secret: when you finally stop, or, some broad generalisations of a traveller

there's that point you get to in life as a person who likes to travel about the place, having adventures, when you want to keep moving, but you also want to stay still.

there's the yearning for the new and unknown places, for the rush of foreign smells and noises and coins. that sort of travel-crack (by this i mean, the addictive rush of traveling) that keeps you moving, almost forgetful of the experiences before you've had them.

everything is unknown and nothing is certain and it's the most freeing thing, probably even more so for those who always loved to plan, like me. it's a revelation, especially the bits that you hate, or the traps you fall into, representing Australia in some unknowing way, those parts you end up loving.

it's freeing, to know that whoever you choose to be each morning is no less you than that other person you left behind either yesterday, or last country, or back in Australia so long ago. either way, a lifetime and an age have passed, and you're here and now seeing everything, loving it or hating on it.

and then.

it's that little voice that misses knowing which kitchen cupboard has the mugs in it. strangely, it's missing Australian dairy products. it's your parents, either bemused at your vagrancy or travelers themselves, who want to know where and how you are in a suffocating way (somewhat and sometimes) that you've caught yourself craving at least once.

it's coming home with a new lover, to show them off to your family and your hometown in a way that reveals unflinchingly that it either will not last, or it's solid gold. it's the broken heart you drag in the back door of home, too weary, too broken. or it's the trudging through visa applications and proof that you really do love each other, sometimes put upon you much too soon.

when you finally stop, you haven't really stopped at all. if you're lucky, you'll have travel mates who become lifelong friends to visit and be visited by. if you're really lucky, perhaps they'll stop to rest more than just a little while on your back door step, drinking beer and balancing out wishes for the future with the golden remember whens.

when you finally stop, you'll be searching for a place steady enough to plant your feet. you'll know it because you'll catch yourself smiling at that final crest in the road before you hit the home valley, smiling in recognition at that feeling, that undeniable warmth in your heart.

you do feel the warmth elsewhere - the top of a mountain on a bluebird day, or apres-ski, tired and happy with shredding buddies (why is it that places of great height inspire this warm glow?). i don't for a minute suggest that you can't belong somewhere while traveling, but my point remains:

when you finally stop, you know something. even if you don't have it mapped out or pinned down exactly, it's yours to know.

when you finally stop, you give thanks for all the other lovely bits. you want more, you want feet on and in the earth, like roots.

you shake your head in disbelief at the simple truth of it. you followed your heart around the world this whole time, giddy, and when you finally stop, there it is, and there you are.

Friday Feminism: film review of Miss Representation

One of the things I'm doing to expand my writing horizons and hopefully sneak feminist things into people's minds before they even figure it out is to write for the student newspaper at the university where I'm studying.

Below is the article I wrote about "Miss Representation", a documentary from 2011 about women in the media. If you can, sort out a copy of the doco to watch. It's one of those ones where you do a lot of sighing in recognition of various truths. It is definitely depressing in bits, but I really think it's an opportunity to take away some determination and grit.

Milly, the President of the Women's Society at my uni, also known as UNEWS, organised a screening a while back and it was the sort of event that had all of us women speaking eagerly over each other at the end. There were some men there, but more men would have been awesome.

For anybody who tells you we don't need feminism anymore, sit them quietly down with "Miss Representation", leave them 85 - 90 minutes and come back for a nice chat. It's a scary world out there for white western women without even touching the sides on the third world, or indigenous communities.

Here's my article (edited by the lovely Stu who has nice ways of saying "no, you have to change that, it makes no sense").

This year has been a pretty awesome one for me. I started my Masters at UNE and was lucky enough to become a member of UNEWS (University of New England Women’s Society), gallantly lead through its first year by the most awesome Milly Roberts (hip hip hooray!).

UNEWS has held some great events over the course of the year – the memorable Blue Stockings Week Debate, more recently a peaceful protest picnic to demonstrate the sheer ridiculousness of Abbott’s one woman cabinet, and most poignantly for me, the screening of “Miss Representation”, a documentary made in 2011 by American film maker Jennifer Siebel Newsom.

