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43.12


i like fantasy stories
with “supernatural powers”


im tired of them always battling some evil
what’s storytelling without the drama?


i don’t want anymore hyper tense militaristic super police bad guys hunting down our heroes in a paranoid fever dream


how do we tell stories without turning to the dark side?


i’ve heard
musicians i love 
trying to make music without their own suffering
or their own hearts
and it holds no interest for me


i know
their suffering makes the music delicious 


the anger and rage
fear and desire 
longing
hopelessness
criticism and blame


so tasty 
so tasty


what is the hum and awe of love?


oh i always forget 
this realm is about love & hate 
the push and pull
dark and light
yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah
gives it contrast
tension
texture


ok ok
can we stop with ultra violence 
hyper military control nightmare?


story telling 
story listening


don’t hurt me 

i woke this morning groggy and late
missed the dawn chorus
i’d stayed up last night til three
stuck in a screen loop


this morning i sat up in bed and watched a woodpecker dismantle a tree


watched blue jays hopping around in the grass


i watered the plants in the garden
i said the cliche “it’s gonna be a scorcher”
thinking about how wilted the plants would be if i didn’t water them
90°
the sun felt so intense even at 10AM


then i drove to a local park
and sold my laptop
to a guy from mexico
for his wife


i felt a strange energy coming from Mexico
i played a VR game last night for nearly two hours
and met a really nice mexican guy 
by calling out some guy being a racist asshole
he suddenly became very friendly with me
and taught me a lot about what was going on in thai game
really took me under his wing
and it was obvious he had a brilliant mind


it all felt so positive


i have been very hesitant to make any future plans this year
but i feel i should go back go mexico!


i’d also like to go back to Italy
and Switzerland 
and Thailand 


oh
travel


and i dream of other places to be


i really want to do a talk about family
i didn’t bring my tripod out with me
but maybe i’ll make a video in the morning


there is something so dear
unique
to be appreciated about family


even when the family dynamic is a dysfunctional toxic mess
there is still love there too
and 
some other quality 
je n’es ce quoi. . . 


and i also want to go back to California
to Oregon
to Hawaii. . . 


and i also want to go many places i’ve never been


and the air smells like honey
and the fireflies are flickering


i had a nice time with my sister today 
many nice moments
and felt very touched when she asked me if i was still moving so much
referencing how i was constantly moving after returning from Thailand. . . and mexico


but after our global pandemic year
i’m not
i’m sluggish
heavy
staid


that’s one of the reasons i’m catching this mercury retrograde comet 
and doing a ye’ole Birthday Project
i have to “shake off this heavy deep sleep”


but she expressed real concern for me that i wasn’t moving much, wasn’t meditating. . . 
i know
i do the best i can
i’m glad i’m reflecting like this every day right now
even if blathering externally into the web isn’t the same as self care
it is a selfing with care


breathing in and breathing out 
like humans do


but now i shall sleep
grateful for the sounds of night
and the soft moving air


i hope you’re happy and peaceful where you are

i’m so glad i got to edit a friend’s document for hours today

italian to english
proofreading
what might we want to say
and how in the best way?

i’m so grateful i drove with my mom to meet Joe and his kids
daughter’s name was Bear
we took her favorite chicken, Guido 
the other roosters were beating him up
and we needed a new rooster
and when he arrived
he crowed in triumph

my dad accidentally washed all the blueberries
and they would mold if we put them back in the fridge

so i ate them for hours

i changed my sheets tonight
to get the fertilizer and grass clippings off

i cleaned the kitchen

i talked with a friend
listened to him
about being fired today
from a job/home he’s had almost six years

family
i think about family
as i hear the TV in the background 

that’s enough for today 

full-on into being here. yeah. i felt today i have overcomplicated my posting process… i guess that’s what happens when i’ve been mostly avoiding social media a while… get clumsy and over-zealous. well, happy mercury retrograde.

43.8 


so
i told you once i would tell you why it doesn’t feel good
you writing me every day 
telling me how much you miss me
and how much you want to be with me


you said that to me for five years
and when i came to be with you
i was very happy
and you were neurotic
and got sadder and sadder and sadder


i have learned that you cannot have what you want
that is
we think there is something we will want and it will make us happy
happier
but when we get it
it doesn’t
not for long
then we want something else
or want not something
or we don’t understand what could ever make us happier
and we just get confused


i’ve learned that
i’ve seen it thousands of times in my own mind and heart
and i’ve heard: this is what people do
and they’ve been doing this for thousands of years
so why would you suddenly stop doing this after a few months?


it’s just that
when you say “i miss you”
what i hear is that
that want.
that wish for something that will make you happy
something that isn’t what is already here


what i hear
is you setting yourself up for suffering
and it makes me sad


when you say “i can’t wait to see you again”
and “we have to spend more time together”
and “don’t you think we should spend more time together?”
or “oh! we just have to spend more time together”
what i hear is some future thing
some thing that isn’t happening right now
something you’re hinging some happiness on
and i know it won’t work
because we’ve tried it already
and it didn’t work 
and, again, humans have been doing this for thousands of years
And It Doesn’t Work.


what i know is
we all have challenges


our neighbor
our landlord
our father or husband
our friends
our lovers
ourselves
whatever
we have challenges 
and these things drive us crazy
they make us angry and sad and confused
we want to do something about them
we want to get in shape
lose weight
quit smoking
write that book
change our diet
sell the house 
get a new job
retire
get a new car
a new computer
a new. . . 
we all think we have a solution to our misery
but we can’t do it


there is a part of us that knows that it won’t work
and we aren’t capable of dealing with that dissatisfaction
so we just keep telling ourselves a story that we know isn’t true
tricking ourselves into believing it
so we don’t want to have to accept that there is NOTHING that will make us happier in any satisfying way


we’ve tried it a million times in our own lives
and humans have been trying it for thousands of years


something i keep saying about the last president of the united states is
he gave such a gift to the world
he showed us that you can have all the money and power and fame
and still be miserable 


that isn’t to say that life is only misery
it is just to say that so much of the beauty and joy is not only cancelled, it is missed entirely, lost to the stream of time
by the misery we find ourselves in moment to moment
we could have the perfect lover in our own homes
and miss the opportunity to love and be loved by them
because we are confused about why that isn’t making us happy
when it seems it’s all we ever wanted 
for years and years
but when we get it
it isn’t what we thought it was
and it isn’t doing what it is supposed to
and we cannot just accept that that equation doesn’t work
because it is the solution the whole of society runs on
the solution that is sold to us every day
by every external source
and by the repetitious habits of thought in our own minds


and that’s sad
it makes me very sad to see people trapped in this cycle of misery
because there is nothing it can do about it


i have tried for years and years
usually only succeeding in making people more miserable


i can be with them
to the best of my ability
to make them feel less alone 
by having a friend there for them to access
share the joys of reality with
but even then, as you’ve seen, 
even that doesn’t work often


people can be married and spend most of their moments in separate rooms
and when they do interact
it might all be bitter
despite any attempts of sweetness


i’ve seen it
i’ve lived it
i’ve witnessed it


this game works better for some people than others
but it never works 100%


perhaps it works better for people who hold the idea of happiness in their head
and shrug off all the disappointments
all the dissatisfaction
if they can just say
”well, that’s not what i wanted or how i wanted it to be, but that’s ok. i’m happy anyway. this is still great”


it can be a simple mundane thing:


