chipmunk

Oey

Hi guys. Today was the day!!!! Drum roll.............. My dear mother put ME on a swing! I know, I know it was a little risky. But I wanted it. And what I wanted more than that was a sweet slushie. I saw one right in front of me, and I went for it, without even thinking. I grabbed a nice handful of slush and sucked away. Then I went for the straw. It was so great - I had it all. Then I poked out my eye and started to cry. It blew my cover. My woman saw me and took the best toy I ever had away. Love you all. P.S. I'm growing big and strong, and I have the grasp of an iron man.

Adventures

howdy everybody. It's Saturday. Matt's likely in another stretch of Utah countryside subjecting his kids to all-new incredible things. Am I jealous? Yeah. Bien sur! Who wouldn't also wish to participate in such fine weekend adventures with wonderful people?
Which brings me to why I write.
Here's some of my own adventures for you to enjoy:

My adventures in healing.
This week has been strange. I have been sleeping a lot. I could write a book about what it's been like getting seriously injured and how the body and mind deal with it. For instance, healing. How incredible! This adventure is a passive one, watching my hardworking epidermis repair itself with insane speed and precision. How in the world! I'm certainly not sitting here telling my ant-like cells what they need to be doing, and in what order - somebody else is definitely in charge here. Which freaks me out, I'm no longer in control. And so my powerhunger places me in a state of wanting to "know": I have been gathering as much information (mostly local, IE from Mom) about wounds and the healing process, about head trauma, scabs and infections, neosporin and ibuprofen. In truth, this injury easily ranks in my top 5 life-threatening situations, so hypochondria's kicked in like never before.
Enough about that, what about art?

My adventures in art. Joey mentioned in a blog recently about how he was spending a lot of time watching good films and interesting television shows and making music, etc. Well for a long time I have been almost anti-TV, anti-film because it truly wasn't active enough and I would feel lazy sitting in front of a screen and not participating in any way except through observation. Well since living with Joey (and having left) I find myself on a new mission: to appreciate the art in recorded/edited performances (TV, movies) as much as I have come to love uncut, live performance. Obviously I have become a huge advocate of the theater, and live performance of every kind, so watching a cut and manipulated piece of art feels like watching a television advertisement. I become overly skeptical and ooze cynicism to the point of usually turning it off to go make food or go for a walk. Well, being around Joey was really good for me (seriously dude, you probably didn't really know this) because it was like looking at my life through a different lense. I get so enraptured with doing doing doing that to allow someone else to "do" whiles I simply observe and listen, well I have forgotten how beautiful and important this can be. Yes, have a critical mind and eye. Look for things that work and don't, and why. But also, it's sometimes OK to just give in your trust and to let yourself be entertained.
I sometimes feel like watching a film or TV show is like shopping at WalMart, but worse. Because everything in a film or TV is designed to manipulate you: your perspective is FIXED. You are literally told where to look and what to hear - which then dictates what you think and feel. Watching a film is 2 hours of sheer submission on your part. That's why I hate camera lenses and editing a little bit.
Then again, my hate is totally unsound. Joey, again, helped me out. Because what he wrote reminded me that there is no bad or good in art - just perspectives. In school at UC Santa Cruz, there was one thing I heard from so many of my teachers, usually near the end of a term. They would tell us this: "Now that your class is finished, your learning in the world will begin. Go out and educate yourself in everything - go to local Art museums, watch shows and performances, sign up for new letters, attend concerts and rallies, watch films and read books, read everything you see, everywhere you go look at what has been created around you- that's your next big task in learning, especially as artists. You have a responsiblity to feed yourself with the art of others"
So TV and film - it's important to recognize the power of this art too, the art of the fixed camera lense and masterful effects of editing. Films and TV shows are huge works of art, the pains and hours of hundreds (if not thousands) or hardworking artists and individuals are working together to earn money and create a large collective single work of recorded art!
This is important stuff. This is the meat, to me. Humans working, collaborating for months and months, so much work and so much money, and for Why? For the purpose of effecting society through entertainment. This could be one of the greatest causes in human history, and it's an age-old one, dating back to the Greeks and their theatre.

Two more adventures:
My adventures in Gladcorn.
Recently I read online that the health foods store in Cameron Park sells Gladcorn. (I read this whilest still living in Santa Cruz). Overwhelmed with excitement, I made a special trip down there early last week to get myself a savory bag of the stuff.
To make a long adventure short, they had none. Instead, their spot on the shelf was empty, and since their boss would be out of town for the next 10 days, I wasn't to expect any new shipments until after that. I was slightly heartbroken, so I bought some chips at Food 4 Less instead.

