gotten some intimate human life experience in, once you have seen people up close and realized you’re not like everyone else, when you read it, you appreciate how he sees things, and how he calls people out. I think it’s time we start pushing the people who are powerful positive reality projectors to wake up and come out of hiding.
Before I get into my ruminations and digressions, I’ll give you a physical update.
Drove up the 1 along the coast. It was sublime. Saw a lighthouse at the end of a cliff. Felt like it was my sister and I almost pulled a 180 on the freeway because I was so compelled by it. Love that on a Monday afternoon, this road is only for the privileged few who are free.
I love long drives. The way the swell and fall of the hills and landscapes make me feel like I’m following the curves of an expansive, all-powerful woman in repose, the way the handling of a car around tight cliffside turns reminds me that life is precarious, but with the right combination of fearlessness and zen, you ultimately control your progress. It’s an aesthetic rejuvenation, a journey of appreciation, a path towards realizing how small you are in the face of the great expanses of nature, yet realizing that you are infinite.
I checked in and the girl in the office with too much make-up commented, wow, you’re staying in a cabin by yourself. I sigh inside. C’mon sister, we don’t blow each other’s covers like that. So I have to go with my backup story, that I’m meeting someone. What’s his name, she asks. I’ll create a car tag so he can park. I mean, he’s not being dropped off or anything is he?
Christ. Okay, we’ll play this through. I give her the name of my shadow character, the faceless character my protagonist chases in my book, whose name came to me in a dream. His name… 11 + 11 > 22. Somehow, when I dreamt his name, I had been gifted a name in which the numerology of the letters added up exactly the way they needed to. Sometimes the universe wants you to know it’s there.
So I was amused that this was the first time I’ve gotten someone else to write his name. I do hope he will be meeting me at my cabin. But I will have to get that car tag back.
Night falls and I’m sitting on the deck of a cabin, nestled in a redwood grove with the ocean separated by just a cliff. I’m sitting close to a fire I’ve built myself, and am listening to the wind through the trees as the fire lives its own brief and frenetic life below me. It feels like it has so much to say.
I’ve noticed:
When I am me, people tend to stare. It doesn’t make me uncomfortable, just wary and more focused. I made only one stop on the drive, at a general store to pick up bottled water. Conversation stopped when I walked in and a happy guy in a fishing hat stepped right in front of me and introduced himself. A very friendly but impulsive sort. I chatted as I kept moving, striding towards the cold display. I heard whispering and I turned to see three Hispanic guys huddled together and giggling. When they saw me looking, they abruptly stopped and smiled. I nodded but didn’t smile. Sometimes you have to be careful when it’s a group of guys aware of you, though 3 is less problematic than 2.
I grabbed some water, but as I got in line, the guy who had first introduced himself moved to the back of the line and asked me questions about what I was doing and where I was from. I answered politely, though guardedly, and then became fixated over what canned goods they had on their shelves. He turned to the cashier and started talking about me, about how great it is for people from Los Angeles to come through and how nice they are, and I just kept myself occupied until he left.
I paid for my bottles of water and saw one of the Hispanic guys on the lookout in the doorway and as I came around the corner, he turned his head like he wasn’t watching. I walked by him and in the corner of my eye, he looked like he was going to say something, but I kept going and he didn’t have the guts. I got in my car and immediately started up the engine, made it look like if they didn’t leave I was going to. So as they pulled out, the two guys on the passenger side were pressed against the windows staring but I busied myself cleaning up wrappers in my car. I wish I had brought a hat.
So finally, I get to be me, by myself, communion with the fire that I had given life to. The half moon hanging above the tall redwoods, the loves of my childhood. Nearby, a creek babbles to itself and anyone who will listen. And everything, feels infinite.
I thought about so many things. I thought about people. I thought about how people tend to come in and out of my life, but how reconnections with positive people always feel like no time has passed, though the faces slightly change. I thought about the people I currently have in my life, and took the time to think about each person individually, exploring what is uniquely beautiful about them and really appreciating and loving them, feeling thankful that they have come into my life.
I find it wondrous that somewhere over the last few months, I fell in love with someone, despite not knowing yet with whom. It’s like a part of me has been psychically sending out secret admirer letters and has fallen hard, but I can’t see who the recipient is. It could be anyone in my life (or maybe not physically here yet!) and maybe that person knows, but no one seems to want to tell me or step forward. So I’ll just go with it. I like mysteries.