“this is good enough. i’m glad i have this. i’m very happy. this is good”


it can be a simple as that


for me
i’ve had to get a whole bunch of thoughts and concepts and meanings and equations
i’ve had to understand what blocks happiness from being sustained
on an intellectual, physical and emotional level
and i’ve had to learn about the solutions on those levels
and even with all that
i’ve still had to learn that none of that actually matters as much as just choosing to be happy
just choosing to be at peace
for no “reason”
not because i have anything or anything is right
though it is good, it feels good too, to appreciate when i have things i like and things are good and right. . . 
but just choosing to be at peace because it’s worth it to be at peace and be happy
it’s more important than me being right or the situation being right or someone else behaving how i think they should or someone else treating me how i want to be treated
it’s worth it, more than any of those conditions, and countless others i’m not going to enumerate now
it’s worth it to just be happy and content and at peace
because being miserable isn’t worth it


and it’s very complicated how i’ve learned that
how i’ve changed my values
how i’ve come to decide i’m going to live like this


it’s taken years of suffering in my unique ways
disappointments, confusions, angers and depressions
all that
and teachings
practicing
and the patient loving of some people who were more grounded in their own happiness and peace than i was
people who weren’t threatened by my misery and the chaos of my confusion


when people come at me with their confusion and misery
i often try to just model happiness and peace
some sort of clear wisdom to them


but often i just get sucked into their whirlpool of misery


and that makes me sad
i can’t be a good boyfriend or lover or son or worker or teacher or whatever
if the misery of someone’s life makes me miserable


i don’t have the stolid discipline necessary to keep from being driven crazy by other people’s crazy


and i know i kinda do
i’ve had some pretty intense experiences that i have made it through ok
but it’s been at quite a price to my health


you know what i mean?


maybe you do
maybe you don’t
but that’s all i hear when you say you miss me and must spend more time with me
i hear you believing that something will make you happy
or make me happy
completely forgetting how that equation doesn’t work
and the only way you’ll ever be happy
is just being happy no matter what is happening
all the time


and however that works for you
you have to find


i have a way
but it really doesn’t work for most people
isn’t even compatible with most people’s way of life
and gets blown off course by the weather
like most things in the world do


still
i’m grateful for the experiences i’ve had
and the lessons i’ve learned
and the tools i have when i need them
and maybe some day
i’ll figure out how to give them to other people


but mostly what happens
is people hear me offer them
and say “yeah, i’d like that”
and then just want to lick the honey from me
and drain all my juices
and ask for more ask for more ask for more
(“knowing they’ll never get that which they ask for”)
and no matter what i give
it can never be enough


and that’s sad
because i love to give
and i love to make people happy
but it’s not in my jurisdiction to change people’s values
they have to do that for themselves


and 
darn
i’d really like to be with people who prioritize not being miserable
not generating misery
not making other’s miserable
at least
being at peace
maybe
being happy and content and grateful


and wouldn’t that be nice?

one of my joys today was helping my mom garden. . . i dug up this huge poke root and spent hours processing it into tincture and oil extraction. . . now it will sit for six weeks. . . me shaking it daily. . . new plant friend. . . it’s personality felt very strong and i was very happy to work with it. . . thanks plants. thanks mama (earth and mom)

meh
i was going to garden again
i got all prepared for the flies
meh
then the lawn maintenance men showed up
spraying chemicals everywhere

i harvested some lambsquaters
loaded up the wheelbarrow with land soil and campost soil
brought it up to the house

we made eggs and greens
we watched an episode of Sweet Tooth
i get it, why my friend cried
i cried a bit too
then we planted the tomatoes in the big pots out back
then…
then.. the… 
then…

well… 

my feet were burning from the chemicals on the lawn
barefoot
even though i only stepped on a little of the lawn
i felt it
so i showered
scrubbed
but still
they were tingling
i hated thinking i would get neuropathy from this stupid lawn vanity shit
so i soaked my feet in epsomsalt water
while watching coinbase infomercials they paid me to watch
ok
then talked with a friend i know from Buddhism-world
also a techie
nice conversation
across the ether…

i eventually sat down to have more computer troubles
seemingly insurmountable blah blah Mercury retrograde

then i transcribed for an hour

ok

someone invited me over to his house
for 
whatever reason
people
it’s hard to be people around each other

we played with our VR helmets together
he showed me his cryptocurrency mining rigs
farming
mining
whatever

it was ok
it was what it was
not what really nourishes me

what really nourishes me?
it has something to do with a feeling of kinship
it has something to do with a feeling of peace
mutual understanding

the guy i’d talked with on the phone earlier in the day
pieces of his conversation came back to me
the idea
he was staying with his daughter 
helping her recover from an accident
and she’s an adult
but when she would fall asleep
he said it was like he was given a sleeping pill
he was pass out
and sleep so well

the magic of family

he doesn’t believe in magic
only matter and science

i believe in “magic” and multiple dimensions

i thought of 
how often i’ve found 
asking my mom how she slept
and she says “i couldn’t go to sleep til two…”
and i didn’t go to sleep til too

it’s nice to feel that connection
terrible to feel i may be responsible for her not sleeping well

other resonance

how are we all connected?
the great sea of emotions we all swim in

mom was still awake when i got home
i ate some of the chicken she made

showered again
brushed teeth
rinsed mouth
played some VR
then wrote this

enough for now
that’s all for today
thanks.

43.6 little by little
 

 i woke in the tent this morning
 the rain falling was loud
 i missed the dawn chorus
 i slept
 continued to sleep
 the grey misty day didn’t tell me the morning was going on
 i didn’t bring my phone out with me
 

 when i got out of bed
 my stubbly head scraping roughly on the mosquito net
 i went to look at the garden
 everything moist and happy
 my body being bathed in a light mist
 

 i went in to the house
 i had forgot to bring clothes
 the door was locked
 mom let me in
 commenting on my nakedness
 yes, i know, yes
 i’m grateful i can forget clothes and key and be fine
 i’m so grateful i can sleep outside
 with a tarp, netting, full bed and nice sheets
 not be sleeping on the street
 shivering in the dirt
 

 we went for thai food
 tired upon our return
 napping
 or interneting 
 

 an old friend who i have a powerful spiritual/sexual relationship with at a distance (never yet in person, even though we’ve met a few times)
 called me and turned me on incredibly
 

 how strange
 

 the rest was good
 i prepared to go out and work in the garden
 and the rain poured down
 

 last summer i worked in the garden often when it rained
 this year
 or at least now, this part of this year that has been this last week
 every time i go out side with out a hat and shirt on
 i get bombarded by horse-flies
 they bite
 and it hurts hurts hurts
 it makes it very unpleasant to be outside
 i don’t like wearing clothes
 and though i loved gardening naked in the rain last year
 i didn’t like the idea of having to have wet clothes on today
 so i stayed inside
 and set to some computer projects:
 getting my photo library working again
 (oh, great mercury retrograde project!)
 it’s been a mess all year
 i won’t recapitulate it
 but my huge unwieldy library won’t upgrade to Big Sur, the newest mac operating system
 so i have to rebuild it
 today i started that
 walking back and forth from this room to where my father’s computer is
 trying various attempts to make it make sense
 

 it wasn’t
 

 eventually
 i tried another tact that seemed to be working
 seems to be working
 

 and some where in there my mother mentioned she was vacuuming (is there another english word that has two “u”s together like that?)
 and i felt i wanted to vacuum my room
 and she asked me to vacuum another large room up here where my friend and his five cats had stayed
 

 this lead me to cleaning that room, reorganizing our drying screens (for herbs)
 then cleaning/organizing my room
 putting everything away
 clearing the floor
 (as i had played VR today for a half hour for the first time since last weekend… and noticed how my play area had tons of clutter in it!)
 

