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My attempt to Journal in public- I may get shy or not. Let's see. |
| I am searching for myself- anyone seen me lately? I have just turned 50 and feel like I am about to embark on a new journey. I have always kept a very secret and private journal of thoughts and ideas. Mostly, I have erratic memories and events jotted down with the occaisional sprinkling of philosophical thoughts spiced with ruminations. I am not always so willing to share. Twenty years ago I was in grad. school working hard. A stomach ache sent me to a doctor who eventually arrived at the estimation that I had about 8 years left to live (under the best conditions). I dropped out, buried myself in the mundane living of raising a family, savoring just about every minute. It is now 20 years later and I am going strong. So, what happens next? I guess we'll see. |
| I forgot what it was I wrote last and I am not going to go look. I am going off in a different direction tonight. At my job, things are getting just a little chaotic. The entire world seems to be heading in the direction of more chaos... but it could just be me. I don't want to go too far into it because we are in the midst of a hostile corporate take over, too. Things might be getting kind of different over the next 6 months. I might have to be on the look out for a new place to work (depending on the results of the take over attempt and the costs involved). Both sides are promising to increase shareholder value. One of the quick ways anyone can increase that is to cut personnel costs. There is only so much increases that can go into the pricing or the other forms of cost cutting. The more the "fight" is going to cost either side, the more cutting that will later go on. The larger problem to me is there is no reward for something I do very well... serve loyally. I can work my fanny off for my current company over the next 6 months or so, and then when the other company succeeds in their attempt and the poison pill is activated... I might still lose my job while others "at the top" float away on "golden parachutes". Oh well, life will go on and I will be part of it. But, more later, this is not a done deal and I am still working and getting paid. I intend to keep it that way. I like the company I am currently working for and the current culture. I guess we will see how this plays out. |
| There we go, not getting here to do any updating in a long time. I have not had a boring month. Yet, I have not had a busy month either. Events seem to conspire to place me someplace other than here doing this. I, to my greater frustration, cooperating with those distractions. That is the part of doing this that gets me. I choose to pay attention to folks around me and not here. This may take longer to find myself that I initially thought. Some of the folks I have been paying more attention to include my current (and, final) partner (girlfriend, fiance, virtual wife, etc.). She sometimes seems to take up lots of space and time. Then, we spend time sorting out all the issues and fnally get on with life. Another group I spent some time with this month are two Buddhist monks here in the Atlanta area. Br. Utsumi and Sr. Denise have a 9 day peace pilgrimage each November from the MLK, Jr Center to the gates of Fort Benning, in Columbus, GA. I joined them for the walk this year. I took about 750 pictures and have been sorting, printing and posting them on the web- that has taken up lots of time. Once I figure out how, I might try to post a couple of them here. Anyway, I have cleared out my mail box of all the reminders to post to my blog, I have posted a short entry today, and I will try to be more regular here over the Holiday season. |
| I am not sure what I want to go on about here this week. It is not like there is a lot going on in my life. My friend Halima has returned from Mexico. Actually, Halima is a long close friend to my fiance, Lynn. In any event, she is staying here with us, keeping us entertained with stories from Mexico. What can I say, here is a woman who traveled to Mexico for a two month intership and stayed for almost two years. At one point, she was an out of work, illegal alien south of the border. I am catching some of the stories she tells on tape, but I am afraid that I am missing some of the good ones. Riding my bike to work is going well. The weather here in Atlanta this time of year is exquisite. The days can be almost warm and bright, the blue sky seeming to go forever. The early mornings and late afternoons are almost cool. At night, the tempurature drops down to a decent brisk degree, and not cold at all. I love this part of the country in the Spring and Autumn. It is just about perfect bike riding weather. So, my commitment to exercising more and riding in to work manually is paying off and keeping on going. Trouble is brewing, though. My nice new Giant is taking up too much indoor storage space. Soon, I will have to find a place outside or not (and risk the irritation of housemates)... better get it out side soon. We have a porch, so it should be fine. It is just that I paid so much for