I am not entirely myself.

None of us are, really, no matter what anyone wants to say about nature vs. nurture.
Case in point, I suppose, for what are we but that which is created and shaped by our interactions with others? Innately, I belive, we are not really anything. Personality doesn't exist until it is created, by symbiotic relationships (side note, sybiosis is between two different species, right? hmm, apparently not the word I want just there, but as I cannot remember the pertinent substitution, it shall remain) OH (wait!) social interaction. Yeah. Phew. Sorry, major intense brain fart. A big, embarassing one that I could deny by careful deletion, but instead shall leave.

Golly, anyway. Moving on.

So, Nick gave me the tools to begin thinking about that sort of falsified concept that one is born with a seedling of 'personality'.

1. Personality doesn't exist until it is created, by the individual in question.
2. A personality can be created (huh? how can one create something out of nothing?)
3. Restatement of hypothesis : A collection of emotional responses that may be classified, albeit incorrectly, as personality.
4. Since it is a human definition, it is truth, but a supposed truth. I don't believe in human truth. Truth and fact are just another religion. Sure there is probably a kernel I agree with, as with all of them, but I take what I take with several grains of salt.

*By the way, side note, totally just took care of a dead mouse caught in the mousetrap in the attic by it's face, my family couldn't deal with it, so I hauled it's cute, mangled stinky lil' ass to the curb and tossed that shit!*

Yeah, I give up on the personality business I wanted to talk about, I'm too distracted now. Perhaps some other time. Perhaps not.

Home(?)

Je suis en Rochester. <- Anna, look! I'm practicing!



Um. Well. After 1. deciding to leave early, calling my mom, packing in 30 seconds, and crashing out the door to the airport, being told to come back at 11 pm for the red-eye to chicago, trucking everything back home, coexisting with Krista, Andre, and Gordon for a few hours, being denied a ride to the airport by Gordon, hauling my ass, et. al back to the airport, having the plane break, gettinga new, smallerplane, not having a seat, getting rescheduled for the 11:53 AM flight, getting back on the thrice damned train, meeting three guys, getting to numbers, and getting walked to my doorstep, breaking it to Andre that he would not, in fact, get my badass bed to stretch luxuriously on (NOT! have you seen by bed?), farting around till sleepytime, waking up, going to the airport, going thru security, getting to the gate, meeting Jim the mine technician and getting his business card (in case I ever need a rock crusher installed?), getting the flight delayed two hours, boarding (whee! global alliance rocks! first one on!), getting delayed another 45 minutes ON the plane but not yet to the runway, getting off the ground, sleeping, drinking horrid more-high-fructose-corn-syrup=than-cranberry cran-apple ocean spray airplane-beverage, sleeping, landing, finding I hadn't missed my connection to detroit because THAT plane had been delayed an hour and a half, and taking off and flying...after ALL that, I made it to Detroit. It only took me 15 hours. Ish.



Landed, mummy brought the siblings B and C, driving, gabbing, homeing, gifting and being shown around mum's projects-in-progress tour of our house (including my bedroom, by the way, looks to be interesting), the family went to bed, and I went to James'. Um.



Comfortable couch-sitting ensues. Frustration is voiced. Calm. Jabber. Roundabout updates on 'sex' lives A and B (not to be mistaken with sibling B). Lifestyle conversations. Astrology conversations. Nutella, bread, milk, and cigarettes. Couch sitting. Catching up. Departure right on time (4:00 am used to be my chronic leave-taking, it happened spontaneously, I decided to go and it was 4:01). Grab shirt, move to put on. Hugging. Stagger, finish 'packing up'. Get held in that dreadful almost-hug face-facing embrace that demands either a kiss or an akward hasty retreat. I am not who I was, entirely. Kiss. Kiss kiss kiss. Break. There she goes, fucking with shit again. You get what you ask for, sometimes. Nevermind the consequences? Always mind the consequences. They bite you in the ass no matter what.

Objectified by Connotation

It's interesting, I'm hung up in the comment, "objectified by connotation", but not because I feel like I am trapped by being percieved in a certain fashion. Krista and I were talking about something similar yesterday evening. I was saying how I feel like one of the places I've had the opportunity to grow and change when I moved here is because I no longer feel like it is necessary to connotate anything. I appreciate what is affecting me, or who is affecting me, but trying to place every human being somewhere in the line of friend, or girlfriend, or husband, only causes more confusion. No relationship is the same, they cannot be categorized within the apparent strictures of society.

