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i learned something fabulous the other day; which is that i am not unemployed, i'm funemployed!!
woot! such a fantastic concept and term i'm going to use right into the ground most likely...
in the spirit of sharing and caring, i thought i'd share visually some of the things that have been filling my time....
first off is my continuing new art project. i haven't figured out how to get access to some of my earlier works as they are trapped on my phone, but let me tell you a story of how this all began....
it was back in the troubled month of april, when things looked gloomy...the weather still sucked, i was still pretty heart broken, and my job situation was very obviously on the rocks...
my friend chewy and i were spending a lazy sunday biking around, when inspiration hit me and i pulled out a section of canvass i had laying around. we quickly decorated it with a crazy urban scene (chewy's doing) and a horse and forest (my doing) and snuck it into the bar across the street and hung it up.....then proceeded to ask people what it meant.
it was so fun that for the next week we decided to make dummies and sneak them in! it was great! i made a neat little man and chewy made this very load woman. it was a whole process, of sneaking them in, setting them up, then slowly moving them closer to the bar area (the place we were doing it at has this large out door patio....)
at one point in the night the two dummies were sitting at a table together and this girl lit chewy's dummies cig and gave mine a drink!!! chewy eventually got his up to the bar (where the bar tender proceeded to talk to it and give it a drink) and i got mine up to the dance floor!!
the next week we took some blow up balloon animals from the dollar tree and turned them into crazy creations.....this time however, we got caught and were instructed to not do it any more!! BOO.
anyway, i moved out of the place i was living in that was right there, so poop on them any way....
since then, we've been wanting to bring it back, but haven't found a new place to do it, but in the mean time, i've been killing time working on my new dummie...and a couple masks and a little horse (portland sidewalks have these horse hitching rings left over from the frontier days and its big here to attach a model horse to them, so i thought i'd one up everyone and make my own horse!!)
anyway- here's a photo of my newest dummie. her name is barbra and she dates billy grippo who is the east sides biggest producer in the real estate game. as you can see, she likes to stay up to date on the news...her and billy haven't seen each other in a while, but they're planning a big reunion soon. i'll let you know how that goes!
next, is a project that i haven't been working on quite as long, but has taken up a lot of my time. as you may or may not know, there is an awesome organization in portland called city repair. basically, it is a group of activists reclaiming public space and bringing communties together and helping to foster a ecological future for us all. well...in theory. don't get me wrong, the organization has done a lot of really amazing work, (including getting the portland city council to pass a regulation that allows neighborhoods to paint their intersections) but i feel like a lot of the drive has kinda left the movement...i personally think a lot of it has to do with the fact that one of the major instigators of the whole thing, mark lakman, is getting really burnt out and overwhelmed and frankly, there's not anyone else in the organization that is willing to put so much into it....ANYWAY...way back in the day mark was this big shot architect and was working on a project in downtown pdx and was sitting in a meeting where they were discussing this toxic leak on one of the projects they were working on and they were all congratulating themselves for bribing the inspectors (i have delusions of erin brockvich here...digging up all that dirt and publicizing it.....one thing at a time though....) and he couldn't take it any more, and quit and went traveling....well...he ended up with a mayan tribe down in central/south america and had some really amazing experiences, including being told about all these city repair site around portland before they happened...he was very overwhelmed and didn't understand how he could make it happen and they told him to just be himself....
one other really powerfull experience he had was one night sitting around in a circle this young man next to him started to do this elaborate dance (while sitting) with this butterfly....and eventually had the butterfly jump to mark's finger (he really tells this story better then me...)...
later, back in the states, while trying to figure out how to make all these sites happen, and well, change the world, mark came back to that butterfly and its traditional correlation to change and decided what needed to be done is to make a mobile tea house that has huge butterfly wings....
{there's kinda more to the story, but that's for another day}
anyway- that was the birth of the t-horse that for several years was a fixture in portland parks throughout the summer. overtime, energy died and it kinda fell off the radar, but we're bringing it back!!!
{and i have delusions of making it a cross-country mobile tea house....but that's for another day...}
so....with out further ado:
The T-Horse
that's all for now. i wish you all much peace and love.
