mkbnett

holy shit this is so good. visual poetry of the moment

all the people around me are incredibly rad, beyond any possible reality i could imagine, haha, and i love them. i love them so much!

:*  to alana

Current Music: http://207.228.243.82/crud/herpes.mp3

 yesterday was good. focused on breath. sprinted and got into my body via jogging with good posture and a loose face (apparently, i've grimaced every time i've ever ran, as far as i can remember). worked canvassing and did well & focused on my breath & posture and those of the folks at the door as well - an interesting consciousness-expanding 2 person game, heh.

realized i'd been in hell in my mind for years, hating myself as everything i dreamed of came true mostly how i'd imagined it though with some discrepancies, and never letting it sink in long enough to feel it out/be deeply thankful for it and always wanting more while being on guard and always waiting for some hidden punch around the corner, so never feeling safe enough to work with it and refine/heal/grow with it... patience, safety. ...so i got a bunch of herbs from people's for long term stress & depression, all the stuff that people's had that i didn't yet have from that section from the male herbal that ariel read to alana and i over dinner awhile back: st. johns wort, damiana, licorice stix, skullcap, sumac berries, american ginseng and devil's club. when i got home, i gushed to tom about all the b.s. stress that i'd been accumulating for years and years on end - it was such a cathartic release. i think because of his co-counseling experience, he's learned to listen to other people's issues without taking them in personally, which allows for that catharsis to take place on it's own in other people without giving them advice or inciting a sympathetic response in himself. it was rad and i look forward to doing co-counseling stuff with tom to learn how to be a better healer and to help heal his male self, too (there's men's co-counseling and i think women's? or maybe just mixed gender and women's...? from their website: http://www.cci-usa.org/what_is.htm there's one group in long island:

maybe post-civ?

maybe fundamentalist?

maybe they already have?

what do you think?

diaphoretic - having the power to increase sweating

carminative  - an herb or preparation that either prevents formation of gas in the gastrointestinal tract, or facilitates the expulsion of said gas, thereby combating flatulence.

Tepal - sepals or petals that are indistinguishable

terete - Cylindrical but usually slightly tapering at both ends, circular in cross section, and smooth-surfaced

locular: Having, formed of, or divided into small cavities or compartments.

Subglobose: represent the shape of a plant organ (especially found in pollen granules, fruit, stems, flowers  or seeds) that is somewhat globose, but not having the perfect shape of a sphere or ball.

Left: Shapes based on the sphere and ellipsoids, distinguished by the ratio of a:b.

1. 1. Globose or spherical
2. 2. Subglobose or prolate spheroidal
3. 3. Broadly ellipsoidal (sub-prolate) to ellipsoidal (prolate)
4. 4. Oval (per-prolate)
5. 5. Fusiform
6.  
7.  
8.  
9.  
10.  
11.  
12.  
13. 
    a subglobose flower