 hours hours hours
 it seemed
 all of these attempts
 but when i walked back into my room
 after it was all cleaned and organized and vacuumed
 i felt SO GOOD
 both of my parents have very cluttered rooms
 and most of my life my room has always been very cluttered
 my apartment in NYC was always a depressing mess
 i’d clean it
 then quickly drown in it again
 

 it feels so good to clean the room
 

 of course
 i don’t really live here, do i?
 i’m living here now
 it’s kinda enough
 

 i told my mom
 what helped me keep my room clean
 though i didn’t say it like that
 

 i told my mom
 that in many ways
 my relationship with her now is very healthy for me
 she’s a good friend
 and that’s so nice
 to have a someone i can enjoy talking with, helping, being cared for by
 it’s so nice
 i’m so grateful
 

 golly, i certainly hope some day i can love and be loved by a man
 a lover
 a parter
 golly
 geese
 phew…
 

 anyway
 

 i fried some potatoes for myself for dinner
 cleaned up
 then came up to do my italian
 and write
 …
 i stared at the screen 
 not knowing what to do
 so i just continued transcribing the hand written journal i kept at the three month meditation retreat i did in 2016
 

 the video i made on 43.1 
 i mentioned a Buddhist practice of “five daily reflections”
 and that happened to be what i was transcribing today
 my friend Tony had mentioned that i didn’t put them in my writing for that day
 so i’m going to copy here some of what i transcribed today (with a little elaboration)
 :
 “
 Annie’s Talk: Ayya Kehma
 Concentration Practice & “special effects”
 The Five Contemplations / Daily Reflections
 

 bringing these into the forefront of our minds uproots common delusion / pride / arrogance .
 our deal in Samsara: 
 i’m going to age. i cannot avoid aging. 
 i’m subject to illness. i cannot avoid illness
 i’m going to die: i cannot avoid death
 i will be separated from everything i hold dear. when i die or before
 i am heir to my Karma: whatever actions i perform, good or bad, i am heir to them. all the conditions that have ever existed to manifest ME is the path of Karma i am in.  i am the embodiment of all of that and every choice i make is the continuation of that flow…  
 

 This brings an Honesty into our lives, we cannot fool ourselves about our Human Existence.
 

 (and i talked with my mother about this today, oddly also it was in the transcription… she said she doesn’t think of herself as “old” though she is 70… she thinks she’s just… 30 or 40… but i said she should watch how it feels when she says “old” - in this culture it is a pejorative… the word “beautiful” often just means Young… many cultures admire and respect “old” people for their experience and wisdom… our culture finds it tedious and generally wants to get it out of the way or avoid it altogether)
 

 Mainstream People find OLD AGE UGLY - 
 i find it beautiful: i have always fetishized the wrinkles, bushy eyebrows, the broadened pores
 … of course, the constant pain & failing faculties isn’t so attractive - i try with Yoga & vitamins to preempt that … but it’s Nature - it will come to all of us. 
 in my youth, i assumed i would be dead by now… thought AIDS was going to kill me. The choice i made was not to live in fear & let Death come at me. i tried to be reasonable - Present… but still figured it inevitable, as i had been a weak, sickly child. The year i realized i was no longer afraid of AIDS & i would live to be an old man. i was shocked by both of these realizations - & that was the Year i got HIV - i had been living as if i had a compromised immune system my whole adult life - 
 she mentions riding a bike without a Helmet.  
 DEATH CAN COME AT ANY MOMENT
 LET GO OF YOUR CLINGING 
 Love will be there. 
 so reflect - are there still unwholesome qualities in us That we would wisely Abandon before our death? 
 Now is the time!
 “just as a man who’s hair is on fire would use all his resources to put out the fire”
 Attachments to things. relationships.
 at the time we committed unskillful acts we didn’t have much wisdom… but now… with wisdom & mindfulness we won’t make the same mistakes  
 
 She tells us stories of her life…
 Poor childhood in South Africa - middle class in London, full on American first world Problems in California. She Absolves herself to us. Dharma talk. 
 … i looked back on last sunday -
 yes. i see her frustration with me - 
 i do not show her respect…
 Her hopes that her rambling self-absorbed stories will illustrate points of wisdom is the same wish i have. the same insecurity  that it’s just useless blathering. Who’s benefiting? some people? or are they just being Nice … so good to be presented with these challenging reflections - like her looking in her iPad & seeing how she’s really aging. Black Mirror. 
 … i started to “sit” … to make this feeling go away. i felt the aversive urge to Metta… as i called Tony now, i remember, because i was fearful of Trump’s effect on the Ecology for Greed (Keystone Pipeline) then felt Karmic fear in my room over all i have stolen on the internet - like my van getting broken into, what will i suffer? 
 so i didn’t move. i just sat - to see if i could Just sit and be with the horrible feeling i was feeling. Horrible, but i sat with it. Like rubbing a dog or cat’s nose in its own Piss: DON’T BE AN UNWHOLESOME ASSHOLE
 Now… kindness… kindness… Compassion arose! it did. 
 

 