I've been hearing concerns that all my posts are, well, a tad depressing. and that's the wrong image to give out about my life here in Portland. sure. at 2am when i can't fall asleep and my life doesn't seem to amount to much, dark thoughts tend to swirl in my head and writing has always been a sort of therapy for me; so i do what i know how to do to deal with the negative thoughts. get them out my head and into the world.....maybe some one out there can see them and know they're not alone; or something.
in reality; most days i feel so good its somewhat alarming; having spent most of my life feeling blah.
i'm realizing that its a process you have to go through to allow yourself to be happy and feel secure in your decisions.
today was one of those days where things were beautiful and i began to see my life fitting together and making sense....
it started with an interview at a physiologist's office who is looking for an office/project manager for his growing ecophysicology firm....
it went pretty well, BUT he did say he has a lot of applicants....eh. whatev. its something i could do and be good at, but nothing that really excites me....
after that i stopped by radio shack and had a really de-humanizing experience...all i wanted was some freakin batteries for my new (used) camera...and the guy ended up trying to sell me a freakin charger and three times as many batteries as i need....and a credit card, and a job!!! DAMN! anyway- i left there with no batteries and a memory of why i hate radio shack and a vow to never enter that damn store again....as for a job there??? please! me? a sales lady? someone who hates consumption? HA.
THEN i had a coffee meeting/get together with a landscape architect i met recently. {story of meeting- i ever so briefly tried my hand at renewable energy sales- sucked! not only was it a sales position, but it was door to door to boot! ANYWAY. one of the supervisors there is this really awesome lady that does a lot of social justice work and the other weekend she was having a party; and i overheard a lady say she's a larcher, so i butted in and said i have bla.....} the meeting was pretty fun; she kinda got into the profession the same way i did- round about from art- and is actually practicing and licensed and all that good stuff; so we talked shop a little bit- me about some of the projects i'm involved in (depave.org and city riparian) and she talked about some of her experiences working in high end residential....any way, it was decided that we should approach a building owner that approached depave about removing some asphalt and seeing if we can finagle some compensation for some design services!! WOOT!
as i was leaving that meeting, i ran into Albert who is paying me to do some research/writing on population growth and Amy Pearl who is the exec. dir of this social entrepreneurship organization {who i've know for a spell through trying to get things accomplished for gms...} they were having a small get together, talking about the upcoming social change (or something) forum they're planning at my new favorite coffee shop; urban grind. i'm pretty excited about it and am willing to throw some energy into it; especially some community mapping stuff....
now i'm home; and wanting to nap before my T-Horse meeting, but feeling wired- but in that bad way....wired and fried.
oh...at one point i did make it to fred meyers to get both film and batteries.....but DAMN! B&W film is freakin expensive!!
so there you have it- an up beat post from Rose City.
Once again finding myself unable to find sleep.
it is because i sleep too late into the day? or is it because of too much stimulation too late in the day?
my life seems loose and anchorless, drifting out on a sea of peaceful calming waves...
somewhere, i know, there's a point and purpose to all this, but for now i'm trying my best to find my puzzle pieces and where they fit into the larger picture...
somehow i know i have them all, they're all there, but something vital is missing, some impedious that will make them all make sense. i know that my pieces alone aren't going to bring that picture together, and i'm meeting those that have other pieces....
maybe i'm too impatient and have to remember that rome wasn't built in a day, and its one foot in front of the other till you realize you've walked a mile and that mile turns into another and another....
but why, sometimes do i feel so out of whack? like i've have no idea how to interact with people? why do i sometimes feel my presence so strongly changes the dynamics of a situation; why do i feel like there's something i should be doing that i'm not....some way i should be acting that i'm not...
maybe i'm trying to cram too much into too small of a space....
i don't have to be everything to everyone.
i just have to be me to myself.
whatever the crap that means.