After a while, it got cold so I went inside and started up the little gas fireplace. It’s really not the same as a wood-burning fire, but I’ll go with it. I sat in a lounge chair and did some writing. I know where I’m stuck with this book. It’s about how I’ll need to write this so that people will understand and believe in magic. Because it happens all the time if you want it to, if you allow it to.
I had started posting about the Morcheeba concert I went to on Sunday night but I ended up getting too sleepy. But I’ll tell you about it now. It was beautiful. It was amazing. It was like liquid foreplay that engages your heart as well as your passions. There is something so soulful, so fun and frisky, yet so far-reaching to hear them live. I’d been feeling so bad the night before, having a surplus of dark energy and suddenly, as soon as the lights on the stage turned a rich navy and the music began, it all seeped out of me like an energy offering through a spiritual portal that had suddenly opened. And I felt so good, so free and again, like I was on the right track and the universe has something unique for me if I’m brave enough to follow. I was feeling so good and people were looking at me and sharing smiles.
I didn’t know the Fonda theater has a rooftop deck! It was amazing, an amazing night to hang out on a roof and watch people. It was so easy to see people, to see people cowering with their insecurities and anxieties, to see people who were predatorial, to see people who were downright bored. I saw a guy walk by with a girl following. She walked with a demeanor of a servant being led by an invisible leash. I didn’t like that, but I think some woman allow it to happen by not believing they are so much bigger and more powerful than what a man tells her. Then I saw the most beautiful man I’ve seen since childhood, his features so fine and delicate like a lily about to bloom. I was looking at him and appreciating his potential, what he was on the verge of, when I saw the girl he was with mad-dogging me. Her shoulders were a little sloped and she was hugging herself anxiously as she talked. Small
person energy. I had to be careful because she looked like she was just daring for me to start trouble so I looked away and busied myself listening to this aggressive drunk girl who’d had a timid, agreeable guy cornered between a wall and a potted plant, rhetorically wondering what her psychological issues were that made her so complex. Oh man, if he had a machine to transport himself away from her. I was giggling, it was so funny. I looked back over at the beautiful boy and the girl was still staring at me. I looked the other way and it was a group of guys who kept inching closer and closer to me, all the guys laughing and joking but sneaking glances at me. It felt too complicated so I went back downstairs.
I was enjoying the show, smiling to myself when I saw the sexiest man walk in. He was free, like me, like what I want to be. From his eyes, the way he dressed, the way he spoke, the way he moved, he was magnetic and freely emanating his energy. He was with a girl and I didn’t want to be rude and mad-dogged again so I figured I would let him come to me if he wanted to. So I decided to create a little energy storm.
I pulled out my phone and started stream of consciousnessing on the memo pad. I wrote about connections, how sometimes between two people, you don’t just decide you like someone. Often, people can find each other attractive or interesting, but when there’s an actual connection, something intangible that makes two people stand out to each other, then it’s something you can either ignore or pursue. I was going to pull him in if this was indeed a connection.
As I was typing this, I would look up occasionally and catch him looking at me. We smiled at each other once, but I would look away quickly. Again, I was feeling shy and I didn’t want to be disrespectful to the girl he was with. Suddenly, he turns and grabs the girl by the shoulders and says , “Are you a lesbian now since the last time I saw you?”
I started laughing. I knew he’d said it so I would know that he’s not with her. I looked up and saw him looking at me, laughing as well though she was responding to him, and I looked down again, typing on my phone. When I looked back, he was looking confused, and I knew it was because he was wondering if I had caught what he’d said and responded, or if I was just coincidentally amused by text messages.
I decided to challenge him a little. So I waited until he’d turned his head, and I slipped through the crowd, disappearing.
I’d forgotten about him when suddenly, he appeared next to me, surprising me. His skin was so soft.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to surprise you,” he said. “But I just have to know. What were you laughing at back there?”
You’re so sexy it’s almost unfair, I thought.
But I told him I couldn’t believe he’d outed his friend like that.
He started laughing and we chatted. He said he had to get back to his friends so he wouldn’t seem rude but that I should stop by later. I said sure, but I knew I wouldn’t. I’m passive. I let life unfold and only open my doors for those who come find me and show that they really want to connect.
Well, oddly enough, I had an inkling and just checked and someone has posted a Missed Connection on Craig’s List looking for me.
I think it’s the guy’s friend. Should I respond? Or should I let someone else tell him about me?