i recorded a video in the afternoon… out in my bed, the wind billowing the mosquito net. i had about fifteen minutes until dinner was ready… i was kinda in a rush, but i wanted to film in the day… i wanted to tell this story… but i became increasingly uncomfortable while telling it… and after dinner, i drove down town to work on a client… while driving, i thought of how i regretted what i said… and it’s uploading at the house… will be posted… and people will be angry… and this is why Trans people attacked me so many years ago…i’m really not a great ally… or maybe it’s not about that… i felt bad for saying “people can never change” or the likes of that… though people are changing all of the time… can we really change who we are? sure we can… i’ve learned how to be a very different person than who i was as a teenager… at least, i look different, i value different things, i respond to things differently… but i still have a lot ov thee same thoughts and feelings… i just give them a lot less energy and time… many of them never get expression because i no longer value them… but they are still there. i’m still that person, i’m just living that person differently. – – – and that may not be true. i don’t know. i was listening to Sharon Salzberg’s “Real Love” on the drive down and she was talking about stories… the stories we believe in that we need to check into and see if they are still real, still true… and how true are they? it’s often surprised me that people have told me i have a bad relationship with my feminine nature… my inner feminine, whatever you want to call it. but i’ve heard it so many times from so many different people that i have believed it and pathologized it… when i decided to see myself as a woman a few weeks ago… i was shocked at the self loathing it brought up… i was not prepared to deal with that and did my best to just let it slide and move by it.. but that’s like keeping silent to siding with the oppressor, right? same kinda thing… i was so taken-aback… so knocked off kilter… i couldn’t believe how un-graceful i took it… and it is something that can be worked with … seen and felt clearly… and at least accepted and perhaps the persective chan shift… most importantly, it’s something i don’t yet know how to deal with. it’s been an imbalance for a long time… and i find that it still is… and maybe now i will begin working on it in earnest… maybe now some useful tools will appear that i can use to … what is the word? fix it? balance it? heal it? i don’t know. it falls into other stories i don’t know how to change… “i’m bad at picking friends and lovers””i’ve never had a healthy relationship””i can’t write a book” “i could never have a job …” stuff we think and feel… i’ve certainly diffused some of the horrible death bombs in my mind and heart through my life… i suppose its good to know there are more left to work on… – – – anyway: i was happy to see when i got back that a few people had responded to the video very positively. it’s not a finished tale… and that’s ok. thank you.

43.4 - “spitting out the demons”
 

 the intention of “editing” every day for four hours
 is really more about this:
 carve out some time for myself
 

 age old story
 but a big part of why i’m here
 is i’m tired of living just for myself
 i haven’t figured out how to have a partner
 but i have a family
 and i’ve never fought with my mother
 and actually get along with her quite well
 like and love her
 my father and i… don’t have animosity now
 we are friendly… i wouldn’t say we are friends
 

 the idea of what a friend is
 is different to different people
 but to me
 it has a lot to do with being able to just spend time together
 and open up about what’s going on inside of each other
 

 one of the things i love about my mother is
 we have things in common that i rarely have in common with people
 : making tinctures and salves… giving massage… supplements and organics…
 otherwise
 we do puzzles together, play cards together
 some movies we enjoy watching together
 

 i can’t play video games with her
 and i can’t share any of my sexual stories with her
 (imagine there weren’t a taboo about that… we just don’t have it in common)
 

 i can’t do any of those things with my dad
 i believe everyone has an internal life
 but i often say 
 i imagine he doesn’t have one
 today i was thinking more along the lines he has a neglected internal life
 but he’s a guy who will talk about the weather, sports, politics
 but if i ask him about events in his past
 or his experience of religion
 or what he thinks and feels about something
 he generally has nothing to say
 

 in a similar way
 his person spaces in the house are cluttered, undealt with 
 sure mine and my mothers are well, but to a much less degree
 he thrives in socializing
 fishing, hunting, hosting the hunters and fishers
 and Business
 

 so what’s going on in him?
 i can’t say
 

 i imagine many things
 

 my mother has a healer friend
 you send her a picture by email
 and she does some healing work on you
 she says some weird stuff, as you may imagine
 but tends to be on-the-mark a lot of the time
 and just as often as her “treatments” do nothing
 they often help
 sometime miraculously
 

 a psychic friend of mine says she’s working with the spirit of her grandmother to do the healing
 friends who have left their human bodies who are doing things in the etheric realm
 

 in relating to my mother and sister
 she almost always says “i have released you from deamons”
 she never said that to me
 until i started staying here again
 and i remember that when i was a teenager
 i thought everyone in indiana was cursed
 by the spirits of the land
 by the ancestors of what we call “the native americans”
 i remember, when i left the USA, i then came to believe that everyone in the USA was cursed for the same reason
 then i began that most humans everywhere were cursed
 being punished
 

 not by some christian god
 but by pissed of nature spirits
 but all that is good
 

 it’s a conundrum
 how, lets use our dominant paradigm’s most common metaphor:
 how Jesus is an antidote to the Jewish Deity of vengeance and righteous anger
 he’s just this guy who came along and was like “whoa! everything loves you. you’re forgiven, we all love you. everything is love. it’s all good. chill. just love one another. just be kind. i love you. i’m god, it’s alright… we’re all god, and… “ 
 and they fucking killed him
 and then used his memory and image to torture humans for
 what
 two thousand years now?
 

 all that is good in this world
 that makes flowers bloom and rainbows etc…
 is torturing all of humanity
 

 we’re in “the good place”
 all perfectly arranged for us to be miserable 
 and torture each other and ruin everything all the time
 

 but
 you know
 it doesn’t have to be that way
 we don’t have to play that game
 

 i keep getting distracted
 i came back to edit something and wrote this out
 but earlier, i had written this:
 

 i totally believe in a version of reality 
 where reality has a back stage
 like
 we are on stage, on TV
 but there’s a huge world producing the TV show, you know
 costume shops, set shops, prop shops
 acting schools
 writers…
 etc…
 (that’s the kind of writer i’ve always wanted to be: script doctor for reality… i’m still working on that)
 

 anyway
 that’s a metaphor
 and reality is as simple as what you can know write now (not what you can imagine or cognate, but what you can actually know through senses… reality happening right now)
 or as complex as anything anyone can possibly believe
 and then some
 

 i vacillate between those…
 

 i told my mom i think the body/consciousness/self that we use and interact with others in this Reality
 is the tip of the iceberg of our “soul”
 an appendage
 perhaps just a hand
 metaphor again
 like a physical manifestation exploration vehicle
 

 consciousness is happening in many realities 
 it’s broken into various archetypes
 but all collapses into oneness
 this is now and forever
 but also
 it is divided almost infinitely
 so it can have specific experiences
 one of those
 is individuality
 it’s a game, a stance, a script, a role, an app
 whatever
 but it’s happening
 a process running
 

 the self in this dimension we call reality
 is connected to a huge being doing many things in many other realms simultaneously
 and likewise
 behind that
 all those come together
 

 one way of describing “we are all one”
 

 meanwhile
 we are also driving the kids to soccer practice
 wondering what we’re going to eat tonight
 planning out a menu
 or pulling through the drive through
 or gorging on a bag of chips
 or a pint of ice cream
 meanwhile
 we are imagining taking over the world
 or how we will secure a happy future for our selves
 or the ones we love
 etc…
 

 so
 we were playing dominoes
 and i felt like my dad had some strategy 
 but he doesn’t talk about anything happening with him
 some magic deflection shield
 i ask him
 he just says “i’m lucky”
 he always shakes his head and laughs with almost every interaction with family…
 

 when i hear him say that
 i hear an infinite echo in multiple dimensions
 like he has huge tentacles 
 running many deamons
 pulling strings
 to make us pull the right dominoes 
 so he wins and the rest of us lose
 

 in this version of reality
 he’s just playing
 he’s just studying
 he takes a long time to pick and organize his dominoes
 he take a long time to play
 he cannot express what he is doing
 either consciously or unconsciously 
 he’s protecting a secret
 he’s always in competition
 always at war
 

 i decide to cheat
 i hold back the wild card that would let us play
 so we have to draw almost all the extra chips til we find the 
 double three, was it?
 gets to be there are only about 7 left when mom finds it
 

 we play through
 i rack up tons more points
 he gets some
 but still less than the rest of us
 

 the next round
 and the rest of the rounds
 i get the worst chips possible
 

 we kept getting caught in these feedback loops of having to pull chips
 

 i’m thinking of how he’s either some grand warlock
 or an incredibly repressed functional vehicle for one
 and he’s punishing me for trying to stack him up
 like he punishes us all the time.
 