Exhaustive Summary of Day:
7:30 a.m. - Meeting time comes and goes with a few mobile calls to ensure folks are en route, while Tom picks up denatured alcohol for use in pop-can stoves later.
7:45 a.m. - Tom and Ariel meet at TrackersHQ, fashionably late. Cellphone calls circulate amongst the entire group to meet up at various points along the Springwater Corridor Bike Path en route to Powell Buttes, 10.5 miles away or to tell the team that they're taking it easy for the day. 6 of 9 are up for it after a long day & night of shoe-making. 8:00 a.m. - The ride commences.
8:10 a.m. - Tom and Ariel meet up with 'Matt! at the Spokane entrance to the Springwater Corridor in Sellwood.
8:12 a.m. - 'Matt! phones Michelle to let her know of the time delay and she relays her location: in a tree along the corridor near the organic farm who had us trap nutria for them. Gabe meets up with the group.
8:20 a.m. - Michelle jumps down and gets onto her bike to join the gang along the corridor.
8:30 a.m. - Like a bungee cord the group occasionally spreads out along the trail as some speed ahead and others lag behind (Ariel, hah). Everyone looks out for the others and ensures everyone is happy with the pace.
8:45 a.m. - Gabe points out Zenger Farm along the Springwater Corridor, one of the growing sites for the Sellwood House's CSA membership. The group notices that there is 3+ miles to go in a ~15 minute period from rendezvous time and takes a poll on what to do. The group decides to push it and speed up in order to meet the crew arriving separately at Powell Buttes. 9:00 a.m. - Tom, Ariel, 'Matt!, Gabe, and Michelle enter Powell Buttes park and cellphone Trackers Associate Emily Porter confirm meet up location and time at the the parking lot on Powell & 168th.
9:05 a.m. - Unforeseen closure of trail sends group looking into maps, sending a scout ahead, and moving forward with ease.
9:30 a.m. - Arrive at Powell Buttes parking lot 15 minutes late - it's all good, though. Mike and his family, Calli and Natasha, join the group. Location for the Herbal lecture is discussed and the benches downwind of the site's bathrooms are chosen to block the constant ~10 mph wind with ~ 15 mph gusts, not to smell the roses.
9:45 a.m. - Emily Porter serves up a Nettle Infusion and Ant Cupcakes!
10:30 am. - Set out into Powell Buttes for a wild medicinal plant walk and mindful tiny harvest.
11:00 a.m. - 'Matt! harvests the invasive Scotch Broom to make a broom.
12:30 p.m. - Break for lunch.
1:00 p.m. - We meet Kevin, the caretaker of Powell Buttes, who came over because he saw 'Matt's Scotch broom and tells us about opportunities to help tend the park's wildlife, while harvesting from & building lasting, mutually beneficial relationships with the land.
1:30 p.m. - We make friends with Kevin and he shares with us some info & stories on local restoration efforts.  We offer him an Ant Cupcake & he eats one, too!  YES!
1:45 p.m. The group decides to change location for the afternoon session to the parking lot of the Bi-Mart down the street in an act of artistic flair to both display contrasts and shatter them.
2:00 p.m. - Ariel, Michelle, and 'Matt! process some sustainably harvested Oregon Graperoot and add vodka to make a tincture.
2:30 p.m. - The group heats oil with sustainably harvested Herb Robert mixed in to make a salve. The heat was provided by pop-can stoves made by the group two weeks ago. Thai chai tea is made, as well, with the help of Michelle's camp stove, after many attempts/experiments with modifying another finicky pop-can stove.
3:00 p.m. - Mike McKelvey & fam call it a day & the group wishes them a good weekend and holds a short impromptu meeting on the activities of the week and the next week. Another on-the-spot location change is decided by all, this time to the suburban housing development down the street. Another experiential art genius move.
3:15 p.m. - Emily Porter points out and discusses various medicinals along an untended strip of rich soil next to an apartment complex. Tom, Ariel, 'Matt! Gabe, and Michelle harvest Dandelion & Dandelion root for tea & tinctures and Bearberry for a smoking mix.
4:00 p.m. - Gabe invites all to a stew pot dinner featuring Trackers-butchered buffalo meat and local organic CSA root veggies.. The group bids adieu to Emily Porter ('Matt! thanks her & asks about a potential return to share herbal wisdom & gives a hug) and sets off back down the Springwater Corridor.
4:15 p.m. - The group chats about life and developments at Trackers and generally feel really good on the way home.
4:30 p.m. - Stop to prune/take Fig tree cuttings from a tree Gabe ate from 2 years prior and said was delicious.
4:45 p.m. - Group bids adieu to Michelle as she turns off the trail to bike to her Milwaukie home.  'Matt! got sad cause he was biking ahead and missed her leaving, and missed his chance at a hug, so he texts her about it.
4:50 p.m. - Tom spots two nutria on the east side of the trail near three cement pipes that emerge from the ground in a small depression.  The group stops and 'Matt! quickly goofily stalks them, and gets close enough to kick one, but doesn't of course.  Tom points out lots of first year Mullein and 'Matt! sustainably harvests two pocketfuls for his smoking mixture.
4:55 p.m. - Ariel breaks off from the group and heads to the Goodwill Bins. 'Matt! doesn't get to hug him, but knows he will see him at the Sellwood House that night, though Ariel doesn't live there, and won't be invited, and doesn't need to be.
5:00 p.m. - Gabe splits off and heads to New Seasons and Tom and 'Matt! arrive home at the Sellwood House, :1. 
6:00 p.m. - Dinner is post-poned till 8-ish.  Tom and 'Matt! talk about Trackers happenings while 'Matt! writes summary of the day and Tom finishes sewing his leather shoes.
7:00 p.m. - Ariel shows up at Sellwood House, :1.
8:00 p.m. - 'Matt! finishes writing the now exhaustive summary of the day, :1.

