May 2013
24 posts
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Reflections upon Returning from the Homeland
In the words of a local musician in Eugene, OR, home is “a good place to be from but not to be.” I say that lightly, because it was actually really nice being back there. But it is interesting how it’s almost like I have an alarm clock inside that starts to buzz after enough time has passed. That alarm says, “Your work here is done — get thee back to your current...
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“To the gods the moon is the entire moon but to us it changes second by second...”
– Jim Harrison ~ Spring
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“A complete sharing between two people is an impossibility and whenever it seems,...”
– Rainer Maria Rilke
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“Be soft. Do not let the world make you hard. Do not let pain make you hate. Do...”
– Kurt Vonnegut (via lofticriess)
Words to live by.
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Life at Grandma's
Life at my Grandma’s is pretty simple. She lives in a super small town in central Minnesota. An old couple bikes by a few times a day, their pace leisurely. Grandma wakes up a little after 9. My mom gets her a cup of coffee before she sits down. We have breakfast.
She often enumerates her blessings. Something like, “Isn’t it beautiful how the trees are getting leaves, the birds...
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“I did, however, come close enough to say, “Hello.”
This was her...”
– Kurt Vonnegut, Bluebeard
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“And where we had thought to find an abomination, we shall find a god; where we...”
– Joseph Campbell, The Hero With A Thousand Faces
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Open letter to doods
I had an interview on Monday with a volunteer coordinator for a hospice program in Portland. At the end of the interview, she started telling me this story about “Kyle” and how great of a volunteer he was. She went on to say that they treated their male volunteers special, because they are so rare.
I was a bit taken aback, because I just didn’t think there would be such an...
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The surest sign you are ready to change is when you don’t wake up from your dream.
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Philosophy, poetry, pondering of the soul: Cruelty... →
jerryharris3:
We’re all the same force, diffracted and reflecting visions of ourselves, not necessarily good or bad, yet we assume our role to be the highest form of “good” through the illusion of ego, attaching distorted value through the perception of difference. When we torture and enslave defenseless animals, it is digressive to say they are less valuable than humans, when ultimately they...
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Here are a few more punky vegan animal exploitation cliche remixes. Some real factory farmed, inhumanely slaughtered, chicken soup for the soul…
“That was the straw you so dickishly placed on the already obviously overburdened camel, thus breaking the poor animal’s back.”
“Don’t move my cheese! Because you already exploited the cow to get the milk for the cheese, so it’s kind of adding...
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And it don’t stop…
“Don’t beat a dead horse because beating it to death is fine, but after that point it is a bit egregious.”
[Thanks indieheroine for the cliche suggestion :)]
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Cliche Remixploitation Series cont'd
“I don’t have a dog in this forced battle to the death between two innocent creatures all for the unnecessary purposes of entertainment and profiteering.”
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Cliche Remixploitation Series
“Let’s kill two birds with one stone, thus doubling the efficiency of our sadism.”
[Do you have any to share?]
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Thinking about starting a series of cliches with a small but important twist—revealing how messed up they are. Here’s one: “There’s more than one way to do something horrible to a cat.”
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Famous Advice on Writing
explore-blog:
The collected wisdom of great writers, including Vonnegut, Hemingway, Didion, Sontag, Fitzgerald, Orwell, Kerouac, Atwood, Steinbeck, and more:
This is some good stuff. I have a lot of respect for writers. I used to be more enamored by musicians, but the pendulum has swung to writers for me.
wherethecoconutsgrow asked: What are the 3 things in your life that you would like to change?
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When you are feeling melancholy and all too sober, playing Jose Gonzales Pandora station may be like throwing gasoline on the fire.
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What Are We Protecting?
I’ve been thinking about the US, and what it means to be a citizen. I think about when people say to soldiers, “Thank you for serving us. For protecting us.” We want to feel safe, like no harm can come to us. But I don’t think that people often think about the cost.
When I learn about the news of the world and our relationship to it, our relative safety seems greedy. I do...
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Back in 2003 I was invited to be a part of a...
April 2013
41 posts
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Reverse Pooping
It’s the act of consciously trying to poop back up inside of yourself to avoid letting the poop go in its natural progression.
I thought of this concept while biking in to work today. (Please do not inquire as to why the thought would occur to me then)
Happy TMI Tuesday!!
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emiisstrange:
halcyonhours:
We’re all broken and the pieces are missing.
Amazing how you’ve summed up my exact thoughts this evening
This post made me think of one of my favorite Leonard Cohen lines: “Ring the bells that still can ring / Forget your perfect offering / There is a crack in everything / That’s how the light gets in.”
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Creating a Life for Oneself
As I’ve gone through life, I’ve had anxiety around the fact that I don’t really know what I am doing here. Being alive, consuming things, pursuing intermediary goals…it seemed kind of pointless.
I made a conscious decision a few years ago to try to make my life about service. It’s been a slow process, but I am starting to see signs that this is happening. Part of it...
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I
Replies to the camping post:
indieheroine:
oh please. You guys have it EASY with the camping + bladder situation.
Normally I’d agree, but this place had some real-deal-albeit-unlit bathrooms so I think the discomfort was about gender-equal. I went to the bathrooms—like a gentleman. :P
kopns:
Did the toy phone get good service out there? I’ve been tossing around the idea of...
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Marriage? Oh that. No, that never happened.
I got the strangest email from my ex wife 2 days ago. I’ve been silently processing it, not really knowing what to think. After being married for 4 years, divorced for 1 year, she is going all Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on me — only instead of denying the holocaust, she is denying that the marriage ever happened. In a word, she asked for an annulment. I linked to the wikipedia page, because I...
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Making Changes and the Humility of Being Human
I am humbled by how predictable certain things are in their relationship to how I feel emotionally and physically. I am also humbled by how hard it can be to change those things.
For instance, I have been treating sleep like a non-negotiable lately. I treat it like gold, like the sacred thing that can not be fucked with. Making that mental shift, I look forward to sleep more. It’s a goal. I...
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Yay Me!: happiness is: →
indieheroine:
yayyme:
indieheroine:
yayyme:
indieheroine:
heavy-as-hell ceramic tea pot, yerba mate, honey from down the road, lazy afternoons, youtube belly-dancing videos (hello awkward elbows and ribcage, fancy meeting you here), the sound of the swishing washing machine + beats antique mingling in the middle, and the thought of yoga soon. Happiness is.
Happiness is, sunshine...
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In protest of 420 I am going to be productive and think in a linear fashion all day!
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buttpilgrim:
Time to clean up all this 420 talk from my dash
That’s funny, I was *just* thinking this and then saw this.
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“Outside of a person’s love, the most sacred thing they can give is their...”
– James Carville
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WatchI’m really proud of my sister. A few years ago she left a comfortable career and living situation to embark on what Joseph Campbell would have called her “hero[ine]’s journey.” She listened to that voice inside of her which silently persisted that what she was doing at the time wasn’t what she really wanted to be doing.
She decided to go to the University of Utah to...
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I feel like whoever cooked up my emotional state today added tablespoons of Sunday when the recipe called for teaspoons.
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Bad Dream Mode
BDM for short. It’s when you have a destination in mind, you are somewhat time bound, and no matter what you do you don’t seem to get any closer to your goal. This happened in New Orleans recently and just occurred again today!
I was trying to leave work early to go to the coast to meet my family. I got stuck on a support call at work which put me back 30 minutes. I had to stop and...
