Today I would very much like to sit in Pease Park alone and think up and write out some resolutions. I've never really made any, let alone kept them. And this may be superstitious and silly, but maybe this year would have worked out had I taken care of a few resolutions, just maybe. It's cold out, and I do hate the cold, but that's just too bad, I'm going out anyway. And upon the entrance of the new year, I'm going to see a fortune teller to find out what lays in store for the year. Then I'll edit and play around with my resolutions a bit more to accommodate the coming months.
I think this is a good plan.

It is important to note that I have terrible New Year's Eve luck

I never said I was perfect
I still miss spots when shaving

A few observations//thoughts//quotes from today:

A stairway leading to an entrance now blocked by barbed wire, a homeless man resting outside the gate of a golf course under a Titleist umbrella

A tree so large and with roots expansive enough to serve as a blanket for picnics beneath its branches

Thoughts on natural and man-made monuments: The interesting thing I've noticed about natural monuments (trees, mountains, rocks, etc.) is that they don't necessarily face any one direction. Except for sunflowers which face the ever-changing position of the sun, natural things only "face" one direction when their viewpoint is hemmed in by an artificial object. These man-made monuments always face one direction. They may have many entrances but there is always that one more-specific entrance facing on specific direction. Natural things, on the other hand, face the whole world at once.

From Anna Karenina [the greatest book ever written]:

All the variety, all the charm, all the beauty of life is made up of light and shadow.

But it was distasteful to her to read, that is, to follow the reflection of other people's lives. She had too great a desire to live herself.

"Excuse me," he said, "I think I'm becoming ridiculous."

"I often think men have no understanding of what's not honorable though they're always talking of it."

It's really so tough
When the things you want are the same as the things you don't

This evening I applied for summer work in Alaska, Montana, and Maine
So, I suppose...Wish me luck?

Do ya? Do ya? Do ya?

Oh Driver F, who knows

"I'm not too concerned with what I am going to do. I am more interested in who I am becoming. I want to be a lover of God and people." --Shane Claiborne

Ditto, Shane, Ditto

Sgt. Shriver: How can anyone in their right mind decide that it is an intelligent expenditure of our money to put 75 cents into military wars and drop out a quarter to solve the poverty problems here at home? That doesn't make any sense at all.

Myself 40 years later: A-flipping-men!

Johnson's "Great Society" really could have been.

Mother Teresa: We are called not to be successful, but to be faithful.

I've really been struggling a lot with my interpretation of that thought lately. How can you be faithful without some small amount of success? You're supposed to sell everything you have and go serve God but then where will you live? How will you eat? I really want to go teach in Tanzania next Fall. That's so clearly Serving, but how can I afford to go Serve? To do good, a lot of times you have to pay but how do you pay without a job and a level of success that allows you to afford to do good? I think I'm looking at this from the wrong perspective but I'm not sure I see any other spots from which I could see better.


This wasn't eloquent, but I never promised it would be.

Everytime I go to stretch I don't understand why I can't stretch my limbs further
My research appears to be unfruitful
Four months just isn't what it used to be
And everyday is just the same

Audrey and I went to the craft fair in the secret park below our house this afternoon
They had soy candles, pressed flowers, knit hats, handmade jewelry, record bowls, pottery, etc.
We didn't buy anything outside of the buttons I got resembling trees I want my tattoo to resemble
But we found a lady doing fortune-telling and each got our palms read
Apparently...
-I have an ego (true)
-I'm aesthetically-focused and I'm good with design (false)
-I'll always give my opinion on things but I'll sugarcoat for loved ones (true)
-I have a shell around my heart in romance (true)
-I take care of my goals but I'm always close to taking it too far (huh?)
-I'm a "goat, definitely not a sheep". "Sheep follow. But those that try and tell you what to do will get bitten and kicked. You do what you want to do." (true)
All in all though, I really enjoyed it
Audrey's was just about dead-on
We decided to get regular fortune-telling in one capacity or another
And there was a man walking around giving a puppet show
We're listening to the music being played there from inside our living room
I love Sunday afternoons in Austin

Do you want to come sit in the park with me?
I mean, I know it's not Nepal or Iceland
Or any of the places we said we wanted to go
But it's not a couch or a cold staircase
We could just sit



Did you know that the Great Barrier Reef is bigger than Poland?
That's irrelevant

Can we go somewhere and do something?
Everything's gone stale
I just want something new
Who knew that it could be so hard to come by

I don't know where I'm going
But I only like maps for their aesthetic quality
And taking advice just isn't my thing

I'm sick of all the people out there who are still bitching about Obama winning. People who probably didn't have a political stance to begin with. Seriously? Maybe if you had the slightest idea of what was going on in the country beyond your own front door then you'd understand. No one said the man is God. Those of us that support him, that believe in him, just have a brain and a sense of duty to more than ourselves. Yeah, I cried. Because I cried when I found out what war really meant, and what it meant for us to be a part of something like that. Because I cry about how my family is financially crippled by health problems that can't be avoided. Because I cried when I would read about the state-by-state fight against same-sex civil unions and marriage. Because I cried when I would think about how many children are left behind by an education system that fails in low-income areas. Because I cry when I read about what's going on in Darfur and how little the current administration has done to aid the region despite the fact that a second Holocaust is obviously occurring. Yeah, I definitely cried the night he won. And many of those who were aware of these issues, or affected by them personally, did too. I'm not sick of those who were opposed to vote for him for their own political reasons, for his stance on issues important to them. No, I'm just sick of the bigots and the brainless.




p.s. I'm sorry, an admitted weakness of mine is that I'm very hostile about politics. This isn't meant for anyone that went out and voted Republican or Libertarian based solely on their political beliefs. But if you are one of those folk and you are offended, please say so so that I can apologize.

