Journal Entries
Solstice...
Posted Jun 22, 2005
I don't know why I'm writing this here. No one is going to read it; I don't think anyone's read my posts in years. Months at the minimum. It never fails to amaze me that with all the mass of material on the web, and so much of it is just junk - pure schmutz - which will get hundreds of hits, and yet my local friends have never read my entries, even when they were updated regularly. Amazing.
I am feeling the sting of disappointment. Today was solstice, something important to me - it's when I'm most alive, and if I have any life energy at all, it is now. It is also a full moon tonight. And it is also the anniversary of my best friend's death. All very significant events to me. However, it seems that no one cares. No one cared that it was solstice. No one cared that it was full moon, other than the idea that it would be pretty to watch a sunset. No one cared that this is the first time in years I've been allowed to acknowledge these things, or celebrate them, or that I've been allowed to observe the anniversary of my best friend's death. In fact, I would be willing to bet that even if I pointed out that my best friend had died on this day, June 21st, six years ago, I would get blank looks. I had thought it would be great to have some sort of solstice celebration. Maybe play night games. Something. Be able to say happy solstice to someone? But no one I know that would care about such a thing was on chat this morning. I woke up at dawn, of my own accord - an accomplishment in and of itself, given a decade-and-some-long history of battling sleeping diorder, and was up by 6:30, before even my baby was awake. No one on chat. 8:00, still no one on chat. A couple of friends who had claimed interest in a soltice thing decided that the were too busy, or it was too much of a hassle, or something. I was told that if it was important to me, maybe I should have planned something. And that open another can of worms. For years I have been the one to plan things. Now, I have the social graces of a common garden slug. And I have never been good at planning events, or thinking of things to do. And yet, year after year, I have been the one making sure my friends remember each others' birthdays, planning the parties even when I have to throw them together in 24 hours or less, acknowledging the milestones such as leaving home to go away to school the first time, or graduations, or whatever; I have been the one planning things, or trying to make sure other people really acknowledge it, because I like my friends to feel special, or at least that the matter. In all this time, nay, longer; not since I turned 17 so many years ago - 11 years next Tuesday - has anyone done something in my honor. Just once it would be nice to feel that I am worth it, that I mean enough to someone that they want to organize something for me. It seems this is not to be. A golden birthday in a week, and damned if I know what to do that would be fun, especially given that it seems to be a burden to anyone to take the baby for a decent amount of time, when I don't have to get the house in order. We're still not moved in.
I have been trying to organize my music collection, as the only good and reliable antidepressant I've found is music. It is at least a treatment, if not a cure. The problem is when I feel so down I don't want to listen to any music. Or, currently, we have a bit of a family crisis - the other half's grandmother died recently, so we're playing host to the family, and space is tight and time is weird. I have a lot going on, and the next few months are going to be busy, and I don't know how it's going to turn out. I am often plagued by feelings that I don't really have close friends, not like I used to have. I often feel like I have to be accommodating, that I need to twist how I interact in order to make the friendships work, tha I have to sacrifice something in my definition of friendship just to hold on to something that doesn't seem to want me anyway. A lot of loose ends from the past still flapping around, and though I may be hit by inspiration and creative bursts I find I lack the time and opportunity to pursue them (see "baby"). I don't like burdening my other half entirely with child-rearing, but I'm determined not to let my life and interests die, because I know I certainly won't be a good parent if I let that happen. I want to give that little girl something to look up to, to have her know that her parents are not stagnant fixtures in the background. But doing that and still also being a parent if the big challenge.
So I conclude this, my disappointing plummeting solstice experience; a great source of energy - this holiday that happily coincided with a full moon, how often does that happen, that has been reduced to so many wishful ashes. My worry is that I did not make full experience of this time, and from here it's downhill until the darkest winter night, when I struggle to live. I would have thought that the others around me would want to celebrate this time of life versus death, energy versus dormancy, all these things represented by summer solstice, and yet these days everyone goes home before the clock hits ten, because apparently being cooped up all winter isn't enough to override a sense of having had a rough week, or deciding that it's more fun to go home and not talk to friends, or something.