The rest of the show was great, though there was a weird little drama with this guy with a beard who kept staring and when I didn’t talk to him, he would storm off but then show up again and stand very close to me. I wasn’t really sure what that was about, maybe he wanted me to initiate the conversation but again, I don’t do that right now. There was another guy who came by, and my body turned cold and staticky, pins and needles like your muscles fell asleep but very icy. It persisted so I had to move to the other side of the room.
They didn’t play my favorite song, What New York Couple’s Fight About, which you can find on my little music player on this blog, though you’ll have to jump a little because it’s set on random.
Once a label is on something
It becomes an It.
Like it’s no longer alive.
(that’s for a gemini friend of mine….hopefully he can let go of his categorizations and let the people and life show him who they really are, maybe even providing surprises rather than what he expects)
It was a great night and everything was in its right place again.
So back to Walden. Ol’ Henry’s a badass and drops knowledge on people, knowledge that many people today still don’t get. He says, “We might try our lives by a thousand simple tests; as, for instance, that the same sun that ripens my beans illumines at once a system of earths like ours. If I had remembered this it would have prevented some mistakes. This was not the light in which I hoed them. The stars are the apexes of what wonderful triangles! What distant and different beings in the various mansions of the universe are contemplating the same one at the same moment! Nature and human life are as various as our several constitutions. Who shall say what prospect life offers to another? Could a greater miracle take place than for us to look through each other’s eyes for an instant? We should live in all the ages of the world in an hour, ay, in all the worlds of the ages.”
He says there are basic things that people need–Food, Shelter, Clothing and Fuel. Once you have these things to survive, instead of going after superfluous amounts of these things, you should adventure on life because your vacation from humbler toils have commenced. Too many people become slaves to life as though paying a penance, as though you all feel that to stay in the grind will guarantee your survival.
I think I got to that point. I worked hard, was unhappy but motivated and diligent, and I made money. So much money that surprised both me and my employers but I did bleed to bring it in. And now…why not now? Why not go and find my purpose, find what the universe really wants me to tell people? Suddenly, things started happening, and crises were presented. Stay in safe situations, comfortable situations, or take a leap of faith and follow the signs. And so far, I’ve been happier than I’ve ever been, freer than I ever thought possible.
Which brings me to my last thought.
A couple of days ago, a friend noted that I had a basic conflict. I am obviously compelled to write and put myself out there, yet I’m an intensely private person. I did not articulate well why I am actually a very open but private person and these two did not contradict, when I read this passage in Walden that helped me formulate my thoughts on this subject:
“In any weather, at any hour of the day or night, I have been anxious to improve the nick of time, and notch it on my stick too; to stand on the meeting of two eternities, the past and future, which is precisely the present moment; to toe that line. You will pardon some obscurities, for there are more secrets in my trade than in most men’s, and yet not voluntarily kept, but inseparable from its very nature. I would gladly tell all that I know about it, and never paint ‘No Admittance’ on my gate.”
Again, I am bound by honesty and integrity and a deep, burning desire to communicate and illuminate. Any discoveries that I have made, I will tell you if you prove yourself trustworthy, open-minded and willing to understand. You just have to ask me the right questions and I will tell you everything. I never withhold information, though I will guard some things just to see how much someone really wants to know something. Sometimes you have to ask a few times and in the right way.
However, I am also wary of people becoming too attached to me, the messenger and point of perspective. Because I want to be gentle and reliable in all obligations, I hat
e the thought of disappointing people or when they want more from me than I can give. And I can’t get distracted from my function, my purpose, my journey. When people become attached to me, I lose my freedom to go out, follow the signs and make the random connections which build a bridge of knowledge to the grail I am trying to retrieve. Eventually, I will have to retain my freedom, be it politely or forcefully. I don’t like to hurt people, so I try to keep my life and myself private and autonomous because it’s the way I am happiest and free.
If you want to know what I’m saying, what I’m feeling, what I’ve tasted, what I’ve touched, I will share all of this with you. No one has ever accused me of not being generous or being unwilling to share my mind and my explorations. But my body, the commitment of my self, I am wary of because I can’t let myself be trapped in a way that takes me away from my journey. Thus, Julia the ffuhb is private and shared with a very select few. But her mind and her connection to the universe is always open to those who are also seeking, to those who would like to wake up from their day to day lives and see what else is out there, to those looking for proof of magic.