Blog Narrative: Better

Hadn’t opened my eyes as before in a while. The alarm clock just what it is, was, invented to be: a mechanical time keeper for when one cannot feel organic time. Out of sync. After weeks, today I am back. Waking without the help of mechanical crutches, electronic pulses, monotone whistle, electronics or unbalanced blips. Natural time holding things up again, in a kind of manageable, organized order. All better. Just enough to one side, not too far off to the other. Healed. At least for a little while.

 

Action

Inspiration comes when shelter has been provided, food is available, and contemplation is allowed a slow, running boil. After this it is solely an action missing.

 

Blog-Narrative: Waking

It all was yesterday. The feeling of loss. Randomness rampant from the quiet rest in bed till waking morning today. Even though the feeling of deprived DST darkness outside is midnight, reality says 5:45 p.m. Listening to the barks and chirps, the sirens and rushed wind from a car on the next block wakes another reality–a now reality. What good can happen today? The alarm goes off. 5:45. This time morning. A week of waking seconds before the alarm, anticipating the nothingness, hearing the same after the same electric morning melody, thinking the repeating random thought. It all was yesterday. What good can happen today? Again today. 5:45.

 

Nature

Leaves drying. Stages in colors. Softening the pats of those that run up. Asking for nothing in return. As it should be.

 

Mangos & Roses, Breed St. and Cocos

Entrepreneurial vendors?

This picture has been on my iPhone for a while. I knew from the moment I saw from this angle that it would be part of something I would eventually use. Without thinking I cropped the vendor because the enticement of this composition was with the romantic color, aura, the capture of this living moment, the humanistic universal if you will–not with the political, financial, municipal, right or wrong of the thing. Reading about the Breed St. vendor controversy reminded me that I had taken this picture and that it was time to put it to good use.

 

A View From the Lawn

On vacation a few miles from home, pondering. Resting on a lounge chair, reading, admiring nature can all be done without having to take a flight, rent a room or spend money. What are people running from? Having peace within is all that one needs.

 

The Most Beautiful Eyes

I notice that a new post hasn’t been updated in a couple of months. It’s almost as if reaching the year anniversary fulfilled a milestone. Or, possibly, the lack of wordsmithing is an indicator of the clutter of living that has distracted the out pour of random thoughts which is this page, knowing, without question, that my thoughts are not random at all. Could that be the connection? I have also had off-and-on nightmares since the last post. I have learned over the years that nightmares for me mean an imbalance of work and play, not enough fun in the “live” category, a clogging of the way things work, a kind of forced existence. Realization is the beginning. For example, in the last couple of months I have added the most beautiful eyes to my everyday, began anew on a couple of different creative levels, and have not allowed the phyical drain of autoimmunity stop me.  I feel the equilibrium thawing through.

Beautiful Eyes

 

Blog-Thought: Aztlan Underground

Blog-Thought: Aztlan Underground

After a year of “Everything’s Connected, Everything” the categories of Live, Play, and Work still hold true to their “synchronicitous’ synergy. This band and I have a long history. Since my anti-establishment upbringing till now dissent is the most American form of expression. Got a chance to get to know the band a little over the past few weeks. They allowed me to create and live a bit of that aforementioned synergy. Thank you Yaotl, Joe, Zo, and Caxo. If you don’t know of AUG’s oeuvre it is time to listen. And just for the sake of clarification Aztlan is not the same as Azlan of C. S. Lewis fame. Enjoy.

 

Doubting Wind

Confidence. I’m remembering the influential power of “if”. Remember the Dennis Hopper photographer line when he says, If makes up L IF E?

The outside world will try to kill your confidence — don’t let it! Life is about doing. A lesson worth repeating to the self. Especially when doubt sets in.

The wind doesn’t ask should I blow; it just blows.

 

Blog-Thought: Car Wash

Read somewhere where one should make it a habit to visit places one is unfamiliar with–that going to the same restaurant, movie theater, hiking trail, gas station week to week and year to years is a subconscious sign of one’s “fear of the unknown”. I bought into this idea and have been, in a way, forcing myself to finds new places to visit, neighborhoods to drive through, and ways to satisfy my cravings for years. Try it it works.

Who washes your car?

Along these lines I took my car to a Car Wash to get cleaned (something I usually like doing at home with pail and water hose in hand). As I waited for my car to pass each station I noticed an eerie similarity between the looks I got from the workers as I looked through the protective glass and the looks of the animals in the zoo as I stop and stare at each exhibit (especially the gorilla, orangutan, and chimpanzee). I had always explained the look of being forced to be in a place they did not seem happy to be in (at the zoo) by telling myself, Oh, it’s just me adding human emotion to the body language and  stagnant eyes of these animals. This same thought wasn’t as easily pushed aside this time. Another thought came in: is this also what social class, immigrant status, gender and religious views say to those that aren’t like oneself?

Through protective glass

As the car moved on the conveyor I kept thinking, thinking about all those times, while at the zoo, that I wondered about how these animals got to these cages and electric fenced, man-made “habitats”. I remembered the times I had read about how animals had escaped late at night. I lost my car for a few minutes as I thought about how many of these men would escape.

When I returned I noticed that the man that I tipped had a hard time looking at me in the face as I thanked him.

I can say with certainty that I’ll wash my car in my drive way for a while before I go back to a “Hand” Car Wash. I’m glad I went, though. Maybe I should stay away from the zoo, too.

Detailing the Car Wash details