And Finally:

My future adventures in the City of Angels.
In the beginning of September I am finally going to attempt to move to LA. Funny how much encouragement I get from family, which is much the opposite from friends back in SC. Well I think I will love that place, particularly because there's this breeze of electric ambition which dances through the air, down streets and around buildings, making you breath a little quicker. The few times I've been there, I get giddy. I mean, it's LA. And I want to act and perform more than anything else in this world.

So that's all for now. Here's a picture or two.

Llama

So then, on the 14th, we went to Llama Fest at the Sri Sri Radha Krishna Temple in Spanish Fork, UT. Yes, a very strange location for this pretty white Indian Hare Krishna temple, but it's there nonetheless. The saddest part about this evening was that Amy had to work--and she was the one who really wanted to go. But Dolly was in town with us for a week, so she and I and the kids all took the trip down at about 6:45 that night. This was one of the hottest days of the year, even in early evening still about 100 out.

Check out a Google map I made that shows where we were, with satellite photos.

Like I said, it was hot. Pouring from my forehead hot, stiflingly humid inside the temple hot. We parked and walked up the hill to the temple, and there were South American dancers on a tiny stage and booths set up with jewelry and bags and shirts. Llamas filled the inner court with their owners standing close by. We removed our shoes and walked inside the temple, of which the bottom floor is a giftshop with tables and chairs about. A magnificent white cockatoo watched us from within a large cage. We climbed the stairs and the second floor was a seated meditational religious explanation of the Krishnas, what they mean and what they do. A young Indian boy spoke softly and quietly into a microphone, explaining. We went outside through some glorious dark-wooden double doors and were on top of the temple. There are towers at the corners like a castle (Dolly had told Bella this was Princess Jasmine's castle to help her want to come), and a beautiful view of the valley wraps around the temple. There was an elevator that Jarom required us to take back to the first floor. (This elevator was uncertified and a bit unsettling, as it took about 4 minutes just to travel one floor. It's small, hot and claustrophobic and I was beginning to think we should start pounding the walls, though there weren't many others around the elevator area when we got on.)

We walked to the back of the temple grounds where more parrots were housed--one kept mumbling some almost-decipherable parrot-talk to us--and owners stood with their llamas. We pet one or two before heading for the lake. Okay, the lake is really just a big pond--a koi pond with wide, flat lily pads--but we saw others swimming in it and (I already mentioned the temperature) we just couldn't resist. The kids stripped down to their underwear, Dolly got in with her dress on and me with my just my shorts. There was a small waterfall/fountain flowing downward, with a white Krishna status sitting on it. The water was mucky and the bottom was slick with moss. It smelled like fishbowl water. But it was so refreshing and comfortable in the midst of such heat that we welcomed it, welcomed the smell and the moss, the koi and the lilies. I held Orion much of the time while Dolly helped Jarom and Bella splash and play and flounder in the water. We stayed in for almost a half hour, and as we were finally getting up to leave some of the the Krishna temple regulars were beckoning at everyone to get out. We weren't supposed to be swimming in such large numbers, because there is a delicate balance in place to support the fish and flowers, and too many people in too many parts of the pond could disrupt. "Plus," a boy said to me, "you have an infant!" But they were all very friendly and all was well.

We bought Dolly a Llama Fest shirt (I know everyone wants one--I do), and we bought a long peacock feather. We cooled off in our wet clothes and toured the temple last time, then decided to call it an evening.

Here's an article about the whole thing on the Krishnas' website.

Lavender

We had a couple of adventures the past couple Saturdays, so here they are.

On the 7th we went to Lavender Days, which is something we did last year as well, which is something we enjoy. There is a farm, the Young Living Family Farm (a long semi-interesting backstory about the questionable founder and its MLM counterpart will go unmentioned here) in Mona, just past Santaquin. There are huge flowing fields of lavender on either side of the road, and a big organic garden with vegetables sprouting everywhere. They have distilleries where they distill essential oils from their plants, and little lined-up stacks of greenhouses with misty windows. There are also a medieval village out back, a pond with swans and paddleboats, an old west main street strip, a playground, barns and tons of animals (horses, sheep, Barbados sheep, goats), a shop and so on.