 1 - i just took a deep breath and held it for at least a minute and a half
2 - i just breathed normally for a bit, then pumped out all the air in my lungs and down near my stomach, too and held that one in for just 30 seconds, heh
3 - weird shit like that are interesting games to play & can help yer body
4 - this one develops lung capacity and encourages deeper breathing because i stretch the edges of what i'm used to, both bigger inhaling & deeper exhaling, and helps me realize i normally breathe fairly shallow, like most folks raised in Western Civilization
5 - i'm going to work as a canvasser for the sierra club next week and i think it will be hilarious because while it's good to get folks to spend money on "environmental efforts", i do not believe they will honestly fix or save anything, heh - least it pays my rent and allows me to be outside and talk to people, heh
6 - two weeks ago i trapped nutria rats with TrackersNW and skinned, gutted, butchered, and ate 'em. i want to make leg warmers with their hides.
7 - i've been crying recently and it's been amazing, it's been years and years - since maybe before i was 12 that i can remember crying more than once every few years
8 - Alana & I are planning to compile a collection of writings to publish The Indie Almanac: A Seasonal Guide To Living Awesome Within Our Rad Universe as our first major project of The Outside(r) Art Institute. http://www.outsiderartinstitute.com
9 - In the book "The Male Herbal" my "constitution" is Seer-Warrior
10 - For the Enneagram Personality Types, I identify as a 9 with an 8 and 7 wing
11 - I've been reading foundational books on post-civilization anarchy/art/society lately... and realizing that what they are all really pointing to is a lifestyle of consciousness-expanding/physical skill improving PLAY
12 - the one on art is "T.A.Z.: The Temporary Autonomous Zone, Ontological Anarchy, Poetic Terrorism" online, here: http://www.hermetic.com/bey/taz_cont.html
13 - the personal account of the rewilding/healing process is: "Fire And Ice: Disturbing the comfortable and comforting the disturbed while tracking our wildest dreams" excerpt: http://www.beatingheartspress.com/genderfucked.html
14 - the one on the politics/society is "Post-Civ! a deeper exploration" zine, found here: http://www.tangledwilderness.org/?p=102
15 - i have a pale green bike, it's a 10-speed frame that looks like a converted fixey, although it really has a kick brake and an internal 3-speed hub
16 - my bike's name is shrub
17 - my favorite color is green
18 - my favorite number is 4
19 - i started 8 egg-cartons full of seeds in the last weeks and have some baby sprouts already up. i'm so psyched for my garden in april.
20 - i've been "praying" (i guess?) using affirmations from Louise L. Hay's book "Heal Your Body" each morning for the past few days and it's felt really nice to be posi
21 - my housemates and i have been living without heat for the past month to both save on billz and acclimatize ourselves to the cold
22 - it ain't so bad, especially whenever Alana's here to share my bed, heh
23 - in the past week i prepared & served my first wild-gathered miner's lettuce salad, my first stinging nettle side of greens, my first nutria rat chili, and drank my first wild-gathered usnea decoction tea, :1
24 - i've been learning herbal medicine and have found that lemon balm tincture inspires me to drop my grumpy bullshit & be happy & active
25 - i'm assistant teaching a permaculture design certification course

Even though i'm old enough to be an adult, i still consider myself to be a kid and treat all people like fellow kids. So I can't be mad at the adults of my past who have "wronged" me. I now understand that even though i only knew them/thought of them as adults, they were just kids the whole time, too! Somebody had tricked them into attempting to be greedy, selfish, forceful, uncommunicative, unsharing adults and my life shows that there is no compartmentalization of life - into kid vs. adult, into work vs. play, into master vs. slave. All is one moment where you are free to express yourself as the beautiful beloved genius that you are, as a baby is free with it's laugh and it's cry! At all times! Regardless who is watching, who is monitoring, who may be judging your behaviour!