 and it’s tile after tile
 and the tension is building in our shoulders and the table
 and my mom puts down a chip that stops us in that vein
 saying “this breaks that spell”
 

 when i was younger and did drugs often
 i had many years where i felt everything had meaning
 everyone was talking to me all the time
 everything was talking to everyone all the time
 the billboards
 any random advertisement or song lyric
 every utterance was infinitely extrapolatable back to some eternal truth
 and i kept hearing the whispers of that truth in everything
 but couldn’t understand it from my human mind
 with all my baggage and confusion
 and it was making me crazy
 because i felt i was supposed to be doing something
 to 
 somehow fix this nightmare hellscape of vaguely unpleasant mediocre eternal suffering we were all in
 (that’s the version most of us are in: over fed on empty food with all the electricity we could ever want to power our constant distraction machines and condition the air so we think we should be comfortable but continually find we aren’t anyway… as opposed to the people who are, like, starving and dying of cholera, living in huts made out of garbage… or many other points along the arc between those two… and past on either sides, i’m sure)
 

 i gave up on all that
 

 i was telling my mom that today
 that i’ve not been writing much for two years
 vaguely making notes about things i should be writing about
 things i may like to write about in the future
 but balking any time anyone asks me to write something
 and when i feel really inspired to write something down
 i often find i write a paragraph and 
 STOP
 

 during all of those meditation retreats 
 i learned how to not be stuck in my thoughts all the time
 i learned how hinging reality on the experience through SELF was hellish suffering and i learned how to not have to do that
 and every time i’ve written in recent years i feel my mind slipping back into that “selfing”
 and every time i sit down to write
 i feel my mind spinning up into extrapolating multidimensionally every experience
 so the last few days i’ve not been sleeping much
 my mind has been hyper-active
 and when i prepare to go to sleep and wake up
 i flit through the phone
 looking at things
 jumping from thing to thing to thing
 

 i remember when i lived like that
 

 heck
 it’s just a few weeks, right?
 it’s mercury retrograde
 

 just like the good old days
 

 sorry, what was i going to write about?
 i meant to tell you
 that “editing” today
 just meant 
 taking time for myself
 that is
 getting done some things for ME
 things that don’t relate to the life i’m living with my parents in indiana 
 but maybe a future life
 maybe a past life
 meaning
 internal life things
 

 yes yes
 countless writings i have written i need to edit
 but also
 just a million projects i’ve “meant” to do for years
 and i’m making time to do them
 

 yesterday i edited a few pages on my web page
 which took at least twice as long as it could have
 because i had no idea how to do it and had to figure it out
 today
 i took an impulse i’ve had for
 twelve years?
 or at least four
 since someone once paid me in Ethereum 
 to figure out how to properly use block-chain wallets
 that is
 buy and sell and trade
 follow the graphs
 

 so i spent hours doing that today
 installing many apps
 creating various wallets
 spending about the the amount i would make in one massage session
 to buy some imaginary money from other imaginary money
 then turn it into other imaginary moneys
 

 maybe i was spurned  by porn twitter
 i the search field
 seeing Elon Musk had triggered some huge buying frenzy of a sex worker cyrptocurrency
 yeah
 i want people to pay me CUMMIES
 but in order to do that
 i have to have some first
 and in order to do that
 i need a wallet that can exchange them
 and they are an ALTCOIN
 so i had to learn about Binance, which isn’t usable the USA
 etc etc etc
 i spent hours doing that
 and finally got a Coinbase account working
 

 the ETH this guy gave me in 2017 was worth $1000 USD when he gave it to me
 a few months later it was 2K
 i was impressed
 a few months later it was 200…
 it hovered there until recently
 to when it’s shot up to over 5K
 right now it’s $3.7k
 and the bit i bought on coinbase i split into DOGE and MATIC and BITCOIN and 
 it’s already gone up a bit
 

 when i first heard of Bitcoin i thought it was absurd
 like most of you
 but i did the math today
 and if i would have bought $200 of it in 2010 when i heard of it
 it would be worth twelve million dollars now
 so 
 let’s buy on the dip
 right?
 

 then i went out and weeded
 and made a little youtube video
 where i talk about some other metaphor i haven’t talked about on here
 and mostly nothing else i wrote about 
 

 if you read all this
 i’ll be shocked
 

 i realized
 i’m doing this project more for myself than an audience
 which i’ve talked about already
 i love being of service
 i love helping
 but it’s time for me to get back on the horse
 and start playing the Dominic show again
 and that requires internal work
 

 i’m always doing internal work, actually
 but there’s an infinite amount of different aspects of internal work
 so back to this
 

 polish the stone
 polish the stone
 

 love you, good night.
 

so when i said i would spend four hours a day editing. . . it was because i felt i was being too much of a consumer. . . it’s fun to watch TV and movies and play video games and listen to podcasts and audiobooks. . . and it’s nice to be able to let go of the heavy weight of feeling some obligation i don’t know how to fulfill about adding wisdom and entertainment to the cannon of human storytelling. . . BUT. . . i’ve got work to do and i know it. . . infinite work to do. . . and there is only so much i can do with other people. . . just like there is only so much i can do with myself. . . so . . . me being a creator. . . an editor. . . i felt it when i woke up today.. i didn’t want to do storytelling in the same way. . . i wanted to work. . . and how did that manifest? my old tried & true: procrastination: i laid in bed (i wish i could spell it with a y. . . ) i layed in bed for about four hours after waking. reading through social media replies (ugh, that’s why i felt so terrible waking up yesterday! when i post on social media then i go to look at social media. . . while i was writing last night’s piece i decided to post the day’s pics on IG. . . and after they posted some guy’s post came up. i didn’t know him: he as just a hot sexy bear. he was a hot sexy bear who mostly posted pics of his naked furry body (IG limitations) . . . but this post was him at a military funeral. . . and i read about his dead husband. . . and looked back through his last few months of hell, watching the love of his life die of cancer. . . dealing with having COVID himself, on oxygen. . . occasionally posting a sexy picture of his butt rising behind his smiling face. . . it’s such an emotional landmine field. . . social media. . . people angry about stuff. . . or sad about stuff. . . baiting for thirst or emotional support or emotional vampirism. . . or just beautifully expressing to the best of their ability the experience of life. . . in all its pleasure and pain. it was beautiful to witness. . . but when i turned back to my writing piece i was noticeably in a different emotional space. . . ) so yeah, i did that again this morning. . . between twitter porn and all the other social media sink holes, harvesting the fruits of my postings and making emotional impulse buys along the way. . . feeling guilty i wasn’t with my parents down stairs. . . twice came and feeling exhausted and depressed. . . hooray! i went down stairs and finished the puzzle i had been working on for a few days. poured out a tincture i made a month ago. . . explored other tinctures from years ago that might help my mom. . . maybe got a little drunk from all the alcohol in them… ate some kitcahri and came back up stairs and napped. then sold a video to a guy who was a part of my daily practice group last year. . . then recorded a video for a client who pays me to make him time lapse fetish videos. . . so i made some money (even though there were three clients today who wanted sessions but didn’t want to pay me and a hotel but could not host) . . . then. . . THEN…. i sat down and started editing. . . all my notes’ organization got razed earlier this year. . . so i worked on that for a while. . . then started transcribing the hand written journal i kept at the 2016 retreat. . . i’ve been working on that thing for four years now. . . but in the last few days. . . if i can just finish it. . . then what? here’s a quote from it i enjoyed. :