They do this 5K run at 7 am. Last year we ran it, and it was nice, not too hot yet so early in the morning--you run through the lavender and the strips of purple stretch on and on. This year though, we were babysitting for our friends Dave and Michelle, so we had their two youngest kids, Torin (5 and Jarom's friend) and Brianne (2 and Bella's friend). They had spent the night. So we got up early, brought two joggers and threw the kids in the car with instant breakfasts spilling all over them, and we got there late. Way late--about 7:30. The run had started and people were already coming in. I mean, this was a run, a real competition with prizes and everything. People weren't wasting any time. We were so late that we didn't even bother to walk it, although we did still get our shirts and little prize packs with an essential oil and a water bottle.

Merchants were setting up their many booths, very much like our farmer's market. In fact, most of the people we're used to seeing at the Provo farmer's market were there. We bought some mixed flower honey and the kids got snow cones. The real hit for the kids, especially Jarom, was the climbing wall. All the kids climbed it at least a little. But Jarom just kept going back for more, and on his third attempt, he made it all the way to the top of the hardest side of the kids' wall. He's a natural climber (I made it to the top of the hardest side of the adult wall, but Jarom's victory is much more mentionable than mine). That's where Jarom and Torin spent most of their time, on the wall at on the bouncehouse slide. We also did a ring toss where we won a red bottle of some berry-derived superdrink.

The kids also got to ride horses around a little walking wheel: Jarom rode Pepperoni and Bella rode Buttercup. Then Bella and Brianne got to see the Lavender Fairy, which was something Bella had been waiting weeks for, ever since she received the "invitation" (a real printed invitation) at the farmer's market. They had a tea party with juice and cookies, played and told stories. Later we rode a carriage through the farm, where we stopped at the lavender field on the other side of the road. We used clippers to cut our own bundles of lavender, which we still have stashed around the kitchen. It's the best scent--this we all know--but being in a field with that color and that smell is quite wonderful. Before we finally left in the early afternoon, four hours after arriving, we watched some jousting. Yes, there was jousting, not entirely authentic, more like an obstacle course, a competition. The knights flung spears at haystacks with targets painted on them, and they jabbed at hanging rings and that sort of thing; they and their horses were fully costumed and armored, and the horses neighed and reared back and squires ran out to arrange the course and gather dropped weaponry. There had been a smoky haze all morning due to the Utahn wildfires, and the afternoon eventually became scorchingly hot, so when we did leave we stopped on the way home at the Red Barn in Santaquin and had ice cream and drinks. The kids fell asleep immediately; they were exhausted after getting up so early and having that kind of fun.

newest experiment

now that the adrenaline has finally subsided from its swirlings, check this out:

I succesfully got into the worst biking accident of my life today! Hooray!
And my reward? Give me a few months; we'll see how long these injuries endure.
Fortunately the golf ball between my skull and forehead disappeared as quickly as the short cement pillar summoned it's ugliness.
Areola, I'll miss your full circumference. Left arm bicep skin - good riddance, right? I mean, seriously, that was where my only tattoo was gonna go, so Ha! Take that society- as always I'll opt for au natural. As Jordan Lykins so eloquently observed, when looking at my current appearance, one cannot help but be reminded of a poor dark sailor after receiving forty lashes, or Jesus as they raised him to the cross (minus a thorny coxcomb). Shoulder, side, arms, forehead, bright red painful streaks - I guess my fecitiousness is only to mask my sincerely apologetic undertones. You and I both know that this is all very Stupid. I've done many stupid things before, to you and me and others, but this one creamy-whipped top them all... Stan better have seen my fancy foot-trick as I raced across that busy overpass connecting Del Taco and Rite Aid. He certainly got a dose of trickery once I'd lost all control, and my usually-immaculate movements were destroyed by a rush of sliding concrete on flesh, tumbled arms and my head's halting in a collision of timeless disagreement.