I’ll be honest: it’s stayed with me. Newsom covers a lot of ground in a confronting 85 minutes, hitting her viewers with some unnerving statistics to hammer home the point that representation of women in the media is not only done in an incredibly negative way, but also fails to offer up healthy role models for young women. In 2011, the year “Miss Representation” was made, only 11% of protagonists in films were female. Only 20% of news articles were about women. And here’s a scary one: Between 1937 and 2005 there were only 13 female protagonists in animated films...All of them except one had the primary aspiration of finding romance.

Given the media saturated world in which we all exist, these statistics are pretty alarming. It’s not just grown women that are living the consequences of media decisions, it is young women and girls who are inheriting the implications of this sort of representation. Newsom’s examination of media coverage surrounding American female politicians like Hillary Clinton brings to mind the appalling treatment of our former Prime Minister Julia Gillard at the hands of not only Tony Abbott and the Liberal Party, but Australian media at large. Constant discussion of the former PM’s clothing choices and over-examination of her family life was an overt attempt by the media to reduce her to a person who couldn’t possibly run a country. Regardless of your politics, it seems like common sense that the Prime Minister of Australia should be judged by her leadership skills, and not being childless or unmarried or female.

Real world women as role models aren’t to be found in popular media either. Anybody opening a fashion or beauty magazine is met with a flood of slim, young, white women. This uniformity offers us, the consumers, a very select representation of what it might mean to be a woman or a girl. ‘Miss Representation’ argues that we need a much broader spectrum of society represented for us: a variety of shapes and sizes, backgrounds and ages. 

The upkeep of this very narrow of definition physical perfection and beauty is very important to the media. We are meant to look at the people on the pages of our magazines and see that they are ‘beautiful’, and of course we know that advertisements are made with the intention of selling consumer products. What we think less consciously about is what else we as a society are being sold when we consume advertising and popular media. All of us are being sold a particular ideal which we understand to be desirable. In a world where even the small part of the population that fit this ideal are airbrushed before they hit the magazine page, how do the rest of us fit in? How do women ever feel as though they’ve succeeded in such a visual world? How do we learn to value ourselves when we don’t match the people in the pages of magazines?

‘Miss Representation’ notes the measurable effect of popular media’s focus on this ideal: 53% of 13 year old girls are unhappy with their bodies. That number increases to 78% by age 17. The most telling statistic of all: American teenagers spend 31 hours a week watching T.V., 17 hours a week listening to music, 3 hours a week watching movies, 4 minutes a week reading magazines and 10 hours a week online. That gives a lot of air time to the warped ideal currently being sold as ‘beauty’. It’s not much of a leap to come to the conclusion that the constant exposure of teenagers to popular media generates and reinforces significant body issues.

The documentary gives us tough stats to deal with – it may take a focus on America, but given the huge amount of American media that Australians consume, these are statistics we need to be thinking and talking about.

So what now? It’s easy to be blown away by this information and increasingly disillusioned with the state of things. But that’s certainly not going to improve the situation for us, or for the young women and girls, or the young men and boys that are inheriting our media-saturated world. The fact of the matter is that the media working against us can be used to work for us, whether it be to create new representations of women and girls who can be role models, who expand our understandings of how a woman and a man might look and behave.

Jennifer Siebel Newsom notes on the ‘Miss Representation’ website that “The media can be an instrument of change”, and it’s up to us, the consumers of media, to make that change. It might be as simple as consuming with a critical eye, starting conversations with your friends about how unrealistic the images used in advertising are. It might be having a conversation with a young woman or a young man that you know about what a real role model is, and who the really interesting and significant folk are, the ones that aren’t selling us perfume or holidays. It might be challenging yourself to step away from the magazine that makes you feel insecure or like you’re failing to be good enough. It might be a more active role in advocating for change in advertising: making use of the #notbuyingit tag like the ‘Miss Representation’ website suggests, along with a conversation starter kit, a houseparty, or a letter (you can visit http://therepresentationproject.org for ideas).

The important thing for me, as a feminist in Armidale in 2013 is that I have the ability to make my own contribution to media representation. I have the Nucleus to write for, and the UNEWS crew to share thoughts with and ask questions of. More talk is better than less in a world where we are the users of media and have the ability to demand that changes are made. So here’s to the next year of UNEWS awesomeness with Kate and Hanna at the helm for an exciting 2014.