it... ok, not that much, but more than I thought I ever would. Anyway, I am still riding after a month and feeling kind of fit and trim (although I still have a few pounds to go and I still get winded going up short hills I am getting there). What amazes my about the biking in to work is that I am leaving the house at the exact same time as when I use my car. Yes, I am only going about 2.5 miles, but in "city" traffic with stop lights and all, I still have the same driving time (about 12 minutes). That was one of the fears that kept me back for so long, I dreaded the idea that it would take significantly longer to bike in. I think if I were going 10 miles it would. But, in the city here, anything under about 8 miles is going to be very close. For all the lights and stop signs tend to be equilizers for travel time. And, mostly, the traffic cooperates with the slow moving manual traveller in the outside lane. I keep right and they tend to keep left as they go around me... so it works. I did get flipped off today for the first time. I was about to make a left turn in traffic. I was behind a bus. My vision was restricted and I made a first attempt to get into the driveway at work. A little car came zipping along down the road quickly. She wasn't speeding, but she wasn't waiting around either. I quickly steered back into my lane. She would have been kind of cute, shapely face, dark hair, good skin... then she flipped me off. Bitch. Oh well, I didn't get hit and she didn't hit me, I called it even but she just had to toss out an extra little gesture. Later. |
| Here I sit at a local coffee shop. The coolest thing for me is finding the local ones with free Wi-Fi. I can feel like I am getting out while still being able to do some things (like check this site and see that it has been a year since I posted). What I want to know is how does my girlfriend/fiance/virtual wife sense when I am about to this sort of thing? She says that it is an addiction and seems kind of sensitive to me spending a lot of time on the Internet that Al built, but I don't see it. I am more of a coffee addict. Let me go for a week without Internet access and no symptoms of anything except boredom. Let me go three hours without some coffee and heads (mainly mine) will roll. That seems to me a physical symptom of addiction. I am exaggerating some, but the point is I seem to need the coffee. There are days when I don't even think about firing up a computer or looking for something on the internet. So, it puzzles me when certain things happen. Like right now, I just sat down in a coffee shop- with a Chai Tea Latte frozen drink by the way- when the phone rings. Yes, it is my favorite dream woman. She is ready to chat. I am in Georgia. She is working at a conference in New Jersey- how did she know I had just gotten into the fire up the internet mode? I know we are deeply connected on a soul level, but this is going just a tad too far. Now, when presented with the choice between surfing and connecting, I will choose to connect with her- but does this have to happen every single time? Do I have to answer her call every single time? Well, yes. Not because I am "whipped" but because she is a fairly independent woman and when she calls, she has something important to say or talk about- or she just wants to hear my voice and, guys, don't tell me that is not flattering. But, my conditioning is that she is wanting to tell me something that it is time to hear. So, I answer. But, what gives? Why is it right at that moment when I am just getting down into doing something? What am I avoiding? This can't all be her doing. That is one lesson in life I have down, when something like this is bugging me, I usually have something going on that I am dealing with in myself. Either I don't want to deal with what I am about to do (eventhough I am convincing in my clear dedication, HA!) or I want to put it off or there is something I need to do first. Or I just want to blame her for something going on inside me. Hey, it happens. And, the last couple of weeks have been hectic enough in and of themselves. My friend and I moved into a house- the unpacking and shifting of furniture is enough stress. I have been struggling at work. The manager went out of commission with a heart attack and may not be back for a couple of months. The District is short handed, which meant that was working alone in a two person store for the most part. And, Sarbanes-Oxelly (I may have the spelling off here- the Act is called SOX for short) started to kick in. The Act specified things for corporations to do that would make sure measures were in place to prevent any other company to ever turn out to be an Enron. Once Bush's buddys had the field day... up came the ladder and no one else can even try now. That meant about four months of inventory, accounting and filing had to be checked, re-checked and reported on. I could have used two people to help out. I am still not caught up. And, we are changing over our computer systems. Did you know that Excel makes a rather decent mapping program? I am learning. It is pretty cool, but time consuming. And, don't get me wrong, I love working