The Goonies.
"Good enough, for you it's Good Enough, for me it's Goooood Enough" those notes that were already singing through the summer air, something happened to me in these few seconds of unworldy confusion. Something that was so fast, so quick, so unexpected yet so vivid happened to me while Stan and Phil watched on. Something really happened. Something so real and incredible that immediately after I was done, I'd gained one of the weirdest memories I'll ever have. Here goes:
Goonies was playing in my head, and then the fastest dream ever. The dream was this -
Goonies morphed into sounds and pictures that make no sense but are all familiar, and then it was like somebody flipped through television stations with the sound on, only so fleetingly that all I could hear was BLLLLRPRPPschshRP, and like staring at the sun for too long, I had the images of this dream etched into my retinas, immediately...so that as I looked up at Stan I already wanted to tell him about it. The sounds I heard, the things that just whipped across my mind. And I think now, it's incredible - it wasn't during falling that I had heard and seen these things, it was in the seconds before. I had my foot out, stupid tricks, and then came a moment when I completely knew I wasn't going to make it. In that moment, and just before and just after, that's when I had the fastest dream ever. That's when Goonies became blrrrpeys and bikes and kids became a dance of colors and ideas. It was the fastest thing, and as I crashed I didn't even know I hit my head. Stan had to tell me I did, since that ominous golfball was hiding already beneath my skin. He also told me to stay still...but I know better than that. In confusion, there needs be decision. I decided that I needed to get the heck to the nearest safe place I could find that was not on the cement walkway of a busy freeway overpass.

5 minutes later I was ahead of the boys, bloody, biking up to Rite Aid, washing one cut in the bathroom, stealing their breakroom freezer's ice pack, and sitting with Stan, shirtless and torn up, talking and talking and talking and talking. Talking. But Stan, oh Stan, the good good man. Until we were beckoned to leave the building, he stuck right there. He heroed me, when I needed a hero the most. I have had very few times in my life when I, Mikie Beatty, am so helpless that I am reaching out my hand for a hand to save me. And today Stan was there, a hero, with his hand outstreched for me. I love you Stan.

Darin picks me up. Darin's driving, I'm burning. We get to the house and he lets me take my course of care - so that as I scream and groan and gnash my teeth in the bathroom, while my wounds disinfect and my body settles into it's new state, he patiently lets me take my course. So Darin you have my hearty thanks as well.

And now here I sit. Alone at Heather's. Covered in neosporin. Kind of an adventure I guess. What's sweet is that when all is said and done the truth of it is, these cuts look pretty rad. They're the perfect way to let a bunch of road rashes and chest gashes happen to you, almost like I chose to put them in their respective spots artistically, rather than them just happening by chance. My face, a sort of important tool for an actor, remains almost completely unscathed (aside from one golfball's trace).

What have we learned here?
HA. Haha. Not really about riding bikes, not really about showing off or cautiousness. Instead, I learned that the human body, when kept and physically well, can withstand some pretty darn gnarly stuff. Even though infection is possible, and pain will ensue, I now know that my body is in this case way more in control of Me than I am of it. And so body, I salute you, your independence, your quickness to heal, your accuracy, and maybe from now on I'll respect your functions a little more thoroughly than I have been. Because I love you body. You're my instrument for beautiful music. I won't let my selfish desires or moody dispositions take away from me my most important friend in life, You.

Paradise

"I still believe in paradise. But now at least I know it's not some place you can look for, cause it's not where you go. It's how you feel for a moment in your life... and if you find that moment... it lasts forever..."

I think I did find paradise. And it's lasting forever, alright. There are details that go askew in the days passing, but the paradise never goes away. I think I even found it right around the time The Beach came out. What with the year 2000 being such an adventure and all for me. And Heather.

Taking a Greyhound to New York- and beyond to Connecticut
New York City
Going to London, Paris, Madrid, Granada, Amsterdam, Emmeloord, etc...
Coming home to New York City.... to meet my dear sister.
Our luggages both being lost. Mine by the plane, hers by the bus
The house burning down.

Kerouac-ing it in the city with new friends Jonathan of Grove street and Angel and Angela, two best friends who I had met in Spain just a month earlier (weird stuff happens when you travel)

Boo dying, the little dear one.

After that, especially later after September 11th, after trying to live in LA, Portland, the haunted Sonoma county apple groves, trips to New Orleans, around Mississippi, - somehow all these travels and our family's hikes and camping trips and dealing with 2 of my ex whiny boyfriends before I could find a braver type, after all these and all of this, paradise is here. Permanently.

Pretty much now I can write songs about it. Songs to aging children come, now.


What I search for now is an almost daily togetherness, a tribe of people in which:
there is piercingly true moments of love and a spiritual feeling
a tribe that is peacefully kind and in love with each other and all the human talents and beauty
with a love in that tribe that shoots straight from the heart

Family is those things for sure. But I want to expand it. I am hoping the paradise in my heart will help build it. I think I am 70 percent there.