I need space. I need quiet. I need opportunity to do what I am now able to do but find hindrances. What I need is time returned to me. And that cannot happen.
marchhare out
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Latest reply: Jun 22, 2005
Beginning the next cycle
Posted Dec 31, 2004
So here is the closing of the year, and the beginning of the next. One could choose to represent it with the Ace of Wands in a tarot deck. though the last time I did a reading there was a lot of stuff moving around and being upheaved and being set in motion, and the Ace of Wands didn't show up at all. Made me suspicious.
So I have my two classes starting up mid-January, I will hopefully by hook or by crook have a job (may be returning to my work at the book store), I have been given an Apple Tech Training Kit - which will enable me to become Apple Tech Certified, and still many other projects on the back boilers (such as an Incomplete in one class from long long ago.....) And in addition, I hope to take a stained glass course, will continue my study of tai chi, and as a present to my brother I am doing a mural in his new house, just one bedroom wall to start with but hopefully eventually expanding to the other walls of the room as well. (It will be a shallow marine scene, not unlike what you see in Finding Nemo - all coral reef-like.) Still trying to learn design, HTML, C, Unix stuff, doing my Guide entries, get moved in to the house (still), and somewhere in there a new terror has been unleashed upon the unknowing (baby has learned to walk). The added stress is that my computer is falling apart and is also no longer capable of doing heavy media work because of today's standards, so the need for a new computer is imminent, which requires finances not currently at my disposal. By the time I have the required funds, I will probably be able to get a G5 iBook on sale running Lynx or Siamese Kitten or whatever the next version will be.
And though I like Goo, I find this whole "squish the journal entries into a narrow column" format disconcerting. Is there a way to cutsomise that?
Tabbed browsing. New trying. Got Firefox, giving it a go. RSS feeds and all. One advantage of obtaining a new computer, aside from all the nice video-related stuff (i.e. animation rendering, DVD authoring), would be running on Panther and actually *being* able to run X11, which would in turn allow me to run Open Office and the GIMP and such fun treats. So much to learn, so restricted by mortal time. Thereby we see the minutes, how they make up the hour; how many hours bring about the day, how many days to bring about a year; how many years a mortal man may live.
When I decided to do this journal entry, I actually had a point to make, something in mind I wanted to broadcast. But I forgot. Well, in the meantime, you get the news of a bunch of stuff I've mentioned before, I think. Except the walking. That's new. 
MH out
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Latest reply: Dec 31, 2004
Darkness Grows
Posted Nov 20, 2004
Much like moss, actually.
As we trudge toward solstice, I am reminded of what it is to be situated on the 45 degree line. Winter is a harsh thing here. And it hasn't even snowed yet.
Why is it always autumn? It seems that I drop out of Guide existence, then I pop back up in autumn, and then I disappear by January. I hope I don't disappear by January. It gets a bit disheartening to think that I do, for once in my life, make an effort to make myself accessible - personality-wise - and still no one approaches me. Well, almost no one. The people that do end up being quite busy. I know I haven't done a lot of Guide entries or anything else that gets me *noticed*, but I am out there.... It's okay. I don't get much notice in the real world, either. Just would be nice to find a community where I actually exist.....
Time. That is what I need. Time. Time suspended, or time pockets, or some other physics-defying trick wherein I can amass six hours out of one without suffering the adverse effects of things like aging or missing my baby's development or anything silly like that. Time to get house chores out of the way, which would pave the way for the time-pockets in which I would learn and work on the projects at hand. Painting projects or plaster carving one day, Guide entries the next, welding on et another day, continuing my computer-related education yet another day.... That would be the thing. Yup. Why couldn't I have been born an elf? Some years ago, probably four or five (before the Movies were out), I had been reading The Hobbit, I think, and I had a dream that I was in the house of Elrond.... Don't remember much of it, but it had been a cool dream. Oh, to visit there, and pull time from where there was none....
I think now I'm babbling. Perhaps I should check on my Cube entry. And perhaps I should give thought to what changes to make, how I should revamp my space here. Should it still be the Almost Fascinating Burrow-Tree? Should it be something else? Should I make a whole network of entries? I do have a list of places & people in the works.... going to take quite a while to sort, though, seeing as how it's almost entirely composed of links.