for the company, I like the work I do, it is just that lately seems to be too much stuff all coming due at the same time. And, it is a lot of stuff that is coming down out of the blue from "on High" outside of the company. So, it is that out of your control frustrating (but it is out of my supervisor's and her supervisor's control- so what can you do? keep a cheerful attitude and do what you can each day). Anyway, I am going on quite a lot today- I have a weekend off so I can take some time to do this sort of thing. I haven't yet got into my new bicycle- my new means of commuting the two and a half miles to work. It has been 4 weeks- and on Thursday I bought my first $15 of gas since my bike came. I was buying about $20 a week. And, the best benefit is that my body is slimming down, I am feeling more energetic and my legs are sore- ok, so it is not ALL peaches and cream. I am hoping that this time next month I will see a serious decrease in my measured blood pressure (I was being coaxed by my doctor to go on medication). So, we'll see. And, I will try to not go 22 days again without putting something more up here. |
| Here it goes after a week. I am being very pestered by the daily reminder in my mail box here. Good think I don't check it so often. I did figure out how to re-set the preferences so I don't waste band width here. I probably won't write anything much more often than once a week, anyway. So, there you go. I am sitting out here on the "porch" (loosely defined area just outside the front door). I live on a Self-Storage property near an industrial park right off a very busy street. The "porch" is the concrete walk up to the office (located just to the right of the front door). The weather is beautiful. I have my choice of nearby Wi-Fi networks from the business park. I am liking life at the moment. Just for the record, I am using my own network connection- I figure it is the safest and most legal and mostly more moral choice. Now, what? The week has been kind of a normal one for me except for here and there. I get up, I go to work, I come home, I walk the dogs, I go meet my partner, then go to sleep and start over the same tomorrow. It is a mundane sort of existence. And, I seem to like it, mostly. I did get to meet some of the news makers this week. Cindi Sheehan stopped in town for a speech. She is one remarkable person. The thing that struck me about her was her authenticity. Most folks a month or two into a media circus seem contrived and superficial. She was still warm, down to earth and authentic. Her pain is the universal pain of motherhood. The values she is expressing, in my opinion, are the universal values of motherhood. She wants the children running the country and the corporations to grow up. I kind of agree. Spend anytime on a pre-school playground and it will become apparent to any rational human being that we have a bunch of ego/children calling the shots. I attended a memorial service at a local mosque on September 11th. Ministers from all different faith walks and churches came to pray for healing to move forward. The were all sincere and made a very good point to me- we have to individually work for peace in ourselves before we can expect peace to fill the world. I know I have some trouble with that at times (mostly in traffic when some knucklehead driving without a plexiglass stomach cuts me off). I have some paths to follow to heal some of the anger I dump in to the Universe at those times. My reaction to one driver kind of scared my partner, and so I have more incentive than religious platitudes to work with here. But, the concept and work is the same. I work on my anger and attitude then pray for the ripple effect to pick up momentum. And,it will. It might not feel like it because the news programs have an agenda to keep things stirred up and our culture likes to keep things stirred up- but I have to believe that I can have a personal positive effect. I can try. One other effect I can have it to begin looking a little deeper into my consumer habits. My partner came back from a trip up north. She brought back some cookies baked in a neighborhood bakery by the owner of the bakery. We shared the cookies over moring coffee while lounging in bed (another level of decadence and kind of fun). I am not sure I am able to explain it well, but they had a depth of texture and feeling that I don't find in many cookies. They were not especially cheap. But, they had that homemade sense about them. In our American culture it seems like we are all too quick to throw away that depth of connection to things we eat or buy. If it is a nickle cheaper over there, we dash off without consulting our soul or spirit about which one has more depth or life. I am beginning to notice that what is best for me, what has the most life for my spirit, is not always the "cheapest" thing in the short term. A lot of time, the cheapest thing now turns into the most expensive thing for my spirit and ends up giving me the most grief later on. I have kind of rambled on for awhile here tonight. I guess I better get out of here for now. |
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