(and not like in The Beach)

love you all!

a little about summer

i just realized this: none of our family was born in the summer. Funny, huh. Almost like these three long months of the year have no definition, no holidays, no social boundaries. The summer becomes a time of do-anything, feel-everything, a time when you know you can get in your car and drive to a city, waste a day swimming, or go to work and make some cash. Summer is limitless, with no "thing" that holds us back, unattached - it sits as always, a constant reminder.

Summer is that huge and stretching place beyond the gates; our rot iron gates, squealing when they're swung, keeping us safe- from wanderlust, summer's truth, no routine, travelling, dreams and futures, freedom just past those metal gates.
None of us were born there, all the more reason for its mystery.

then sleep, and good work

Last night I watched the opening performance of Much Ado About Nothing in the decorated forest glen up at Shakespeare Santa Cruz. Joey came with me too. Now, as much as Much Ado isn't exactly my favorite Shakespeare play, I had just about the most wonderful time of my life sitting dead-front on the forest floor, surrounded by friends, watching smart actors do good theatre.
How elitest! I don't care. Because it killed an insect that had been scribbling around inside my heart for the past few weeks; smashed it like a bug and tossed away the dirty pieces.
Not to say that bugs are all bad - just that some ones (like ticks) will suck your blood into their bodies and make you sick until they are so fat that you can pop them blueberries. This bug was on its way, but I stuck around for last night and popped it good, killed it. and now I'm awake again, after a few weeks of strange blur and dark sad and uncertain half-conscious.

When the play was over, the whole cast and crew showed up at our infamous Rush Inn bar for a little afterparty. I talked and laughed and even danced with some of the most amazing individuals I've ever gotten to know in my life.

Matt and Amy have a quote on their fridge that to this day spells out a fix to what might be wrong (and blindly so) in my life at times. Something about the greatest source for unhappiness and misery coming from replacing what you want most with things that you want in the moment. Then there's a quote from the film The Beach that defines paradise not as a physical place, but as 'a moment in your life. and if you can find that moment, it'll last forever'.

Here is what this means. 1- risk the money. Have NO money. Risk having no money. Because when we get worried about money, we put warps and squiggles in what is already fixed and good. I warp my life from time to time because of money - but college has taught me lesson after lesson about the worthlessness of money and the rewards of sacrificing all of it for an idea. (IE: $$$$ for a degree in Theatre Arts?) 2 - risk the comfort. I don't know how many times I have not wanted to do something because it was uncomfortable. But I learned a good few years ago that our comfort is a bulwark, blocking out opportunities to learn new things and love a bigger world. So, risking the comfort hurts but just for a second. And soon after, you're swimming in a river or lake or ocean of new possibilities for living! And it really works this way. Try it, I dare you. Do something tonight that you would never do. That you wouldn't be caught dead doing. 3- never stop questioning. Question your money, question your comforts, question every decision you make, every last one, until you are sitting in your room or house looking at all your possessions and "needs", asking yourself with a furrowed brow, "Why do I have this book, that television, these specific shoes, those specific habits, why my fingers are white, why my little belly, why this music, why any money" 4- change. Do it. Ask a question, find your truest purest answer, the deepest root, and look for a subtle change. Just to try something new. Why do you speak english and not French? 5- Remember. Remember remember remember. You will love yourself someday for remembering things, so do it. Remember what once made you happy. Think of that 'paradise' and remember it. Happiness never goes away, we just tend to forget about it. We are all free. So remember. If that means you have to write down everything you ever think, do it. Because the more you write down, the more you get to read and remember later on. Works for me, thank you Heather (gave me most of journals in life).
6-Sleep.
7-do all the good work you can come up with. Read and write and think, watch and listen and learn. Play and run and dance. Give and take and share. Live, love, do, try, do not, try not, dream, wake, drink and be merry for tomorrows are forever today is real.

i will eat the wilderness

one more month of summer!

hey everybody, are we cute or what? colorfully bombastic and full of vim and vinegar. we are loud and happy and proud. not to boast or anything but i look at the stars and thank them to have been born into this family...
lucky
lucky
lucky!!!

i got a basket for my bike, thus being able to ride it today and pick up some nectarines and tomatoes at the farmer's market before heading to work this morning. now that i have made some money i am dragging mom along on a shopping spree to folsom in which i will buy at least 3 cds because of the joy of finding new music. also at least one sundress, i hope.

love to you all!