The wisdom of the finite. . . knows something the infinite simply cannot

11.20.2016

43.2 Turtle and Trains
 

 i didn’t feel rested this morning
 and when i woke… i didn’t want to be awake
 was it yesterday i dreamt of being in alaska
 sitting in hot springs with northern lights
 impossibly sparking like cartoon electricity over my head?
 what strange funk was i in this morning?
 i didn’t want to feel like i felt
 i lolled around in bed
 

 being here with family
 i often feel like taking a few hours alone to myself late at night and whenever i wake up
 but the rest of the time
 i feel i should be present with them
 that’s what i’m here to do
 to be with them
 

 that was how it was when i came back in 2019
 and though things are different now:
 i was here then specifically to be with them
 to experience them as they are 
 now i’m just… living here
 now this is a place i am
 and i don’t want to fall back into childhood habits of adversive self isolation and avoiding them
 i feel guilty when i have massage clients or isolate to play videogames
 but i’m finding a balance
 anyway
 when i wake up
 afer a while of being awake i feel an urge to go down and be with family
 and these last few days my mother has been very sick
 so there is another sensation of wanting to care for her
 but i gave two massages yesterday
 and i’m very noticing how “drained” that makes me feel
 vs when i was here last year and not giving any
 

 so i got out of bed slowly
 (oh, the internet is taking more of my time as well because i am posting… and when i’m posting i am looking at replies: all of that takes time… and in recent years i have greatly curtailed my posting… all in an effort to not be starting at social media a lot…  it’s worked well… it’s amazing how much time social media can take up… but hey, for many people it’s still The Greatest Show On Earth… i’m kinda over it… but it is what it is… and it allows me to be with all of you fine people… my voice in your mind… hand in hand… )
 and went down stairs and puzzled a bit
 talking with mom about what we were going to do today
 

 we got a plan
 which lagged and lagged
 i made a nice lunch of lambs quarters and greens
 (oh, i didn’t talk about that in the video, darn)
 there is this weed that grows like crazy in our garden
 not our garden this year
 but all over the compost heap
 it’s a lovely wild spinach
 sometimes called Miner’s Lettuce
 i mostly call it Lambs Quarters
 i tried to grow kale last year
 but some bug ate it all
 this wild thing: nothing eats it
 it wants to be here
 and i don’t need to do anything
 it just grows and grows
 so i eat a lot of it
 (last year it was purslane.. i wonder if it will come back too? none in sight yet)
 i made a great breakfast of eggs, left over beef, and lambs quarters
 then i fed and watered the chickens
 then took off to go into town to buy some things for the dinner i was making and some other things for my mom (coz she’s sick)
 

 but on the way into town i saw 
 an elderly couple standing by a fence of a subdivision
 with a shovel
 and a…
 what was that?
 a big metal pot? a bucket? a lid? a big stone?
 holyshit… a turtle? a huge turtle!
 i love turtles
 and i swung the car around in the next subdivision
 and drove back to where they were
 parked the car in their subdivision
 and walked up to them and said hello
 “can i be of help? is that a pet?”
 no! they said… it is some big wild beast… we think it’s a snapping turtle…
 it got stuck under the fence and we’re trying to help it out… 
 i told them it wasn’t a snapping turtle
 i assured them  (i thought it wasn’t)
 and suggested i come around the inside and pick up the turtle and get it away from the road
 the woman suggested the turtle was trying to get to the pond…
 that seemed like a good idea to me
 so when i went to grab the turtle
 they were very worried for me
 because it was aggressively attacking the shovel
 i assured them i would be fine:
 turtles are a known quantity, you know? they are a shell and legs and a head
 and if you hold the back of their shell, they cannot bite you
 (i’m only now remembering that it can hurt them if you hold them by only the upper part of their shell… because their innards are heavy and put a lot of strain on the lower part of their body… they just aren’t meant to be held like that)
 it took a while for me to pick him up
 he had a huge tail
 and huge claws!
 such a huge turtle!
 (more pics on my instagram)
 he was digging himself into the ground
 holding himself firm
 and trying to destroy me with him mouth
 

 oddly, i had no fear
 i held his shell firmly
 and eventually fond the leverage to pull him out from under the fence and up into the air
 

 i carried him about twenty feet before he figured he could get his back claw to scratch my fingers
 … he didn’t have a good angle or speed, so he wasn’t really hurting me
 but he had the potential to now that he had figured out how to do it
 he was smart and would figure out how to hurt me soon
 so i put him down and took a step back
 

 he was pissed off
 aggro-turtle
 

 and i understand
 he was scared and confused
 and was just stuck under a fence
 

 i thought he was a box turtle or something
 (spoiler alert: he was a snapping turtle)
 i was really impressed that he kept his eyes on me
 and kept turning to face me whenever i changed direction
 

 he was not actively trying to chase me or anything
 but he was letting me know he was watching me
 

 i mentioned to the two people that i might have a box in the car…
 the Woman said she would go get a box
 while she was gone
 i decided to take off my sandals and wrap them around the shell in such a way to protect me from his claws
 i looked at him and he suddenly seemed calm and let me walk behind him and pick him up again
 so i could carry him to the pond
 

 this was a subdivision
 the houses were close
 the pond was three houses away
 

 i was walking barefoot through the manicured lawns…
 

 the woman called out to me
 not to put him in the water
 she wanted a picture of him
 she was running at me
 albeit
 slowly
 

 i kept walking to the water so i could put him down
 he was holding his mouth open
 i could imagine he was hissing at me
 and i realized he probably didn’t like being held vertically
 so i held him horizontally
 and told him a story about how he was a flying turtle
 you know, like Gamara
 he could just enjoy flying through the air to the pond
 he got the message and relaxed into enjoying the ride… 
 i put him down a few feet from the water
 and he responded similarly to how he did the first time
 and the older fellow walked up
 still carrying the shovel
 and the turtle really didn’t like the shovel
 as it had just been trying to push him through the fence
 so he bit at it again
 but then calmed down a bit
 the woman took a picture of the two of us
 

 the turtle relaxed
 turned around
 and walked into the water and swam away
 

 the man asked how heavy i thought that turtle was
 “20 pounds”?
 i don’t know, i said, if you were a man… that might be correct
 you know, the way we like to exaggerate things
 the woman thought it might only be 6 pounds
 it was not overly heavy
 but i’m not a good judge of things
 i figured he was at least as heavy as a gallon of water
 