And even now we Forgive them who would belittle us! Who would lock us up! Those folks are kids, too, kids who have been tricked by their inherited culture to enforce the lies of their mother, their mother culture!  We're all kids! We all love to play! Especially the ones who've fallen for that 10,000 year old curse, the lie of civilization/agriculture, the lie of adulthood, the lie told about in the story of how western culture got kicked out of the garden of eden, the lie of compartmentalization.
 
no more masks. no more sad pretending.
 
simply forgiveness! simply healing! simply sharing! simply chilldom! simply love!

right now i'm learning how to urban-homestead and doing initial planning for co-facilitating the www.trackersteams.com full-time adult immersion program next year. basically getting paid to live a life more like the story in the Post-Civ! zine linked to in my facebook status - and to share that lifestyle with folks willing to support me in order to achieve that lifestyle as well, heh

also, I started developing the Outside(r) Art Institute with my fiancee Alana: www.outsiderartinstitute.com which will serve as the organization for throwing awesome parties that include seasonal learning elements that result in practices that regenerate the garden of eden & a culture that thrives in it & tend it well, heh - for example, i'm planning a spring-time celebration party where for part of it, folks will graft their own apple tree from rootstock and a cutting of an apple tree branch and get to take it home (along with a link to a how-to e-zine) to plant or give away - plus bands, dancing, etc. etc.

i'm very much looking forward to the day to day of the rest of this year's immersion program, slowly planning out next year, throwing seasonal parties, and tending my garden and my community, heh

I'm reading "Fire and Ice: disturbing the comfortable & comfortin the disturbed while trackin our wildest dreams"

Okay, so I've just read the intro, and I believe that while it is incredibly comforting to know that others have been down this healing path before, I do not hold civilization responsible for the terrifying acts of clearcuts, genocides, and pushing us towards some kind of apocalypse.

There is no blame for these things.  Cultures evolve and change and bring with them their different gifts.  Wildly different flavorful foods are one of the greatest gifts that evolving, separate cultures have given to the world.

One culture that has had the most palpable effect on my life is the CULTURE of Western Civilization.  Let me explain: not all forms of 'civilization' are the same. What do you call a traditional village of folks who were forest-gardeners, tending the wild?  Forest-gardeners weren't necessarily nomadic and weren't quite hunter-gatherers either (at least in my strict understanding of the term).  FG's certainly weren't agriculturalists - namely because "agri" means field - or rather solely agriculturalists, since I have read that villages of natives would set fires in meadows to burn off the woody plants and encourage the continuance of the meadows, as well.  I suppose they were more like horticulturalists - but this word doesn't quite fit either ("horti" is garden) since theirs was a wild-garden/wild-gardener relationship, heh, not one of domestication and intense weeding and rows with uncultivated ground between them.  And maybe not even a permaculture-styled garden, because they cultivated and used natives only (as far as I am aware...), and didn't have domesticated animals (as far as i know).

Okay, so actually I've never read about anything similar to a forest-gardening tribe...  This can't be because it didn't exist.  It must just be that this meme wasn't available to Western Civ Culture so they could not describe the life of natives in this way or that I just haven't done any research into it, hahaha.

Still, Western Civ Culture is only now rediscovering the forest-gardening meme-family and is figuring out how to assimilate it - which I am in favor of.

This is why I am a proponent of evolving Western Civ Culture (and all others) as opposed to abandoning them in favor of Primitivist Anarchy.

Western Civ Culture HAS provided us with tons of amazing gifts - certainly due to unimaginable amounts of suffering - but that does not take away those gifts.  We shouldn't throw the baby out with the bath-water just because we got burned when we tested the waters.

I believe that i can be happy in a civilized place, especially if I am surrounded by a community of like-minded, like-lifestyled individuals: The Outside(r) Art Collective and my friends here are that developing community.  Throwing Wilderness Community Gatherings provides the surface area, the meeting space, the casual face time for the expansion and sharing of cultural memes and practices that makes sense: ones that honor & savor the wild within and the wild about us.  Still, there's no expectation that the emotional-spiritual side of planting trees be shared.... This is about FUN and being excited that our collective future will be filled with tons of free fruits & nuts & berries for food-security, peace, and to regenerate local resources.

A culture of urban and suburban people who celebrate life and PLAY while planting (perennial polycultures) trees, giving attention to kids and elders, learning and sharing about wildlife, gathering/preparing/eating and sharing wild & local foods, and dancing together with live music.

If you throw it, they will come, :1.

So I just started using Google Calendar as a way to push me into a longer-view perspective, get back into a super broad world-view/time-view.

The idea is to both put myself in the future to see the continuity of my influence and to be able to mark the time in tune with the seasons.