i hate vacuums

hey everbody.
sounds like we're all living pretty different lives. heather's married now, but the biggest difference id say is her BIKEriding of late. awesome heather. i applaud thee.
dad's actually got his vhs-to-dvd converter thing working, and he's USING it. good job dad. a big step. serious. i wanna see all that old family stuff even tho i'll act like i don't want to watch it, and i'll walk to the bathroom and watch thru the crack in the door.
addie's getting a case of the lonelies, it sounds like, unles im way behind. addie, dont worry, its quite interesting being in a town where you know nobody and nobody really knows you. think how free you are!
mum is coming with us on a camping trip, but plans to stay in a marriot.....okay, whatever floats your boat. hows nett? oh yea, and i heard about the fire near moms house, nothing burnt down rite? if i didnt know by now thatd be sad.
mikie's got a couple things im jealous of. a construction-almost-type job, and a lady friend.
matt and amy and babes, their just bein sweet and stayin busier than anyone ive really even known of, which kinda blows my mind when i think bout it.
and in contrast, i just slept almost nine hours. but it's early (for me) and im up gettin ready to go to work...or i guess getting ready for work for me implies waking up an hour or two before i have to be there and listening to music and messing around with the computer until about five minutes before i've gotta be there, at which point i put on my pants, brush my teeth, and get on my bike.
so, about me, i'm in a pretty different spot than ive been before. last time i was living down here i ended up being utterly alone in this town for about a month. now it's been almost two and im pretty used to it, the isolated solitude i mean. at work i have a few buddies, just acquaintences to pass the worktime with, and discuss angrily the corporate management and lame policies of our STUPID STUPID STUPID company (dont count on me working for good ol' regal theatres a whole lot longer.) but other than that, i really dont know anybody at all. ive been riding my bike all over town, which is amazing. i have a super light, thin road bike that is so fun to ride and not very heavy so i can sling it over my shoulder and walk down onto the sand with it, which i do and bring a steinbeck book in my back pocket and gape at the pacific sunset and couples hugging and throwing frisbees for their dogs. i like to stroll downtown, or down to the boardwalk, and watch the people. i like to hear bits and pieces of conversations. i like to take frozen photographs of people in my mind and think about every aspect of their mysterious lives. even tho im rather alone, there are tons of people all around me that i can dream about being friends with, or something like that.
HAHA how lame i am.
i do like it tho, dont get me wrong at all. i have all my time on my hands, ive been recording songs and writing stuff all the time, reading lots of books and watching lots of good movies and renting tv shows (planet earth and the office are the most brilliant works.) but i hope it doesn't always stay this way. maybe someday ill have more than two or three close friends, and maybe we might live in the same town. and maybe someday ill get some sorta girlfriend. and maybe someday ill eat my young. and maybe someday my young will eat me.
anyways, eddy's losin his mind sprinting around my room. and ive really gotta vacuum, but the thing about that is....
im never going to.

nature, nurture, satisfaction

guys, how are we. it's the official dead middle of summer ladies and gents. What are you doing? Where are your lives going? Why are we all happy, or sad, or inbetween? I could tell you my stories, for sure.
For example, I am now on my third week of solicited work from Shakespeare Santa Cruz. What's interesting about this stuff, this time around, is that my recent work has literally been the most physically demanding and laborious 9-hour days of my life. Halfway through these weeks, I realized something, similar to the discussion about bike-riding Heather and Amy were having in the previous post: there's a distinction to be found between feeling high off of thinking and feeling high off of being physical. Two very different paths leading towards that same wonderful and strange feelings of living satisfaction. Say, you just finished an invigorating discussion that lit up all your senses about philosophies on life or work or passions, etc. There's this feeling of satisfaction and trueness that follows, that leaves you kind of high. The next day you go on a bike ride, difficult, sweaty, tiring, and aerobic. You finally stop, and are filled with exuberance! What joy! Now compare the two, the two joys. There's the intellectual joy and there's the physical joy. Both joys feel as good as the other, but require completely different experiences to achieve.
What brought this up is that lately I have been reading/writing very very little. I hate this. I love nothing more than to jot all my thoughts down in a blog or read a sweet book about crazy things. Only lately I have had no desire to be this way, no craving for these things. Since I firmly believe in listening carefully to your cravings, I wanted to understand what was going on. I decided it is because I have been reaching my same places of satisfaction in new physical ways (heavy lifting of lumber, lots of landscaping, carpentry, exercise of all sorts). This tiredness I wasn't getting before and felt instead i needed to vent my energy through words and thoughts.