 i kept saying
 “it could be a box turtle… though they usually have a higher domed shell… but i’ve never seen one this old before”
 they said, “yeah, he’s been here longer than us…”
 and proceeded to just relax into being human with me
 tragedy averted
 our stories came out
 

 they moved here three years ago from the Ozarks to be nearer their daughter
 they had lived in Chicago
 they had lived around
 they went to Rome a few years ago
 didn’t go anywhere else in Italy
 no, Not Florence, Not Venice: they just wanted to see Rome
 

 i’m glad people live their dreams
 

 they asked me where my favorite place in the world was
 … i don’t like playing favorites
 but i decided not to take that tact
 i told them about Thailand
 how i got to study
 and have wonderful adventures
 see ancient histories
 and also just relax in the ocean
 i told them how the ocean was almost body temperature
 (he response was how bad that would be for breeding bacteria…)
 i mentioned how i could float in the sea without having to fight the waves or even move to stay warm… could float and bob around in the setting sun… the vermillion lavender gorgeous sky reflecting all around me
 for hours every night
 i loved it
 

 and the massage was good too
 and the food…
 

 the man didn’t ask me what i did for a living
 he asked what my Skill was
 i loved that
 we talked a bit as we walked back towards their house
 i realized i had parked the car directly in front of their house
 i told them i was on an errand for my mother
 and they said i should call her and tell her what happened
 

 her reply was
 “Wow! What a nice act of kindness!”
 and i hadn’t thought of it like that
 but it was
 

 the woman invited me into her house
 to show me… something upstairs
 

 i liked the mystery of it
 and thought how odd it was
 she admitted to me she was 80
 but she wasn’t afraid
 

 was it because of my haircut?
 or just my general aura?
 or that she wasn’t from Indiana?
 
 Hoosiers seem to be so paranoid
 or at least my family is…
 

 but she invited me into her house
 i washed the turtle off my hands
 then went up stairs with her:
 she had a huge train set
 filling a whole room
 bigger than all i’d seen downstairs
 

 they had cards printed up
 they invited families to bring their kids up to see the trains
 she had three different tracks with different cars
 and even another one made out of LEGO that she controlled with an app on her phone
 

 the joys of life
 right?
 

 what a nice surprise
 

 she offered me water
 but i declined
 and headed out on my way
 

 … shopping… home…
 

 we went and ran errands
 found a new farmer’s market
 and bought some delicious honey soap
 and just felt good talking with the woman who ran the apiary…
 it felt nice
 i was just appreciating the day
 

 and when we got home
 we rested a bit
 then i made Kitchari: an indian curry i was introduced to as part of a yoga cleansing diet
 when it was in the pressure cooker 
 i headed out side 
 mainly to give my mom a break from the dog
 which wimpers at the door obsessively 
 and drives her crazy
 

 we went out
 and i got passionate about gardening
 planting the watermelons we bought today
 planting a delicate squash my mom bought last week
 planting sprouted mung and adzuki beans that i hadn’t put in tonight’s dinner
 planting sunflowers, passionsflowers and some squash along the rows of corn
 weeding for a while
 til the sun had set and the light was almost gone
 watered the garden
 and came in
 to shower
 

 one of the great things of shaving my head
 is being able to shower my whole body
 face and scalp
 without worrying about having wet hair for hours
 it’s a great feeling
 

 then i went to watch some TV with my parents
 and eat the delicious Kitchari i had made…
 and it had a new effect on me:
 it made me feel like i had to do yoga
 

 it’s never done that to me before
 it’s certainly a food that is meant to be a medicine
 to bring things into balance
 it often makes me feel “high”
 and i have always said that when i get high i just want to do yoga
 but i had never felt Kitchari make me feel like doing yoga
 and doing yoga at 11pm just after eating
 isn’t such a great idea
 but i watched TV with my parents
 and did yoga for about a half hour
 a bunch of standing poses
 then some more while sitting in the chair
 

 i felt so grateful for the day
 for helping my mom
 being with the chickens
 petting the dog
 so happy to have some attention paid to him
 so happy to have helped free the turtle
 so happy to have met those nice people and shared stories and joys with them
 so happy to have done yoga!
 eaten delicious food
 watched the sunset
 

 how beautiful life can be sometimes…
 

 last night
 i wrote about an occurrence that happened a few weeks ago
 tonight i wrote about today
 

 i’ll post this now
 you can see it
 the video of me telling the story is uploading right now
 it will take a few more hours
 (the internet is slow here)
 i will embed it in this page before noon
 

 i have always been curious how a tale is told
 and what differences writing or telling it (in videos) can make
 

 last night i wrote the story first 
 then told it
 

 tonight i told it first
 then wrote it
 

 very different details in each
 

 that’s enough
 i’m tired
 

 i love you
 thank you
 sleep well
 have a great day.
 

 

 

i wrote this out as well as recorded a video telling the story. . . in the video i do a better job of explaining why i’m telling this story and why i’m telling it twice. . .

The boy who stole my laptop

43.1 the boy who stole my laptop
 

 My brother told me years ago about a friend of his who keeps his tech new by buying last year’s tech every few years, selling what he’s got, never paying full price, but always staying current. like paying a fee to upgrade regularly. . . 
 

 so i bought this laptop 
 last year‘s model of the one i’ve been using since 2018 (which i had bought as a last year’s model. . . after using, for eight years, a friend’s broken laptop i had rehabbed)
 it was a good upgrade. still under apple-care warranty, and the same price i paid for the one i previously bought. 
 

 i was happy to buy it
 sad to discover it had a european spanish keyboard 
 but i figured some way to re-map the keys so it was basically what i’m familiar with 
 

 to complete the program i just had to sell my 2017 laptop
 no problem
 i was going to use Facebook Marketplace
 and try OfferUp
 and, last resort, i would use eBay
 … i checked and there were the same models selling for $800-900
 i wanted a thousand
 i’d see if i could get it
 

 i quickly found two things:
 everyone wants a deal
 so i raised the price to $1100
 so i could give people a discount and still get what i wanted
 and. . . almost everyone contacting me was a scammer
 

 i had watched some youtube videos about tech-nerds and geniuses hunting down the scammers who call and email and text us spam
 so i did some research and quickly came to understand what these scams were trying to do with me selling my laptop
 

 i thought i’d be able to sell it direct cash trade in NYC 
 but i got about 50 scam replies
 which took me a while to sort through
 and made me suspicious of everyone else writing me
 

 mostly they were writing from profiles of old white people
 but their english was bad
 so
 those who had initiated direct facebook messages instead of going through market place
 i would occasionally hit the video call button to see if they would pick up
 

 a few did
 though i only saw faces twice
 some would cover their camera and hang up quickly 
 two black guys sitting at a table in a tropical poverty-style bungalow
 looking surprised and laughing and commenting on how cool my beard was 
 

 i’m not sure where in the world they were
 but i knew i was a rich man compared to them and felt bad about the whole situation
 but wasn’t interested in being scammed
 