The latter is mainly accomplished through marking the Equinoxes, Solstices, and Cross-Quarter Days (the half-way points between Equinoxes & Solstices), and somewhat less through the marking of the Lunar cycles.

These days - or the weekends near them - will be huge party times: the 8 divisions of the solar year, mainly, with minor holidays on the lunar fulls (maybe both the fulls and the news? and the halves? ::shrug:: we'll see).

This could mean 8 parties a year plus 12 full moon bike rides or some such.

The parties won't just be parties either.  Each one will introduce the practive of a cultural meme via a "Take Home" skill share.  The first one I'm thinkin of doing fruit tree grafting, where each person/family takes home a fruit tree that they have grafted at the event together.  I like the idea of keeping it perennial plant based for a while to build up permaculture guilds at each participant's house (fruit/nut tree, perennial legume, perennial insectary), but I assume winter might offer something different and interesting, as well.

Anywho, yar - 8 parties with 100 people at each = 800 mini-paradises to take home

say winter-to-spring cross-quarter = fruit/nut tree grafting
vernal equinox = seed starting
spring-to-summer cross-quarter = ?
summer solstice = ?
summer-to-autumn cross-quarter = ?
autumn equinox = bring your own berries and make preserves!
autumn-to-winter cross-quarter = ?
winter solstice = ?

FUN TO FILL IN, :D!

 YOUR REAL LIFE COMMUNITY.  REAL LIFE CRAZY DRAMATIC GORGEOUSLY RICH CHARACTER DRIVEN STORIES OF YOUR BROTHERS, OF YOUR SISTERS, OF YOUR FATHERS, OF YOUR MOTHERS, OF YOUR BEST FRIEND'S DOG, OF THE GROWTH AND DEVELOPMENT OF YOUR TREES, OF YOUR FLOWERS, OF YOUR BUGS, OF YOUR CHILDREN - MY GOD OF YOUR OWN CHILDREN! - OF YOUR FAMILY! OF YOUR OWN FUCKING FAMILY!?!

PAY ATTENTION! PAY THE FUCK ATTENTION!

THEY LOVE YOU! THEY WANT YOU LOVE THEM! (IE: GIVE THEM YOUR ATTENTION! YOUR FULL FUCKING ATTENTION!

AND FUCK THE INTERNET, TOO

THIS REVELATION MIGHT REACH MORE OF THE EAR'SMIND'S'EYES OF PEOPLE WHO NEED TO HEAR ME, BUT HOW CAN I KNOW?

HOW CAN I KNOW UNLESS I CHOOSE TO NOT CONTINUE THIS WRITING?

AND... AND... PUT DOWN THE COMPUTER AND GO TALK TO JULIA, WHO IS SO FUCKING RAD, TO DAN, WHO YOU KNOW IS THE SHIT?

WHY NOT? ARE YOU AFRAID THEY MIGHT LAUGH AT THIS IDEA?

DO YOU THINK THAT IT'S SO GENIUS THAT THE WORLD WANTS TO SEE? THAT IT'S 'ABOVE THEM' OR SOME SHIT?

THEY UNDERSTAND.  THE ONES AROUND YOU UNDERSTAND.

NOW DON'T GO ON, "COMING OUT" TO YOUR PSYCHOPATHIC RAGE FILLED CONFUSED CHRISTIAN LOVING FATHER AND GETTING BEAT BETWEEN THE EYES TILL DEATH BECAUSE YOU LISTENED TO ME.

BECAUSE THEY MIGHT ACT DIFFERENTLY EVEN IF THEY DEEP DOWN UNDERSTAND.

THEY STILL MIGHT HATE YOU BECAUSE IT GOES AGAINST THEIR CULTURAL CONSCIOUSNESS.

IF SOMETHING DOES NOT FIT INTO SOMEONE'S "CULTURAL CONSCIOUSNESS" IT MEANS THAT IT IS OUTSIDE OF THEIR UNDERSTANDING...

LIKE HOW IT IS?WAS OUTSIDE OF MY UNDERSTANDING THAT THE "UNKNOWING" MIGHT KNOW FULL WELL AND JUST NOT BE WORRIED, BECAUSE THEY BELIEVE IN A BETTER FUTURE IF WE ALL JUST GIVE IT UP.

GIVE UP ON CIVILIZATION!