I do wish I took more pictures
I don't know the last time I did
Sparky has been found
Ralphie is still broken in some way
Archie will be used only when I win the lottery
Dean can be so complicated
Holga needs to be developed and her flash comes in today

Go register to vote. Because it doesn't matter whether or not you care about who wins, it doesn't matter if you hate politics, or just don't know or want to know anything about them. There are people that are affected by your vote, and it's selfish to withhold it. Your vote is what decides the direction of education, environmental, energy, and health care policies. And just because you went to a good high school, and just because you can afford to see a doctor doesn't mean everyone else can and maybe you should think about them before you decide you don't feel like voting. There are 44 million eligible "young voters" and only half actually participated in the last election. Don't say your vote doesn't matter because you're only coming up with an excuse not to care about your neighbor. Don't say you don't care who wins, look at the policies not the person if you really don't give a damn. Think about something larger than yourself because you're a part of something larger than yourself. Don't be so apathetic.

Glow worms make me want to shower for days
And I fear they may be carnivorous
Also, I have a developed a severe fear of eels
Due entirely to hagfish, also known as slime eels
The other day, I was in that 75% asleep 25% awake state
And I three-quarters-dreamed that there were eels all in my bed
I knew it wasn't reality
But I still saw and almost felt them tangling me up
I imagine it was something like being on a bad trip
Are you aware of reality when you're tripping though?
Maybe I'll look that up later

I think I'm stuck in a perpetual Overture to Illumination
And you think that things are moving along so quickly
But I'm not so sure they're moving quickly enough
Someone will read this and say
"Don't take the present for granted"
The thing is though
What if the present is taking me for granted?
Maybe

I think that people should be much more careful with their hearts. A lot of folk just walk around with their hearts open, waiting for someone to come along or to come back. But it's like wearing a swimsuit in January, hoping it'll get warm enough to go swimming. It's dangerous, you could hurt your health that way. And you could hurt your heart that way. Instead, keep that coat on but don't wear mittens. That way you can feel it if the sun warms up and then you can know that it's right to take your coat off again.

I wonder how you know when Everything is Right with the World
I mean you've gotta know, right?
Then again maybe you're not ever supposed to know
Maybe things do get right, but you never catch on
And it's all just a way to keep The Fates employed
Because you never know if things are perfect
So you keep trying to make them so
Which eventually leads to you really messing things up
And it keeps The Fates busy
Just they way they like it to be

Trust is like car keys, or a phone, or a bill
You set it down and then you can't remember where you put it
And you know it can't have just disappeared
But for the life of you you can't find it
It's only a matter of time till you find it again
What a pain it is to have it missing when you really need it
I'll keep looking though, it's bound to be around here somewhere

You know, I never liked the Grand Canyon
I never want to go see it
I never want to study it
I think it's overrated
And I think that's an understatement
I love geophysics
But I couldn't care less about the brilliance of the GC
Also, I have a fear of holes in the ground

No, I like mountains
And that's definitely an understatement
I always want to be in the mountains
Or at least on a hill
I want to be where I can always see the mountains
If not surrounding me, then in the distance
They're comforting in a way you wouldn't expect

I was watching The Universe today
And it spoke of the forces that build and tear down mountains
Erosion and Growth are always at odds
But there's never a tie
There's always a winner and a loser
For the GC, erosion won. Big time.
In some places in the Alps, water erodes 200 tons of rock a year
For the Himalayas, they just keep growing
About 2 inches a year
And for all we do as humans to the earth,
These forces can't really be fought on any grand scale



And it's the same thing with relationships of any kind
It's just, life keeps moving
You want to maintain everything, but you can't
It's not meant to be that you have all the same friends all your days
There might be those that you're friends with your whole life
But certainly not every friend you ever made you kept
Some friendships of mine have eroded away
And I know it's for the best
While others are growing and have become these amazing peaks in my life
Always visible on the horizon

Then there are those that I'm trying to hold onto
Not sure whether they're growing or eroding,
I just want them to stay how they are to be safe
But I can't help these
There's no getting them to go one way or the other of my own accord
I just have to let nature take its course
Because otherwise it will take it by force

The thing is though, I'm never gonna like holes in the ground
I'm never gonna appreciate erosion
I'm never going to forgive the universe when relationships crumble away

I prefer LiveJournal
But it appears as though people are drifting on toward Blogger//BlogSpot
So here goes
I'll just repost things
And post new things
Basically, just do what I want