The dilemma stands then: would you rather enjoy physical satisfaction through simplicity, or intellectual satisfaction through complexity?

I guess my answer ends up being the easy way out...I'll take both. I want to live a life that puts the two together in equal shares, because I love balance and evenness - it's the way I live and love and resolve.
So there, there's some mikie thoughts for the evening. I'm pretty freakin tired, so this might seem pointless or scattered. Forgive my child-looking face for this. Later dudes

where's your posts?

even just dumb little stuff guys... i miss you ! just a few words even, doesn't have to be fancy. what are you doing today, or dreaming of?
i'm lonely for you all.

hey, i've ridden (right word?) my bike to work 4 times now. i am very proud, but very weak and out of shape. however, that might change with time!

the honeymoon is over

just kidding.

you guys haven't heard from me in a while, huh?!! thought i might leave you alone for awhile. but i'm back, with something different this time. recommendations.

maybe some of you have already read the book "What is the What" by dave eggers. if not i think you should, for sure, quickly. i guarantee if you read this book it will be quickly because it is utterly absorbing. you will learn things you kind of wish you never knew about africa but feel stupid for not knowing about and will wish to know more more more about the history and craziness and people of this earth.

next up. the movie "Sicko." this goes for you too dad. everyone should see that movie. yes it is michael moore but it is applicable and applaudable (?) to every american human being, whether conservative or liberal or somewhere in between, with or without health insurance. entertaining as well as thought provoking. you won't regret it and it will scare and inspire you all at once. the message in the end is very very positive.

that's it for now. i'm off to del schac. much love and kisses to you.

above the fog, below the dirt

in circles, usually we go.
and when the little spinning stops,
in rest and lost
and comfort can we wait.

but i am sick of waiting.
to this day my lack of satisfaction
offers little more than longing
rather sit i in uncertain complications
than go and do or even make decisions.

a plague has blackened, littered up my brain
with sweetest sad and melancholied thoughts
while watching youth about me make their ways
adventuring and living gloriously
i lose myself in dreaming still
and hate my fantasties

someone told me once to feel it out
instead of using all this energy
to "hold it in" and let it fill me up
but all I feel is festering displeasement
boiling my liver into blood
and shaking up my once full-certainties
by baking them as burnt and crispy discs
they've cracked and left me blisteringly empty.
I will not stop since I am happiest
when there is little time to think ahead
- and we all know our finest elements
like when as children swimming in the pool
or playing in our rooms with toys and games
we secretly believe the stories swimming through our brains
of beautiful adventures making every creature crazy

it's all grandeur in my head,
but not delusional or false
instead its true to me
like Sun is true to trees
an uncontrollable dependency

and as the trees reach pointed towards the sky
so shall I
so shall I

Friday the 13th for reals

Last night ended up being horrible. Neighbors on two sides (two DIFFERENT houses of part time criminals) of me were up at 1 am in the morning, yelling, sounding like they were going to walk right through our yard. One of them is especially WHACKED and freaky to me, a middle-aged guys who has a meth habit. To add to this, during the second breakdown of fear in my bedroom, what I thought was a black widow was scaling my bedroom wall. I tried to kill it around 1:30 am with a mop, but it fell and I didn't know if it died or not. All the while Art was on the phone from Long Beach coaching me through this... and then after I knocked it down, I was freaked out that I would wake up with it in my eye since I didn't know if it was dead (like a cockroach I once knew). Plus the low roar of a man's voice seemed right outside our outside bedroom (behind us there are some druggie types and they wander drunk occasionally INTO our yard or house)so at this point I was feeling claustrophobic out in the bedroom. So , angered and scared and alone, I moved my stuff into the house where I laid the futon out. Just as I started to feel cozy and lay down and change into pajamas, the freakiest thing happened. A car pulled up on the street outside the front of our house, and some guys got out and began speaking in what sounded like mixed English and Spanish. Usually when people are out on the sidewalk it sounds EXTREMELY close to our house, and so I just stood still to make sure all was kosher. Mind you, it's now 2 am plus. Art's cell phone battery had died and so he was no longer on the phone. Then I realize it sounds like these two guys are walking up my front steps to the front door. IT SCARED THE LIVING HELL OUT OF ME. They were so loud it sounded like they were already IN MY HOUSE. It was part Spanish so I couldn't understand what they were saying and I was also frozen solid. What they were saying didn't sound nice or regular, it sounded gruff and pissed and mean. But maybe my mind was playing tricks on me. All I know is, after being so scared for two hours that I had even ended up crying in my bedroom (when the spider flew off the wall) the adrenaline in my body rose into my throat. I felt like I was EATING adrenaline. I literally thought these guys were going to try to come in my house. It was locked of course, but still, I thought they were approaching to harass me. So I called Cameron's phone. I was EATING adrenaline and I was absolutely shaking. No answer. I called again. Still no answer. As I was calling the second time I saw these guys go around the side of my house and toward the next door apartment. I should have been relieved but as they walked by one of them was looking in my giant side kitchen window, and some of my lights were on so I know he saw me. I can't tell if already knew I was in there. Finally, Art called back on Cameron's cell phone. At this point I am crying, again. Shaking... seriously, EATING adrenaline. Adrenaline is the weirdest feeling ever. I felt like I could have thrown a couch 50 feet. Living in a town with only acquaintances sucks. There was no one I could call for help close by if I needed it. Even Art's parents are 15 minutes away. And unfortunately, there are druggies on two sides of my adorable little house. Finally, after talking to Art, I programmed the police phone number into my phone and fell asleep around 3am with my hand on the phone. It was so lame.