THE BLACK COMMUNITY HAS BEEN DOING IT FOR YEARS!!! THEY JUST DIDN'T TELL YOU!

THEY DIDN'T KNOW HOW TO TELL YOU!

I'M BLACK BITCH.

WHAT I MEAN HERE IS THAT THE REAL LIFE STORIES OF THOSE AROUND YOU, EVEN THE ONES YOU DON'T LIKE OR THINK ARE UNINTERESTING OR UNINTERESTED OR 'NOT WORTH YOUR TIME' ARE WAY MORE INTERESTING OVER TIME IF WHEN YOU CHANGE YOUR MIND AND START PAYING ATTENTION.

THE BLACK COMMUNITY GAVE UP ON CIVILIZATION YEARS AGO, "LAZINESS" - HAHHAHAHA - WHAT A JOKE?

AND OF COURSE THEY WON'T EXPLAIN THEIR REASONS TO YOU...

WHAT DO YOU MEAN? WOULDN'T THEY WANT TO IF THEY WANTED YOU TO UNDERSTAND?

OR MAYBE ONCE YOU GET TO THAT LEVEL OF CONSCIOUSNESS, YOU JUST DON'T HAVE TO EXPLAIN ANYTHING ANYMORE. IT JUST COMES OUT IN THAT MOMENT TO YOU WHEN YOU EXACTLY NEED IT TO, NO MATTER HOW LONG IT TAKES.

THEY HAD FAITH. THEY HAVE FAITH!!!! 

HAHAAHAHA, HOW CAN YOU WHITE PEOPLE GO TO CHURCH WHEN YOU HATE IT SO MUCH, BABY?

JUST DON'T GO, hunny.  God don't care if you don't go. HE LUV/LOVE YOU BABY-CHILD.

OR COME TO OUR MOTHA FUCKING CHURCH AND GET DOWN!!! GET SOME SOUL!SISTA!!!

COME ON, YOU GOT IT IN YOU!

WE STILL PRAISIN JESUS, WE JUST GOTTA BELIEVE THAT HE WANTS US TO FEEL GOOD! AND LOOK AT US, BABY? WHAT DO YOU THINK WE'RE ASKING YOU TO DO?

SING IN THE CHORUS, SWING IN THE CHORUS, DANCE IN THE CHORUS, WAVES YA HANDS IN THE CHORUS!

WE ASKIN' YOU TO DO WHAT YOU FEEL LIKE YOU WAS A KID, LAUGHIN AND A PLAYIN.

AND TRUST THAT WHEN YOU DO WHAT YOU FEEL, WHAT YOU REALLY FEEL DEEP DOWN, WHATEVER iT IS THAT THE WORLD WILL STILL LOVE YOU FOR IT.

AND IF IT DON'T... iF THE WORLD DON'T LOVE YOU FOR IT, FOR WHATEVER DEVILED REASON, YOU JUST ASK GOD TO FORGIVE YOU, CHILD. CAUSE HE DOES.

AND IT AIN'T ABOUT BEING CHRISTIAN, heh.
IT AIN'T ABOUT A "BEING" - IT'S ABOUT A PRACTICING - ABOUT A DOING!
it ain't about being anything religious. it's about acting religiously, hahaha - only playing your part in the game. (EDITOR/AUTHOR'S NOTE: even while writing this I was hunched over and on the computer afraid that my housemates would think i was an idiot for writing these ideas and probably think i was - a dork  - ...i mean, AWESOME FOR THESE IDEAS. THESE PEOPLE UNDERSTAND.

note from higher consciousness: and while rewriting this last part, Brian Schuch played the saddest riff on his guitar that i have ever heard from him, ever (he always plays happier upbeat older tunes: nintendo, "old" rap songs (within last 5 years), some classical), --------===-==-==---------but then i realized that it was Julia playing, the jazz guitarist, singer who lives in the room across from me.

i can't believe i haven't really taken the time to get to know her?

and now Marcos the cat, interrupts by playing the guitar
with his paws, slapping an old guitar's broken strings
and dan gets on to look something up on this computer now, so i think this might be the end of the EDITOR/AUTHOR'S NOTE, now a return to the original stream of consciousness, the first complete part of the poem, taken from where we left off, :1, now enjoy, :1: 

now if you feel like you wanna be a rock star and be serious about it, you gotta start acting like it.

if you don't wanna be, then that's okay, too.

you still gotta savor the world to be happy.

it don't matter if you are scared by your dreams.  you gotta pick one and follow it. or you gotta get credit for not doing that, for not following any root and just jumping around as we please, learning about this, spreading the word about that, dissecting and -seminating the good wood,word as it comes out from God's mouth himself, or actually out of his mind from his mind-beams from his head - telepathy if you will.