What with being unemployed and all, i've had a lot of time to sit, and think, and think, and think some more.
i realize in a lot of ways, that i'm just waiting for everything to come together, to find that final piece that falls into place and makes everything click. what i'm beginning to remember as i sit and wait is that my goal for myself, and my perceived strength, is being that piece for other people....
which kinda makes everything a bit harder on myself, because that doesn't really pay much!
sometimes i can o so clearly see how everything is working and how its all going to work and see my vision moving in front of me; then i get brought back to reality and all it takes to get there.
maybe that's in a large way a source of so much of my awkwardness, i'm so often living in the future, or a different reality, that its hard for me to relate to people living in the here and now....
somewhere i'm living this life were i'm removing toxins from the environment and spreading peace and love all over the damn place....
but here, and now, its almost all i can do to smile at people.
1. Yielding a bare or meager living with great labor or difficulty. 2. Marked by poverty.
O, such a word to succinctly sum up my feelings on erie.
maybe it is time to go back.
the fear and confusion i feel about my situation right now vanishes under a cloud of anger, passion, and a sense of urgency when i think about erie.
i had always assumed i would end up back there, but had mostly assumed it would be many years from now.
while i sometimes feel lost and isolated out here; i more often then not felt smothered and alone there.
i know what work i need to do there, but don't feel that i have the tools to do it.
maybe i'm making excuses for myself. maybe i'm being selfish by holing up in this glorious city (which i just hole up in any way--but often when i do get out i fall in love with it all over again--but MY. i do miss sunsets over water. and my cat.)
lately, it seems like waves of fear have been over taking my life.
so odd, because not that long ago, waves of absolute belonging so intense i couldn't focus were over taking my being.
are both these waves symptomatic of my inability to "be here now"?
i wonder why i suffer from such feeling of loneliness, but yet keep myself secluded in my apartment?
i wonder what love means to me.
i wonder what it means to love someone means to me.
two things happened today that made me want to crawl into a dark, dark black cave and stay there.
the first (these are not listed chronologically) was finally getting word about my dream job i've been waiting on. i didn't get it. not only am i now in the position of being unemployed and not having something on the horizon, but i'm at a loss once again with the intended direction of my life. i mean, i really see/saw that job as my dream job and what i want to do with my life. maybe i wasn't as qualified as i thought, or maybe they made a mistake. anyway, its left me thinking- now what? all this is really starting to feel like a colossal bungle on my part; a bungle which could have been avoided and a bungle i get myself into a lot. i am doomed to never hold a job down for more then a year? i am doomed to forever be living paycheck to paycheck? just what the hell AM i doing with my life??
the second thing also has to do with repetitive negative behavior patterns; this time more to do with my inability to know how to interact normally with people....i have a tendency to over think things and build things up way too much. AND the thing that happened didn't really affect anything....it just made me feel crappy. which i have to wonder why i let such a little thing make me feel so crappy...
it was kinda a moment of deep personal insight when the dark hood started to come down over my brain, and the desire to hide started to set in....i realized that that's what alcohol does (especially over drinking) brings that hood down hard; cuts off the outside world, and some how allows me (briefly) to exist without experiencing life. where does that desire come from? its not that i don't like living, this world, or people (well mostly)- but so often this desire to hide from it all overwhelms me.
i keep hoping/thinking that some day those feelings will fade, and that i'll be able to face the world with out psyching myself up for it...
maybe i just need to stop being such a whiner...suck it up a bit.
tied into all this mess is this nasty feeling that has recently come into my life that if i could only find someone to love me, i wouldn't feel like that- that some how this imaginary person's love would heal me.
i know that's a bunch of bullshit. and always knew it was a bunch of bullshit- but here's the odd part- its a feeling that has become ever so much more prominent in my thoughts since my girlfriend dumped me for a boy. i think part of it for a while pretending that if i could find someone to love me again, i could forget her and move on....now its taken this evil life of its own, and every woman i meet that i'm interested in is my destiny....which is crazy and not healthy!
some how, i have to get my shit back together, regain my composure/confidence and re-negotiate my standing with myself and the world.
simple, right?
i've spent the last couple days...okay, maybe really several....mostly in my bed/room. now, while sequestered in there, i have been reading, watching movies and writing; but mostly sleeping and thinking; and when ever so often, i'm able to break out of my ocd thoughts of "oh shit, i'm going to run out of money, i'm an idiot, why did i quit before i had a new job lined up" and other things i don't feel like mentioning- i realize the pattern i'm falling back into.
