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Dread
I feel a wave of dread flush over me. It isn’t a fictional telling, just a perspective. When I imagine a flock of birds flying up in the sky, I imagine skyscrapers and small birds colliding with them. Large birds too, like geese, swans. I imagine at least less than there used to be. At least hundreds at some point. Maybe this was inevitable, so all I can do is move away or turn my head. It puts me into a pigeon-hole.
Conservation shouldn’t be this difficult, but the pigeon-hole is just the hole the pigeon can make a hole for itself. We navigate around each other, and I would say orbit, but this requires space we don’t always have. That skydiver who didn’t clear the bridge, but has done it for years. When we fail to take the right spaces, the spaces take you.
It feels good to submit to sleep sometimes, knowing maybe I will show back up tomorrow. Sometimes I dread going to sleep because I know I won’t like tomorrow. Every day can’t be perfect, but we imagine perfection like we have already seen it. Since nothing is going to surprise us, surprises are just new world views we can’t deny. The truth can get stale if we know it won’t change.
Even your favorite foods might change one day. What stops you from changing your favorite color?
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Making it Through
Infinite doors, but where do they lead? Getting over a hard day is about as strenuous as any trade or career. When you are bogged down by those invisible chains, it feels like the air is thicker, steps are heavier, and each door feels like it leads nowhere. Perhaps those things you once enjoyed no longer call out to you. The time passes in mysterious ways, slow sometimes and fleeting others. The middle ground is that acknowledgment that holds you back from enjoying clarity. It feels like you have to run even when you stand still.
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Writing as a Hobby
When the average artist suffers in their artist block, there is but the madness-consumed fellow that breaks the mold. This archetype finds random and chaotic source material and samples bits and pieces together to mix wonder. This slow cooker lets the moment settle itself, and only manifests what the recipe calls for. Oddly, the objectively lost find anything to scour.
My travels on this place called me to maintain an internal dialogue. In order to sate my own interests, my taste in writing is kept impactful. All the words matter, but only some stick. Sometimes, the most obscure details are best left in plain sight. Others, we wish the search was worth the navigating. If doesn’t hurt to have a treasure map, especially when we have an idea what the treasure is worth.
Each book has to sell like gold. That’s the figurative carrot on their figurative stick.
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“Roommate Assistance”
This one is short. When you room in college, you’ll usually have a roommate. You can’t always find a roommate out around walking on the street unfortunately. With the age of technology, finding a roommate has never been easier. Each student is coded into automatic systems. It’s as easy as prison.
Arranged marriages, dating apps, roommate assistance, what’s the difference?
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Progress is a Portal
When you make significant progress in the real world, it shifts the way the rest of us perceive living, and what it means to be a alive. It can change our daily lives so much, that we no longer do what we used to do. From waking up and brushing our teeth, to not having the energy for it, we adapt to our environment. I like to imagine a comparison to humans and birds, that our cars and houses became roadblocks that they were required to adapt to for survival, and the trees that we had to chop down to get to where we are now. It screws over the birds twice when a human makes progress, and someone out there was screwed too. I feel like humans screw over everything else, because to make one thing is to destroy something else.
I never really answered why progress is a portal exactly. It is because it takes us away from everything else, becomes untouchable for a moment, and lands anew in new lands. The end result maybe far beyond our original scope, and the definitions just lead further in. We gain a foothold of knowledge, seemingly uncovered rather than discovered, and lose it all upon rebirth. Somehow we recognize the patterns whether from youth or from our ancestors before us. In a way, we know our progress could stand the test of time too if we found it strongly enough. Not only can we persist, but we may indeed carry our belongings past death if we saved it for later. This is how we remain on Earth through the ages as humans, for our needs stem from the same tree.
The portal part is the transition itself. The change is only noticeable after the transition has begun progress. It makes a significant impact like a real portal noticeable in the world, a black hole that takes up more space than it looks in that singularity. It stretches something until the ant who only needed one step to walk the gap needs hundreds. More breaks are required on the way, and thus we never stopped sleeping– setting up camp for the night. The progress will come day or night, but usually not both at once. We will recognize that the pursuit is futile at some point of time, and our mind and body cave in. We cannot keep the singularity afloat for long, but instead we make segments like bamboo and shoot our chutes into the sky defying gravity, the pull of singularity.