 

from when i was high the other day:

----------------------

SUFFERING IS LEARNING TO ACCEPT YOUR DREAM-WORLD, AS IT IS THIS MOMENT, AND JUST BEYOND THIS MOMENT, AND FAR INTO THE FUTURE WHEN YOU ARE MAXIMALLY ENJOYING AND APPRECIATING AND REVELING WITH YOUR DREAM-CREATIONS, YOUR DREAM-manifestations, IN YOUR DREAMS, IN REALITY, IN THIS MOMENT.

today and yesterday is the first personal time i've given myself in over a month.  i still have more to do and lots to talk about.

today in an effort towards cultural continuity and remembrance, i downloaded my music onto Julia's computer (i hope she doesn't mind) and loaded songs of friends (mostly) onto my new music playing cellphone.  I don't have a memory card for it, so it holds this much:

Bigger Princess - Homesick
The Eskalators - Green Sky
Pink Type - Lightning Bugs
Yayahoni - True Love is Not Nice (herman dune cover of jonathan richman)

I'd like to have defense by no courage, a song by noah britton, and a song from kate, not sure which ones - i'll have to get them off of cd's i have.

i feel like this one part of noah's entry is becoming more and more true for me:

"the human response here is to feel and care about the people you know who you care about more than the rest
and for once i agree with that decision
so
if you are someone i love
i will care immensely if anything terrible happens to you and do whatever i can to help
but if you are not someone i love
i cannot afford to care about your problems any more than i can about the problems of some korean guy i'll never meet, or some african woman i'll never hear about
however
of course i feel a permeating concern for the entire planet and everyone on it
but this doesn't mean i'm going to ruin my fun because of that
i'm going to try to forget all of these things that i am not going to do anything about
because, shit, do you think some starving guy in china needs to worry about whether your car got stolen? or your friend committed suicide? or you have a terminal illness? man, that guy has enough problems as it is. and so does everyone else.
so
pick your battles"

also matty pop chart's song "the world out there"

i also remembered what makes me awesome has nothing to do with whether i'm good at anything or have lots of experience with anything or necessarily what i do or say. it's about the way i go about doing everything.
 
ariel helped clarify this for me, and to him i am indebted.  someone mentioned in consolation, "well, your kayak-building is coming along nicely." and he replied, "yeah, thanks, but building a kayak has nothing to do with my sense of self-worth." which is genius.

I think maybe i've suffered enough for my sins, haha. I'm totally ready for the year of the Earth Ox, which only comes every 60 years:

"The Year of the Earth Ox evokes stability and dependability. The Ox is a practical work animal, while the Earth element is steady and firm. Together, they create a kind of plodding energy that can be exasperating. Still, progress will be made in 2009; it will occur in slow, barely perceptible increments. If you stay patient and keep your nose to the grindstone, you will make the most of this ponderous energy." more from tarot.com's chinese horoscopes page.





 

A Future Happy Memory on  Urban American Folk Culture:

I'm so blessed to have been enjoying my gifts with the avant-garde cultural creative community, :1 and to have fulfilled jonathan richman's dream from I want the City, but I want the Country, too, heh.

I am so freaking blessed to have been laughing and playing while collaborating with the youngins on the implementation of a confidently playful, creative, collaborative culture, with businesses built on equal trust, integrity, and PLAY; with co-ops, collectives, and volunteer-run fun event-driven action, with care taken and given in everything and positive vibes flowing eternally.

I am so freaking blessed to have been goofing off with so many holy people, enacting fun and meaningful customs and yearly traditions both entirely new and from combining earlier traditions from all known cultures - like ***Tree Birthday (aka Valentines Day, aka Tu B'Shvat, aka Imbolc see below) - every month, every weekend!