yes, there's the depression, yes there's the fact that i spent most of the last several days being reclusive, yes there's the constant beating myself up; but those things don't really bother me....i mean they do; but there's something worse, deeper, more sinister....
and that would be my alcoholism.
its not a new realization that i could classify myself as such. i struggled a lot with my drinking in college, but it was oh so easy to write it off as just part of the experience....plus, there were people who drank more than me, so it must not be that bad, right??
the year after i graduated, i made the decision that i need to quit. i needed to get it out of my system and learn to live my life with out it. it was kinda easy, because i was in a new town, and wasn't faced with the peer pressure of going out and having drinks. i quit for six months and was pretty proud of myself.
i decided that since i had faced a test- being in a public place where others were drinking and didn't drink myself- i was save. i could start drinking again and have it under control. so i did.
at very first, i might have maintained a little control over it....not drinking too too much and not making a complete ass out of myself...
but slowly, incidents started occurring- drinking more then i anticipated, acting more of an idiot then i would prefer, being hung over longer then was healthy...
for a bit, it was the exception that those things happened....for the most part, i was under some resemblance of control....
but something happened, something changed- and recently, its been more the standard then the exception; more the way things go then they way they don't....
nothing really too terrible has happened, but all too often i've chastised myself the next day for how much i drank, how much i spent, or what i said.....or how i acted- or just wished to goddess i didn't let that much vial liquid pass my mouth because my brain is trying to escape my head.
so, when i was ever so briefly detoxing, i also wasn't drinking. and hadn't had a drink in a while; so once i stopped detoxing; i figured it was time to start drinking again...
the first drink wasn't a big deal...i just had one; and the craving for more didn't really kick in....
the second time wasn't that big of a deal either; i had a few more then one; but didn't do anything too embarrassing- but did end up sleeping most of the next day...
the third time, however- i drank too much, acted like a huge idiot and crashed my bike- maybe once, maybe more; i can't really recall.
two days later and my head still feels out of sorts; and i have to wonder- why?
why do i keep partaking in something that i hardly get any joy out of any more- that i hardly enjoy the taste of any more- that more often then not, creates more problems then its worth??
the answer, really has two parts....
one- once that first drink has passed my lips, i often crave for more and more till i'm to the point of illness- that is definitely a sign and symptom of alcoholism...and the reason why i need to not let that first drink past my lips; because once it does, it just opens the way for more. and i really don't think there's a way to avoid that craving other then just not partaking at all.
the second part, which, really is the much harder part is/are the reasons i drink...
one is just because its easier to not say no....even though i'm not in college and my social life doesn't completely revolve around alcohol- portland sure is a town big on its beer....
two is its affects as a social lubricant.....having always been someone that's pretty shy/with drawn its nice to have something that doesn't make me feel so shy/withdrawn; something that lets me seem a little freer...
and three; which i think is the biggest issue; is some mess of unresolved emotions swirling around in my head....yes, there's the social awkwardness which constitutes a huge part of why i drink; but there's also all the feelings that come up around that, and behind that...and the anger. deep, deep seething anger that comes up when i read the newspaper, or listen to a ignoramus...and which comes boiling out and over flowing when i'm drinking....that kind of anger makes me scarred of myself, scarred to let people in too much, lest they see it. scarred because i don't really know where its coming from...
so i realized i have a choice to make- continue down the path i'm on....watching my behavior and drinking slowly slip more and more out of my control; covering up the weirdness i feel with hangovers and drinking: or confront those demons. show my fears to the light of day and learn how to interact in this world with out the help/hindrance of alcohol.
making the choice is easy. sticking by it is what will be the challenge.
I made a decision on the fourth; which i realize is not quite tantamount to writing the declaration of independence or what not; but still, in my mind at least; begins to bring some solace to my weary, weary soul....
i've decided to officially declare to myself that dubbya is officially a lame duck president....or more realistically- what he has always been a lame fuck.
the end is in sight.
let's all hope we can pull together and not only repair some of the damage made over the last eight years, but get at least a little caught up to the rest of the world.
maybe now; after such a long, long time, i can again begin to read the news without desolving into a state of hysteria/depression...
maybe now the future will no longer hold images of the apocalypse for me and actually hold images of something hopeful, something good- something with lots of flowers and butterflies.
let's all hope that that horrible horrible man/administration represented the death rattle of the far right and things will begin to get better....
things i hope for in the future:
universal health care
mandatory paid time off!!