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Soil for the Trees
Lots of little changes since my last update. I followed through so far and got some dogwood trees. When they grow up, it might be a good idea to pass them down and sell them. They were cheap to start, just four bucks each. I had my dad pick them up, so I am still relying on them for a lot, but I am reckoning with that truth for now. The main goal is to start the foundations for the plants.
I thought I would start an LLC so I pay less taxes but some video on the internet scared me into that possibility. What matters more is that if I want to start a nursery, I just need to pay an annual fee, then I can sell them after inspection. They make it easy. I was worried about the legal, but that’s the least of my worries.
My mom is telling me of all the plants I could sell clippings of. Oh yeah, it was also Mother’s day. I have to listen to her more. It’s not that I have to take all her advice, but some of her advice is good enough that I don’t need the internet for any other. Her word could take me far. I am hoping one day my partner is as inspirational.
For now, I watch the foundations being set in my friend’s life and I am happy for him. His thing is in the studio and in entertainment. Honestly, the jokes on stage brough me to tears. Something about a crazy uber driver was part of what I needed. We never know what we need, so it may come as a surprise to us, because it won’t be if we really want it.
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Smarts, Feels, and Feeling Smartly
Smarts come in all sorts of sizes. You have street smarts, pet smarts, and mart smarts. Everything there is to know about has a higher level we deem “smart” to know.
Feelings wear all sorts of disguises. We have feelings from our hands, head, and gut. All sorts of feelings we may never be able to explain, as they are better off experienced. Thoughts may cloud our feelings, as much as a bad day can spoil the scenery, or pain can diminish pleasure.
What then is made of the smarts for the feels? Some say it is emotional intelligence, but what is the difference between emotional smarts and emotional stupidities? The answer lies in how it makes others feel, rather than the universal constants of truth. Someone’s entire perspective is a truth, and it often lives in their feelings. It is the gate that denies exit or entry from the brain. Nothing gets through our ego without being observed first.
The smartest smarts of all the smarts is survival, yet survival is not how we want to feel. Our survival instincts drive us down narrow paths. We wouldn’t need to pigeon-hole ourselves if we wanted to feel good. We would hope that the good pulls us to it (and the bad is repelled from us like a bad odor.)
We want to feel good at the end of the day, at the start, and the middle. We always want to feel good, so of course it is somewhere around waiting for us behind survival. Why else would we press on?
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Jumps
While I have done a lot of pondering in this blog, there’s also been some actual life changing events in my life. I have been managing a break-up, figuring out what I want to do for a career, etc. Even this blog itself was a step. Now I must take more than a couple steps– I need to jump off the moving train.
I actually know what I want to do with my life now, at least as my lifelong passion project. I want to remain within the world of birds, my sanctuary, and nurse trees that produce the fruits for them. I want to start out with some dogwoods, because it could attract bluebirds and cedar waxwings. I have yet to see the former, and the latter is my favorite bird. I actually like plants a lot too, and I believe they hold a lot of significance. Only thing is, I never had a nursery, my own business, or maintained several plants at all! This is surely going to be a big jump from what I am used to.
I am learning how to love again. I had a lot of trouble with keeping things stable, but now I am seeking someone who seeks stability too. Comfort alone is as nice as a mattress on the floor. I want a nice frame and house, the windows should be clear, and the air should smell nice. A home isn’t just a home, it’s who you share it with. Now I just have to start opening up the can of worms, pandora’s box; I need to take another jump.
I used to do track and field. Ironically, I did not like the running part because I wanted to be a jumper. I may not have always gotten what I wanted and had to run in a couple disappointing races, but at least it reminded me who I was. I look to overcome absurd objectives. I could keep running in circles if I wanted, but that won’t make the path shorter or the bar lower. I want them to keep raising the bar so that each jump above it is more and more surprising. Sure, it might feel like I have to let go of everything, but in that air suspended, I know someone or something will break my fall.