 

30pictureschallenge: Day 2

www.toothpastefordinner.com

for a long time i believed fervently that i was a night-owl. perhaps because of my thing with owls. perhaps because i thought that was a thing that writers did, the staying up late and getting whimsical about their thoughts. it may very well be that this is true, the writers i idolised early on were artists, living artistic lives.

what i have realised over time is that i don't always do my best writing at night. sometimes, yes. if i'm wanting to write an angsty piece then a bit of mood music and a glass of whisky never goes astray. and there's a place in my writing life for this sort of thing; it's important to have balance, and not write sensible things every time i sit to write.

but truthfully, writing during the day, and in fact, in the morning, tends to be more sensible, believable, sellable... readable anyhow. morning time is a time to digest the news (everything seems less depressing in the light of day, even tony abbott), it is a time to be stimulated by the world at large, be it through the reading of a blog or an article online, even ones you disagree with.

some of my biggest thoughts pop into my brain in the morning time. i write copious notes to myself in the morning, which i then attempt to make something of when i return to them after work and have to start on the business of essay writing and thinking.

i've discovered i'm a morning person. i'm not even embarrassed. i'm thinking of starting taking a morning walk. yep. i'm that guy.

so the answer is yes. i do want to be alone, but not necessarily sleepy, for the first few hours of the day. yes thankyou please.

30pictureschallenge: preamble

i promised i'd do it, and so i'm doin' it. i've picked 30 images and will be using one each day as a prompt for some words. i have a feeling this writing will be a little unfocused and whimsical, to balance out the more serious writing i am doing for my essay, for the paper, and for feminism friday.

the words accompanying may or not be very wordy, depending entirely on what i want to do that day.

i'm starting on monday so i can be a book nerd over the weekend and study the heck out of some feminism.

if you're reading along, thanks. if you don't wanna and you aren't gonna, that's fine too.

#30daychallenge Day 30: highs and lows of this month

this month has been one of those months where everything happens. there's been a bit of a run of bad things this week, but i'd prefer to keep them to myself- the people who need to know have my list.

i've been mentally preparing for this post the last few days, but today it doesn't seem right to write another bullet-pointed expose into my life. i've been thinking a lot of my online life vs. my real time life, and how well someone who is connected to me online actually knows me.

i've been thinking about this in part because my ex observed to me in an email on the weekend that it looks like things are going really well for me. they are, in the grand scheme, but it really drives the fact home to me that my Facebook life (and even my blog life) are really not representative of a whole life. you can't read between the lines and know everything about me from these things. the real life friends have sat down with me over coffee, wine, beer, breakfast and talked to me. asked me questions. listened to my wandering rantings.

 it makes me wonder though, just what place angst has on the internet. i certainly don't go out of my way to read it, and try not to write it anymore than necessary; angst balanced out with humour is probably the most acceptable form, i think. tavi gevinson (yep, her) talked in her opera house appearance about how negative emotions are glorified as a creative force, and how she struggled with creating anything at all when she was having some personal battles. i think she's right, in the face of all my processes. it's harder to write the sort of thing a person might like to read when your heart is very very heavy.

how to be a writer, and explore the scope of humanity, without putting you all off with ALL of the feelings?

how to be an online presence, a Facebook bookfacer, and be honest? it's weird. it's very weird.

i have enjoyed putting myself through this 30 day challenge, for everywhere i go it seems the advice for writers from other more successful writers is to write every day. so write i have, and have been rewarded with your interest. thanks for reading, for dropping by, for your comments. that's certainly been one of the highs of this month.

big love to all.

#30daychallenge Day 29: Goals for the next 30 days

stay alive, that's my main goal.

writing-wise though, i think i am setting myself another 30 day challenge. because of Pinterest, i have a lot of images saved that i feel will inspire me to write. so i have set myself up a list, which means that each day i will have a visual prompt on which to write- so from this 30 day text-centric theme to something different.

in early november i am starting an e-course to improve my blog, and i'm sure you all will see some of the results of that.

besides these goals, i aim to be better prepared with blog-strategy; to schedule posts, to stick to my suggested themes, and to follow up on the bits and pieces i've intended to write and haven't gotten to yet.

how am i doing with this challenge? have you read something that's made you think, giggle, roll your eyes? which bits lately have been your favourite bits? which subjects do you want to see more of, and which subjects less?

don't be shy, let me know- it's the help i'm asking for to get better at this whole business.