I am exalted to have been ecstatic from the smelling the fresh fruit in the trees; the tasting of each kind's ripe flesh as it still hangs on the branch; the feeling of the cooling Autumn breeze on my bare arms as we were biking through the neighborhood/wild food forest; the seeing of the sun's rays rising behind Mount Hood and Mount Adams and falling upon them from the west; the hearing of scrub jays, chickadees, frogs, insects, coyotes, and amazing new mystery calls and music, sweet music; the sensing of the most subtly titillating positive symphony of vibes/emotions/moods/spirit
from each of the elements of the local universe; from the caretending of all our relations and the living in the gift of intuition-clarity-love.

I am thankful to have been loving and been loved by so many wonderful, inspiring, delightful people, :1.

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TREE BIRTHDAY! (I made this up through a compiling of seasonal traditions and seasonal natural opportunities)
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We're Regrowing the Garden of Eden in Portland, Oregon And You Are Invited, :1.

Here's how we'll do it on this day:

0. Night before, Brew Rooting Tonic
1. Start: Spring Cleanse Vodka Tincture Shot or Tea
2. Eating of Fruits and Nuts During Steps 3-4
3. Take Cuttings from Neighborhood Fig Trees (and Grape Arbors)
4. Plant Cuttings (Rooting) Where They'll Be Able to Grow
5. Spring Cleanse Vodka Tincture Shot or Tea #2
6. Sweat Lodge?
7. Herbal Aphrodisiac Vodka Tincture Shot or Tea #3
8. Dance Party at the best party Portland has to offer (I'm guessing Henry Stanley will know, heh).

We Drink for the coming of the Spring,
To let Her Energies of Inspiration and Creativity Flow Freely,
To Wash Away the Worries of our Year and the Cold of Winter.
We plant Nourishing Trees to Celebrate The New Year For the Trees (the Jewish Tree Birthday)
and ReGrow the Garden of Eden
For Our Children
And All Our Relations.

Then later in the evening, as lore would have it, that whether by way of love, lust, or inebriation, if you leave a piece of clothing outside for Spring to bless, by morning it'll be filled with powers of healing and protection...

So either wear last year's magical sock or wear another form of protection, :1.

Let's start the fire and let the green sprout and grow, eh? :1

NEEDS:
Pruning Shears or Tin Snips
Pre-Day Scouting for Locations of Existing Fig Trees
Pre-Day Scouting for Locations for Planting
Cleansing Tinctures Herbs (ideally hand-picked-by-you) for Cleansing Teas and for making Chocolate Aphrodisiacs
Fruits & Nuts

How To's:

Rooting
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cutting_(plant)

Make a Rooting Tonic
http://www.ehow.com/how_172766_make-rooting-tonic.html

Seasonal Traditions & Lore
http://paganwiccan.about.com/od/imbolcfebruary2/p/Imbolc_History.htm

Jesus said, "listen, each of you are powerful individiduals capable of things far beyond what your agricultural, capitalistic civilization and domesticated culture expects and desires of you. each of you and your experience are far beyond any monetary value and far beyond the authority or control of any man. ie, each of you is the son of god. ...oh, you won't listen to me cause when i come to you as an equal, you perceive me as you perceive yourself: as some un-powerful nobody? well, okay then, let me re-introduce myself. i am the son of god. so let me try this again. since i am the son of god and since it takes one to know one, i can say with confidence that We Are All The Children Of God."

and what would jesus do?

he'd start an immersion program.

well, he called his team disciples, but i don't think they all really "got it" anyhow, cause the proof is in the puddin: 2000 years later and most descendents of his domesticated culture are still cowering to the same forces. jesus maybe could've used a martial arts element, or maybe some spolin games, :1.

So while tracking deer in the small woods behind my parents' house that leads to the Big Timber Creek (Tetamekanchz Kyl) I picked up 6 distinctly different leaves and figured I'd take them home to ID them.

When I got home, I decided to ask my family the name of each of the trees that they came from.  I let them name all of them, without responding with a "Right" or "Wrong" or any corrections of names.  Then I went online and looked them up, and came back with more info.  First I asked my brother Dave, then I repeated this process with my Mom and Dad.

This is the first time we've ever done such a thing and we all are getting to know the woods a lil better each year/holiday.  I plan to do this again next year: attempting to find the same tree leaves, and then adding 5 or 6 leaves from herbaceous plants to the mix - and adding more info each year, spilling over into animals and fungi, too, :1.

Here's what I collected:
TAKE A GUESS, RESULTS BELOW

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( RESULTS! )( RESULTS! )