Today I had to get up at 8 and go babysit my brothers and sisters in law. Art's cruising through Santa Barbara, having a blast. The difference between when I went on my road trip with Heather and Darin and Joey is that Art got to be at home WITH HIS BROTHER. It sucks being in a town where I just don't know anyone well enough to call them up for support. Tonight I might not sleep here.

To add to my effed up Friday the 13th, we got a 150.00 shut-off notice for water and SEWAGE today. It was hanging like a handy little gift on our doorknob, when I got home from babysitting. There was a 50.00 fee just for the notice. How lame. I hate my life today. I especially hate jobs, having to have a job, economy, using unjust energy like gasoline in order to be close to people I love, and bills.

Money will be the death of me.

Past Midnight

And I am afeard a teensy bit! How stupid it is but I am SO not used to being alone at home. Art and Cameron are both gone for a few days, and last night my friends stayed over but tonight, lil old me by me lonesome. And some of our neighbors are a little on the sketchy side of things. But I do love our particular little plot of land and summer, this house is my darling. My veggie garden is growing nicely! I do hope more of you come to my side of the green river soon. I know, I know, it's a pain, but.... hey, Mikie weren't you coming here ever? I love you all and right now I am just up late and bored and a tiny weensy bit lonely. If I felt less uneasy I might just be straight up creative, but I guess I am kind of a chicken.

I started my new job today. I will let all of you know if I will be able to attend the Utah venture, I hope I can! Anyone know who is driving in what cars? Well, I best be TRYING to get to sleep. Hopefully I don't lie awake listening to every tiny piece of grass move outside my window.

partly cloudy, with a chance of

hey everybody,

so, I haven't written in a long time it seems like. I'm not really poetically inclined lately, due in part I believe to the work I've been doing, and how this summer has been a weird one for me. Weird and Wonderful.
I don't actually have time to write right now, since my little break from the dirty forest is over and I have to go back to build a big fence. Dad, you should have had this job - maybe the old house woulda gotten that infamous fence built that mom to this day...well you know.
I have a lot a lot of stuff to talk about. I would give anything to give you guys some boring more to read right now, so take this blog as yet another preliminary pre-blog, or problogue. Ok ok enough. back to the dirt we go

last set my dears

sorry to bombard you.

the last few of our wondrous mexico days, the terrace and walkway to the beach, our favorite popsicles made of fresh fruit (darin's is strawberry and mine is coco of course) and then our glorious homecoming wedding quilt made by our amazing friends: addie and mom, carolann, rebecca, mary, doniella and suzanne...made perfect and unique just for us.

time to cozy up for our first night home. good night to you all. matt and amy, our treats were so perfect to have along the way for our honeymoon. we brought a picnic basket as well as the pink eco-bag you gave us, and we ate all our goodies up!

five more

ah - now for some mexico pictures - shopping in ensenada, our lovely room, and some beach shots. one of these playful dogs only had three legs and was so so cute!

more pics

now here we have our night in santa barbara (swimming pool) then on down to l.a. where we did sparklers with dave and ashley and were wowed by all the gorgeous flowers (like i wrote about). and the last photo is at the getty which is this gigantic sprawling amazing art museum which is FREE...up overlooking the city, you take a free tram ride up the side of the hill and then wander through beautiful art for hours.