#30daychallenge day 25: someone who fascinates me, and why.

i've mentioned her a few times and i think now is the perfect opportunity to talk about it.

tavi gevinson.

i came across her TED talk probably 3 months ago. i was home sick with ridiculous headaches that have been almost-but-not-quite chronic (seems that it's my ribs, folks- in case you wondered), and looking for a bit of meaning to life. naturally, TED talks. my lovely mum had given me an early birthday/thanks for housesitting present of an iPad, which is something i'd secretly wanted for quite some time, but could never quite justify buying. so yay! lucky me. with it came my discovery of all sorts of apps i never ran on my iPhone due to space, but iPad is all spacious inside... so we find ourselves at TED talks.

for anyone not in the know (to continue on this aside... we will circle round to tavi, i promise) TED talks are about inspiring people in their field making a speech and flashing a few powerpoint slides when relevant. what i like to do is put one on when i'm doing a menial thing, like organising my wardrobe (why is it that i have to do this once a day lately? why??) or alphabetising my books (just kidding; i use the Dewey system) or painting my nails or some such. so i get to listen and learn and be inspired and also, in theory, see my floor again at some point.

so tavi's talk came up under one of the feminism searches i did, and here it is:



she's young and articulate and has used silly powerpoint slides to be self-depricating. and i like that.

naturally, the next point of contact is rookiemag.com. rookie blows my mind on a regular basis because there is just so. much. content, it's carefully managed and high quality in a way that's not smooth but holds a lot of integrity. everytime i read it, i think 'why on earth did i have to grow up 10 years earlier?' - not that i'd like to go back to being a teenager, but for the one time i had to be one, i wish i'd had this to read. i am going to make my stepsister get into it, although she'll probably roll her eyes at me. that's ok.

the content covers so many points and intricacies of a teenage life that i wonder how heavily into mindmaps the team gets in order to pull this off so perfectly. recent favourites posts include:

• movies about obsession
• this awesome review of people, in general; everyone picks one
• this confessional piece about sneaking out

as time wore on and i read more rookie content and interviews with tavi about her motivation and creative processes, the more admiration i had for her. this is a woman with a seriously clever head on her shoulders, but what's more amazing (and i guess also a little sad) is just how revolutionary rookie is, as a very concept. why is it that something made by young women for young women which gives us the depth of character we deserve, as well as speaking to us with respect, in a way that makes us feel known, normal, and supported, is such an amazing thing? why has a young woman speaking up filled me with such hero-worship type feelings?

we need more of it, and we need it yesterday. gradually, bit by bit, this is something i try to address in my own work. not so much that every single thing needs to be picked apart from a feminist standpoint (although listen, between you and me it probably does), but to start being aware. particularly, the stories we're being told as women, through media, are not the only stories out there. that we can create our own stories, and we damn well should. 

rookie, and tavi, are feminist in a way that everyone should be feminist. there is a simple statement there, and it's that feminism is a no-brainer. that being a woman looks different for every.single.woman on the planet. that women are never just one thing; that women are creative, passionate, intelligent, clever, smart beings who make up half the world. 

i'm fascinated by tavi because she is a great many things. her first blog, style rookie, is her younger self and her relationship to fashion, which is just as interesting to read. you can be a feminist and be interested in clothing (i have struggled with this one in the past, back when i was a theoretical feminist fueled by university study, and not a feminist living in the real world who loves clothes), you can be a woman and not care about clothes at all, because you're really into the environment. or, you can care about clothes, and the environment, and asylum seekers, and what other people think of you, (even when you know you shouldn't).

i was lucky enough to see tavi speak in august; she did a talk at the opera house and i went along. it was a special experience made more special by the others i was there with. so many amazing, individual young women. i people-watched and internally raised my eyebrows at some of the outfits until i realised just how great it was that these people didn't look like they walked out of cosmo, and were rocking awesome floral-thrifted-sparkly clothing in the light of day, outside their rooms. the shoes! the leopard print! the fringes! the flower crowns! the red lips! the mixed prints! the accessories! the instagrammin'! the floral cotton dresses! the thick framed glasses! the fur hats and peter pan collars! the dr martens! the general lack of men! the eyeliner and high-waisted things!