*This next paragraph can be skipped over, it was how my train of thought went, but looking back, I suppose it isn't actually the same thought, but a related one*

(Being platonically in love, or sharing bodies to bask in a fount of positive energy, or a healing kiss to an old woman. Sleeping, touching, walking, dancing, admitting, staring, admiring, complimenting, all should be done with abandon and a clear conscious. Labels promote folkways that promote following others' guidelines to life. No wonder we are all so horribly unsure of ourselves. In a compiled rulebook, no one is fulfilled completely. Wow. I seem to be getting further and further away from the original thing I wanted to say...anyway.)

Even one person,be they entertaining or irritable or limber, each adjective leaves less space for them to be existing as THEM. Until more people realize human beings can't be defined without restriction to one human's perception of another, we will all be held back from our true abilities to create a self. I think, and this is my first attempt at articulating it, so bear with me: The self is infinite (working with the fact that is IS something, abstractly tangible as we develop it), but as we are defined by ourselves and others, while it isn't possible to detract from the infinite, we (human creatures) get so hung up on the adjectives that are attempting to define us that we lose track of our own ineffability.

Part of why it is so important to me to spend time by myself is because I need to re-ground myself, and sift through/examine/discard my definition of self. I AM myself. Words detract from truth. Nothing is absolute, nothing is black and white, happy or sad, new or old. Everyone can be anything and everything. We are capable of it, even if we are not sure how to get there.

Thoughts. For my own benefit, because I am a happy, confused, dork.

Intimacy is the opportunity to creatively share enthusiasm. The more, the better. Positive energy promotes positive energy. Stigmas and restrictions deny natural human growth. Developing a sense of touch, action and reaction, knowledge of freely given power, all important.

Free love? Naturally. Not a single working definition I am happy with. Not just anyone, not just because the opportunity arises. Love for a purpose. Create bonds, forge mental connections, explore, learn, grow, nudge the energy of the world a little more on track. Love with abandon, but not recklessly. Awareness of other humans, at our most vulnerable. And at our most empowered. Separate and glow. Shine and hold within you the knowledge that without any tools beyond our bodies, or body, we have the ability to create something beautiful.

"I think you should have sex with whoever you want, whenever you want. But I think one should be picky." ~Andre

Things to work towards :voluntary and constant ego-death, mindfucking , remembering that loving and enjoying something/one is diminished when one attempts to possess it/them

Live and let live. Get confused deliberately. Be methodical. Take life a step at a time, but remember that jumping off a cliff is a step too. Don't be ashamed to retrace your steps. Recollect, and dive back in.

Math Joke...I ache with hilarity.

Noah lands the Ark atop the mountain, lets down the ramp, and says to his animals, "Go forth and multiply!" And all the animals leave, two by two, into the forest, except for a pair of snakes. Upon questioning, the snakes say, "We can't multiply, we're adders." They leave anyway.

Later, Noah is taking a walk and trips, and falls flat on his face. He looks back to see what he tripped over, and he sees a log, and under it, the two adders with a bunch of baby adders. Noah exclaims, "But you said you could not multiply!" The snakes nod. "That's what we thought too, but then we found this log that lets us multiply by adding, and..."

Just Look

Search for me as I float amidst the clouds, dancing forever among the warm comforting rain. I will forever be a twilight mermaid of the sky, ocean, and all that dwells between.

New Friends

Hm. Moving made me eager to form new connections. It took a couple of weeks, but now I have a small group of wonderful people to share my new life with. Here is Andre, who lived across the hall of our apartment building with his erstwhile girlfriend Lee and their friend/coworker/amazing person in her own right, Krista. I love him to death and he happens to be the first person I met on this side of the world, on moving day, no less. And we work together (also his doing), and go do fun things like camping and seeing Crater Lake and finding hot springs and going to the coffee shop. He lives on my couch right now. Which makes me smile.

This is Dre with no beard, which I have yet to see in real life, and this is Dre mostly how he looks at the moment, excluding the eyebrow ring. He's a big bucket of wonderful. Oh yeah. And he lives on our couch. And I work with him. And he can think.

Krista. Oh goodness. Krista lived across the hall too, and she's technically my boss, and she is similar to Sydney in some ways, and the complete opposite in many others. She is smart and funny and wonderful to be around. She has a lovely forthright manner and is quirky and sunny. (Yes, I've seen her a couple times otherwise, but I firmly believe her innate nature to be diamond-bright)

Quoteables

"To love and be loved is to feel the sun from both sides." --David Viscott

"The first step to getting the things you want out of life is this: Decide what you want."--Ben Stein

"When people talk, listen completely. Most people never listen." --Ernest Hemingway