my dream

Last night I dreamt I was on the back steps of a large fancy house, reading. A tall man with a large black mustache and a black shirt with large, fancy, puffy sleeves walked in through the front door, and then walked past me and out the back gate (I said hi to him but he didn’t acknowledge me). Then he knocked on the front door once, and walked in. I looked at him. He got large scissors (the kind used to cut fabric) out of a drawer in the kitchen and tossed them at me. Then he walked over and stabbed me several times in the neck with them.

The End

don’t be skinny

let’s take a walk

What do I like? What can I be happy with? Slower, please.

I think I just have to go stream-of-consciousness on this one, because for some reason (no matter how many drafts I do) I can’t seem to write something worth publishing.

In a few days, it will be my 20th birthday, a day I (oddly, morbidly) never expected to come. I loathe my own birthday–what a selfish holiday! But I’m uncharacteristically proud that I am so close to this one. Twenty sounds better than nineteen, and for once, I feel like it’s right, and I’m ready.

My mind likes to plan, but never likes to follow through. Some days, I hate the idea of graduate school…shouldn’t I be done with college when I’m done with college? People say: you’re crazy, grad school is the new college. Then I realize how close I am to that end and think: but what then? And then grad school seems like the most appealing thing in the world because 1) I love colleges, and I wish I could attend so many of them and 2) it would allow me to procrastinate on the monotony of entering the cliché “real world” and getting  stuck at some dumb boring job in some dumb boring place and decide that all my former aspirations were childish fantasies, completely unrealistic and unattainable in real life.

I have found that my most rewarding experiences have come from me finding something scary, doing this scary (often irreversible) thing, and then living with it. I’m hoping this is what will happen with Nepal. This was all my idea, and it’s the most remarkable idea that’s ever been this close to coming true. I begged my dad to do this, but I only kind of expected him to agree. And then he did and I was thrilled but now I’m thinking it over. I never thought it over before, because it’s easier to be enthusiastic about things you don’t think over, but now I am and I’m starting to scare myself. I have a lot of stuff to do to prepare but I don’t do any of it. I think I need to be thrown into it, soon. Stop my mind running circles around the concept and ACT. I’m terrified for it. I’m unbelievably, gratefully, excited for it. I’m impatient for it. This is going to be big, and it’s going to change my life.

This Summer

I have…

• flown somewhere on an airplane
• learned new songs on guitar
• been to many garage sales
• attended an outdoor concert
• picked wild berries and made a pie
• gone camping
• attended a sporting event
• painted
• slept under the stars
• gone to the beach
• finished books
• improved my cooking
• ridden on a train
• watched countless movies
• discovered new favorites
• sung around a campfire
• floated for miles down a river

I still need to…

• road trip
• backpack
• go to a Giant’s game
• make some money

As far as they go, I’ve had a pretty successful summer. And there’s still plenty of time left.

stalkers

Sometimes I feel like I’m being stalked, but by things, not by people.

Once, I was stalked by snakes. I would dream of snakes. I would see ordinary objects and think they were snakes. I would see real, living, snakes everywhere. I would narrowly miss hitting snakes with my car. People would come up to me and inexplicably start telling me stories about snakes.

Right now I’m being stalked to a lesser degree by French cinema, hot Orthodox Jews, and friendly, likable murderers. I have yet to see either of those two groups of people in person, but they’re on my TV, on my computer, and in my conversations. AKA everywhere.

Try not to.

Yesterday on our morning hike, my father and I began talking about primitive man, and how that lifestyle (the one we evolved to maximize) is so different from today’s. I’ve always wondered if that original way of life is the one that is best for us (and will allow us to function most efficiently)…after all, we evolved to suit it, so it makes a lot of sense. Poppi told me that there’s this kinda narcissistic guy (I don’t remember his name…but I was told he used to be a great runner?) who has written books about living in this way.

…The Primal Blueprint. This is a summary of the guidelines:

1. Eat lots of animals, insects, and plants.

2. Move around a lot at a slow pace.

3. Lift heavy things.

4. Run really fast every once in a while.

5. Get lots of sleep.

6. Play.

7. Get some sunlight every day.

8. Avoid trauma.

9. Avoid poisonous things.

10. Use your mind.

If followed, apparently (and ideally) we’d all become: healthy, energetic, happy, lean, strong, bright, and productive.

Is this common sense?

the detective

“My dear fellow,” said Sherlock Holmes as we sat on either side of the fire in his lodgings at Baker Street, “life is infinitely stranger than anything which the mind of man could invent. We would not dare to conceive the things which are really mere commonplaces of existence. If we could fly out of that window hand in hand, hover over this great city, gently remove the roofs, and peep in at the queer things which are going on, the strange coincidences, the plannings, the cross-purposes, the wonderful chains of events, working through generation, and leading to the most outré results, it would make all fiction with its conventionalities and foreseen conclusions most stale and unprofitable.”

Courtesy of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle…A Case of Identity

Crush of the Week: TRAINS

Look! At how many places Amtrak goes! And I’ve only ridden a tiny stretch: Portland to Seattle and back, twice.

Trains are great because they’re not cars, so I never have to drive. You can spend hours looking out the window and fall in love with so many places (if you’re anything like me, that is). You can actually see things too–almost like you’ve been to all the places you pass through (unlike airplanes, where you’re way too far away to get a good glimpse). The downside is, train rides are gruelingly long (and if you’re frugal and it’s a long trip, you have to sleep in those undesirable chairs). And they’re expensive.

Someday, I want to take a real train trip. I’m sure it’s the type of thing you only want to do once, but a slow train trip trip alone across the country is just the kind of surreality that really attracts me. There would be times of loneliness and boredom in my solitude, I’m sure, but I’d meet some cool people, and I could do so much art and reading and writing. It’s the kind of trip you have to do alone, unless you find just the right person for it (i.e. excited about spending 40+hours straight on a train/in a chair/with you). But what an old fashioned/nostalgic/appealing/attractive way to travel.

(right up my alley)

The Longest Way 1.0 - one year walk/beard grow time lapse from Christoph Rehage on Vimeo.

(A Year of Hiking and Beard Growth)
edit: trying to figure out how to embed Vimeo

just another fan

I got what I asked for, doubled…two of my friends were up for it. I woke up at 6:45 this morning to buy tickets. I had them, I just had to fill in the credit card information. I deliberated. And then I closed all the windows: flights to Chicago, Asthmatickitty.com, terms and conditions, and the tickets themselves. I decided. I guess I can’t call myself the biggest Sufjan fan anymore. I chose $500 over two hours of Sufjan and I regret it.

But Sufjan, if you come here, I won’t.