cross-legged…

… sitting on my parquet floor… resisting the urge to get up every time I think of something I want or need to do… fighting the impulse to text or phone someone… battling the compulsion to check my email… struggling against the inclination to rearrange furniture or knick knacks… succumbing to the tendency to use elipses… trying desperately to be still.

Still is a state I don’t often let myself be in.  Still is a state that I covet and fear.

… brainstorming ways in which I can build my community… imagining methods by which I can connect more to the community I already have… contemplating my ideas of what exactly a ‘community’ entails… considering that my best way to be a better community member is to give myself time to be alone.

Alone is a status that can rarely describe me.  Solitude is a luxury in which I rarely indulge.

…cross-legged in solitary stillness… I am breathing you in and out for as long as I can…

Virus

I don’t even know how I got to clicking through to it today, but I just read this piece on the surprise effect of something you put online ‘going viral.’

I especially like this part:

“We have to pay attention to our words, our status updates, because words (regardless of the length of the statement, and whether delivered in person or digitally) matter. We must be vigilant because we have a responsibility – not just to those we’re sure will hear what we say directly. We’re responsible to anyone who may experience the ripple.”  ~ Gwen Bell

I know I don’t have a lot of readers, but this is a reminder (of something I think I’ve been quite aware of for awhile) that we all have to think, and write, and post, and create as though we have the potential for lots and lots of readers.

This is part of the reason why I don’t tend to put people’s names in my posts; why my writing is always sort of vaguely about where I am, but never truly indicative of my exact location; and why, though this blog tends to be quite journal-ey in it’s essence, I try to write about ideas/connections to my life rather than the actual details OF my life.

Just sayin’ is all…

Drip Drop

(That’s the sound of my sweat literally dripping from my hair and my chin and the BOTTOMS OF MY EARS… this humidity is disgusting).

So I recently wrote that I’m going to start running from my demons, and it actually got me to start running (jogging, really)… full stop.   I go out for a run when I’m lonely. I run when I’m jealous or agitated or sad.  But I also run when I need to wake up or tire myself out.  I run when I am happy or content or feeling silly or ecstatic.

Just need to work on my distance… but until I decide to go longer/further/faster/stronger… I will continue to notice the development of the late summer blooms that are rampant in my neighbourhood, and I will continue to scour for sweet garbage-day wooden furniture scores!

I love where I live.

Humzingerbird

In Pointe au Baril…

Hummingbirds are seemingly dainty, gentile creatures… until you are sipping tea on a windy cottage porch, near their  sugar.water.red.plastic.bird.feeder.thingy and they (mis?)take you for a threat and they dive-bomb past your ear… close enough that you can feel the faint, but definite, wind shift from their ridiculously tiny, rapid wings. It’s loud. And not loud in the way that air-show planes invade your headspace, but loud in that way that mosquitoes get right, disgustingly, annoyingly close to your ears when you’re desperately trying to sleep in a silent tent on a silent night in the hot, hot heat of mid-summer.

Anyway, point is that hummingbirds are close to magical, and are exquisitely pretty, but they scare me the way that mice scare elephants.

Did I just call myself fat?

Four Levels of Social Entrapment

OH MY GOD THIS IS GOLD.

The THIS that I refer to is a piece on Hyberbole & A Half about the 4 levels of extremely awkward social situations:

Level 1: Brief encounters with kind-of friends

You know what she’s talking about… you met once at a party… it wasn’t that great… you don’t really give a flying shit about them… it’s awkward, but neither of you really want to engage with each other, so it won’t last long.

Level 2: Forced proximity

There are many of these types: you go to the library at the same time, you take the same elevator in the morning, you have the same pee schedule at work.  You are in the same physical space and you have no desire to speak to each other… but you can’t stop yourself.

Level 3: The Trap

Hers is the best example; you go out for a solo coffee or brunch or something, and you just want to read, or write, or space out sans company… but someone who ALWAYS wants to talk enters your luxury space and takes that lovely alone time away from you…

Level 4: Well-intentioned social terrorism

HAH!  ’Just thought I’d pop by for a visit.’   … ‘I brought you some wine.’   … ‘I was in your neighbourhood and saw your lights on… and looked in your window and saw you sitting there… breathing.’   um… yeah.

ANYWAY… I  don’t know how she (the creator of this deliciously amazing blog; Allie) does it, but she just keeps churning out these hilariously accurate depictions of real-life situations such as

- learning to ride and fall off a bicycle

- making a sandwich

- trying to be a productive, list-crosser-offing adult

Basically, her raw, pixelly drawings are brilliant and are accompanied by long-winded but AMAZING descriptions of the phenomenon/situation she describes.

Make this blog part of your weekly routine.  So funny.