Does anyone have food for thought? Ideas for walls? Anything? Give me something to feed on. My brain is waking from a long slumber, and I need philosophical fodder. Dancer mentioned on his page that I am good for consultation on spiritual matters. I don't know anymore. No one has sought such consultation from me, or indeed has sought any consultation from me on any matter, in quite a long time. Is there anyone who has questions? In need of advice? Make me think, people, make me think! I beg of you, work my rusty neurons, that they do not fade to my great-grandfather's fate. I am young yet, but disintegration begins early, and in a subtle matter. The writings of Tolkien alone are not enough to keep my mind at work.
MH out
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Latest reply: Nov 20, 2004
Learning Balance
Posted Nov 13, 2004
So a little time back on the Guide and I'm reminded of how much I want to contribute something, write an article or somesuch, and I'm reminded of one of the major things that drew me to the Guide in the first place: The community is fun and excellent, but perhaps too vast for my scattered brain. It's the incredible resource of information. Funny how I almost forgot that, despite it being the original aim of the Guide.... But this time it's not an all-consuming craze; it merely takes up a cozy place within my psyche and speaks softly on occasion to remind me that there is a viable project process available. Not focusing on the Guide at the exclusion of everything else is a precious art, one that makes it possible to be a part of the Guide - as opposed to focusing on everything else to the exclusion of the Guide (which has previously been the case), as the Guide is indeed a source of community and inspiration for me. Somewhere that enables me to see the possibility of being or becoming something. Not many outlets for that these days that I've found.
I'm also making the effort to check up on people, reconnect, and if not go through my apparent backlog then at least clear out the stuff that isn't actual backlog; that is, the conversations I was subscribed to without realizing I had been subscribed. (Is there a way to set that preference of Friend lists?)
I'm testing out some new smileys. Well, new to me. Still miss the butterflies, though.
Not so much news to report. Have I reported that I will be retunring to classes, after too long of a break? Hopefully the 3-D animation class won't fill up before I can register for it. Registration begins, for me, on the 16th. Keep your fingers crossed, everyone. I don't have many classes left to go before I'm done with this [expletive] degree, so I'd like to get them done in a timely fashion, for once.
When I finally get sleep, that is, when the baby can go for an overnight at her grandmother's, perhaps I will be able to write a nice, long entry. Or perhaps, when I am able to carouse about the university grounds I can get back into GuideML, of which mine is quite rusty now. Have I mentioned that I am also now in possession of two chinchillas? Maybe I should do a Guide entry on chinchillas.... I should check to see if one has been done. Fascinating creatures, if they are a bit hyper. Well, ours aren't, they spend most of the day sulking, but in general, especially if given a raisin and let out to run, they have the attention span of a lobotomized rabid weasel.
So I think that since I have the opportunity, at this time, for sleep, I shall do so. being a parent isn't quite what I expected. But what can I say, I'm the youngest of three; not like I had any heads up. Perhaps that's why my siblings have not had kids...... hmm....
MH out
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Latest reply: Nov 13, 2004
Not dead, just dormant
Posted Nov 7, 2004
So for anyone out there, Amy and Dastardly excepted, that care about my whereabouts, if I'm still on the Guide, if I'm dead or gone, I am here; just not very active in any net-based concept. Would be if I could. Might get the chance to when I return to classes; rumour has it that my university has decided that at least one part of the campus shall be completely wirelessly hooked up to the net, so by bringing my laptop to campus I can sit around between classes or whatnot and check the web. Sounds like a forum-posting opportunity to me.
Still nothing new to report. Today is not so bad a day for depression; frustrating, yes, but not a suicidal day.
My baby has developed a saltine cracker addiction.
MH out
Discuss this Journal entry [9]
Latest reply: Nov 7, 2004
March Hare
Researcher U183832
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"The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is a wholly remarkable book. It has been compiled and recompiled many times and under many different editorships. It contains contributions from countless numbers of travellers and researchers."