1 full year of maternity leave!
a government that puts its citizen's well fare above that of big business...
butterflies and bees....
flowers and food
healthy environments for all!!!
rainbows and unicorns that shit happiness.....
okay...maybe that last one is more in the realm of fantasy, but do the other ones seem so out of reach for america? why is socialism seen to be at such odds with democracy??
why can't i spend my life in americorps? damn! is it really too much to ask to be allowed to spend my life in community service getting paid shit?!
life sure is funny. here i am....a pretty well educated, well read, intelligent, caring, passionate person, again looking at the possibility of taking a job i'm WAY over qualified for; and will most likely quit in six months....
i guess i could spend my reserve year and re-up with americorps.....
damn. really people. why can't i just do that for the rest of my life?
what did people do before the internet?
i guess there was a time when tv was the main brain sucker, but i have a sinking feeling that for our generation, and our time the main time sink is the internet. i mean, here i am, logged on, not really for any purpose or with any intent in mind other then trying to kill time. heaven forbid i actually leave my house and try to connect with some real people, instead i will sit here, in my room and troll the depths of the internet, wondering why i feel so alone and disconnected from the world around me.
in reality, i do try to get out a lot and meet people- mostly through volunteering and what not; and i guess i'm pretty american because when people don't instantly become my friend, i get disappointed and discouraged. but- really, i don't try to become people's friend! i always leave it up to them to pursue a friendship with me! how's that for silly?
back to the internet thing, i marvel sometimes at what it would take to conduct business before the internet....imagine, a world bereft of email, im, social networking and "shudder" internet research. it must of been a bleak world indeed.
and further more; how ever would one stay up to date on all the recent conspiracy theories and crack pot prophecies? it must have been a lot harder in those days to find a saviour....
i read/heard one time some statement to the affect that for every invention we come up with, we loose a bit of human potential.
have to wonder what we're killing off with all this wifi nonsense.
lately i've decided to start two missions- one; a suitable location to watch sunsets and two; a suitable coffeehouse/cafe in which to kill time. i'm pretty sure i have an idea of where to find #1 (just haven't gone there yet) where as #2 is a little more difficult. this being portland, many places close at 5ish as people switch to drinking beers; so most likely it will have to be a place that serves both nectars of the gods. also, my operating system is getting old; so my wireless doesn't work with encrypted wifi and having internet access plays a vital role in my ability to kill time.
speaking of time- i really have been feeling for a while that i've hit some sort of wall with my motivation/concentration....i know that there's all these things i should be doing now that i have time to do them; but i just keep putting them off....including reading. i can tear through 2-3 graphic novels a day, but i've barely put a dent in "the chalice and the blade" a book which i've been meaning to read for five freakin years. i read a page, and can't remember what i just read. it that a symptom of too much internet? intellectual over load? stress? maybe i'm glorifying my past, where i seem to think i used to read a lot more....maybe i never really had that much concentration....maybe, just maybe, i'm being too hard on myself.
i realize more and more that i may have a voice, opinion, writing style and vision that i want to share with others (hence this blog) but find myself struggling with the point of it all; and method of delivery.
do i just want to be a poet, attempting to verbally illuminate the beauty of this world? an armchair prophet telling of a future that may be and could be? a re-interpretive historian; telling the past through the language of the landscape? or just a lazy head who wants to pretend to be something i'm not....
what is the point of this world? is it to enjoy your life, or try to improve things for others- can you do both? HOW do you do both?
am i still constricted by a schedule i no longer have to follow? i still dread the coming of 5pm; as if i haven't accomplished anything by then my day is over. why is that? i'm not working; 5pm isn't the end of the day- further more the night is open to working too....
but- what is it that i'm working on? what is it that i'm doing? do i even know any more??
anyway- here's a photo of my newest dummie. her name is barbra and she dates billy grippo who is the east sides biggest producer in the real estate game. as you can see, she likes to stay up to date on the news...