 it’s hard for me to fall for scams 
 so i didn’t sell the laptop in NYC 
 i took it back to indiana with me
 and tried there
 

 mostly more of the same
 but more humans 
 though they mostly were trying to convince me to sell it for $500 
 which i had no intention of doing 
 

 one guy started the thread with “I’ll take it”
 and we chatted a bit
 

 it all seemed pretty straight forward 
 his profile said he was a teenager and showed a football player running
 how could this be a scam?
 the address he gave me was a public park
 only 10 minutes from the house 
 the only thing i could imagine would be that he would have a group of people jump me and steal my laptop
 but i’m not that paranoid
 so i didn’t let the thought linger
 

 we set date and time and i drove over to meet him the next day
 

 he was a young guy
 weedy, thin… frail looking, i would say
 he reminded me of me when i was a teenager
 uncomfortable in my own body
 but he was probably 16 or so
 and i was like that when i was 11
 still
 i remember wearing a wrist brace my last year of living in indiana
 and he had one on
 i felt an affinity with him
 and spent about an hour talking with him about how a Mac works
 as he had only ever really worked with a PC
 he asked a lot of questions
 and i was happy to answer them
 but eventually he started acting strangely
 and shifty
 and said he hadn’t brought the money with him
 he needed to walk back to his house to get it
 

 i assumed i wouldn’t see him again
 

 he walked across the field
 through a breaker of trees
 to the subdivision over there
 and was gone a few minutes
 but reappeared
 

 and after all that
 he said he felt terrible
 but just didn’t feel like he could afford it
 he asked how much i wanted 
 “$1100, right?”
 and though that was the price i had it listed at
 it was struck through
 i had lowered it to $900 
 and guess he hadn’t noticed that
 i said he could pay me $1100 if he could afford it
 but i would accept less
 still
 he “hemmed and hawed” as they say
 and decided he just couldn’t bring himself to pay it 
 

 what could i do?
 i said Ok…
 he walked off
 i got back in the car and drove home
 …
 i looked through the houses
 i got an idea of where he went
 

 people in Indiana are paranoid
 at least that’s what i think about them
 scared of everything…
 

 whatever
 

 that felt bad
 

 over the next few days
 i had a few people say they wanted to buy it
 only to say
 the next day
 that they decided not to
 

 and then more low-ball offers
 

 i had a friend visit for a few days 
 so had other things to think of
 but shortly after my friend left
 this kid wrote me again
 and decided he wanted the laptop
 “for real this time”
 and no other offer had materialized
 and it was a short drive
 so i agreed to meet him the next day
 same place
 same time as before
 

 but i was working in the garden that afternoon
 and totally forgot about our meeting
 when i came back in i saw a message from him asking him if i would be meeting him
 and i responded that i was sorry i had missed our meeting
 but would be happy to drive over now
 as it is so close
 

 he said he might be able to sneak out and grab it
  after his parents went to sleep
 or at least went upstairs
 …
 

 ok
 so he was buying this without them knowing
 i guess
 that’s more to be worried about 
 right?
 i just told him to let me know if he wanted me to come out tonight or tomorrow
 and went about my evening
 

 i later got a message from him saying around 11:15 would be good
 

 so when 11 came around
 i packed up and got in the car and sent him a message telling him i was on my way
 

 we met in the dark 
 in this unlit park
 empty sports fields
 weedy little kid and me
 after i shaved my beard off
 … he didn’t comment on noticing the difference
 again, though, he asked tons of questions
 and i was happy to answer them
 but after about 45 minutes 
 midnight
 i said “ok, now’s the time, you’ve got buy it… you said you would… you can ask me any questions you want through the net… or google them, but it’s getting on … “
 and he started acting shifty again
 breathing quickly
 like an asthmatic
 and he started pacing
 he said “oh man, i don’t want to do this to you again.. oh man, i’m sorry, i can’t do this to you again… i feel… ok, give me a minute, i just have to walk a moment”
 and he walked off into the darkness
 of course
 right
 so i wouldn’t see him again
 but he came back
 and stood next to me
 i was sitting on some risers looking out over the soccer field
 he stood there 
 shuffled his feet
 and grabbed the computer and dashed
 saying “sorry man”
 

 my mind had no thoughts
 i just leapt to my feet and gave chase
 

 now
 i was wearing my sandals
 not looped around my ankles
 so they fell off after the first few steps
 

 i kept running
 

 and i’m not much of a runner
 i was always winded easily when i was younger
 in these running sports
 though i had to play all of them
 and a few months ago
 i hurt my left ankle badly
 and could hardly walk for a month
 it took two months before i no longer felt the pain
 and that was only a month behind me now
 and being here in indiana 
 something had happened to my right ankle in 2019
 often hurting
 so i’ve been thinking of my ankles as Weak in recent years
 but not tonight
 no thinking
 i was just running
 

 i did notice the sensation of the pavement under my feet
 and noticed i did not step on anything sharp
 and i noticed the sensation of running
 the clear drive of purpose
 … i wasn’t gonna let that kid get away with $1000
 some weedy suburban kid
 it just wasn’t going to happen
 i could feel the muscles in my legs and back
 could feel the heat and strength driving me through the night
 could see his body
 quite a ways away
 he had got a good head start on me
 he ran out of the parking lot
 along the sidewalk
 and i was gaining on him very quickly 
 i wasn’t shouting at him
 he knew i was there
 and as the sidewalk was coming to an end
 (because sidewalks in suburban no-wheres go nowhere) 
 he squealed and yelped
 and said “oh, i’m sorry man, i’m sorry i’m sorry, here’s your laptop”
 and gently set it down in the grass by the side of the pavement
 where i stopped
 and did not even follow his trajectory with my eyes
 i just picked up the laptop and turned around and walked back to the car
 feeling the warmth of the blacktop under my bare feet
 feeling my heart and breath pumping in my body
 this feeling of Life
 

 what a gift
 to know
 even in my weakness
 injured
 recovered
 and because of it 
 15 pounds heavier than i’ve ever been
 i could run down a teenager
 a nerd, yes
 but at 42… nearly 43… this body could run him down
 i’ve done an ok job taking care of this body
 even when it feels like it’s sliding…
 

 what a gift
 

 yet the adrenalin also drove me to swiftly pick up my sandals 
 get in the car
 roll up the windows
 lock the doors
 and drive out of there as quickly as i could
 and even before i got to the first intersection
 i went to our messenger conversation and left it
 then blocked him there and at facebook
 

 i didn’t want to hear anything he had to say after that
 

 … when i told friends about this experience
 they all said they would have left the laptop and caught him and left some bruises or broken his nose or ribs or something
 

 but i know that kid
 i know what an insecure mess he is
 how tortured he is
 in himself
 i didn’t need to hurt him 
 he hurt himself enough
 showing himself that he was a thief 
 and a bad one at that 
 that’s enough
 

 i wouldn’t want to live knowing that i hurt him
 having to hurt him
 using my strength to hurt someone weaker than i
 chasing him down was conquest enough for me
 and the actuality of the experience was punishment enough for him
 

 is this maturity?
 this is all what it’s like to Age
 consciousness folding and flowing through time
 creases and shapes…