tavi gevinson did that - just by being a fashion blogger. it was a physical manifestation of one woman's words and their impact on other young women looking for something telling them it's ok to be different- in fact, it's pretty awesome that we all are.

you can see her full talk at the opera house here, or you can read up on her message for this tour of australia she made according to Pip Lincolne's take on her Melbourne visit. i have to agree with Pip, and observe that my take-away point was really if you have something to say, you should say it- even if someone else has already said it, or heaps of people already have. it's about the way you are saying it that makes it creative and original, because everyone's backgrounds are different. tavi talked a lot about fangirling, and what a valuable role it plays in our creative selves. it's ok to love something obsessively, just like it's ok to get to a point where you want to kill your idols (not literally kids; she's not into murderousness) and create something different. 

i've been thinking a lot about my own creative history and am currently sifting my way through over 20 journals from my teenage time. i'd forgotten just how many unrequited feelings i felt at that time of my life, and it makes me nostalgic and in awe of the sheer amount of poetry i churned out. i also painted, drew and collaged. i was marvelling the other day to someone about the days when i used to have spare time (like school), and wondering what i did. now i know. i wrote all my angst to death, but in a good way.

i will continue to be fascinated by tavi, because she is articulate and wonderful, and i'm interested to see what happens next, for the sheer knowledge that so much about my life happened after highschool. she is going to be even more of a force to be reckoned with, and she continues to inspire me every day.

selfie on instagram, from which i get serious spectacles envy.

an instagram of food and shoes- she is @tavitulle on instagram, and awesome to follow.

The physical version of the best parts of web content from the first year of rookiemag.com

The famous bow-on-head combo from fashion week. Apparently it sucked to sit behind her.

 

#30daychallenge Day 15: your favourite blogs*

*i've amended this - it called for my favourite tumblr sites, but i am new to tumblr and really haven't put much energy into it yet. it's like twitter for me - can see why it could be cool, but haven't gotten there quite yet. it's not like i don't have plenty of social media in my life already... what with all the facebookin, pinterestin, instagrammin, bloggin etc.

Let me start off by observing that I'm relatively new to being a reader of blogs, despite having written blogs for about 3 years. In Whistler it was all I could do to find the time to write something, whack a picture with it and hit 'publish'. Now, I'm studying and working full time and I still have that feeling slightly. However I get around this by following my favourite blogs on Facebook (this is why I have started my own Facebook page for my blog) and so I can see what all these folk are writing and when a title of interest pops up on my newsfeed, I can check it out. Alternatively, Z of 'Sometimes Z takes pictures' has this article with helpful suggestions.

But I will share a few blogs that I follow on the regular, just so you get an idea of what sort of stuff is inspiring me these days:

1. Her Library Adventures: this blog, written by Sophie for the past few years, was something I found while researching thrift blogs before starting on something for Re-Use-It Centre/ Whistler Is Awesome (FYI: this is my favourite blog from that time in my life). Sophie is now based in QLD, but has a lovely thrift/vintage/crafty vibe to her blog, with a bit of depth and careful thought. Recently, there's a lot of baby-themed things going on, but that's because she's due in less than a month, so I can forgive her, mainly because it's just so lovely and she's just so happy about it. Her 'Mid-Week Thrifting' section from a while back when she lived in VIC was always one of my favourites... it got my thrifting cravings going!

2. Another lifestyle blog I can't resist is Pip Lincolne's Meet Me At Mikes, which I've organised to come straight to my inbox, because I like to read it off my iPad in the morning when I have breakfast. Pip tends to offer commentary on all kinds of things (life & politics & culture & DIY & general awesomeness happening around the place), but not in a particularly pushy way, which is just the right vibe for breakfast time. She is also the author of several very lovely craft and project type books, and used to run the store called Meet Me at Mikes on Brunswick Street in Fitzroy, which I discovered once and promptly forgot about (fail). Go and have an explore of her site - you won't regret it! 

3. Fiending for Hope is more on the feminist side of the spectrum; Britni is extremely eloquent on her opinions on things that I haven't figured out yet, which I find to be helpful whether or not I actually agree with her (because I'm a mature adult and don't get freaked out by ideas different from my own). Go here for discussions on everything from why Miley Cyrus's new song is not ok to the work she's doing with Hollaback! Boston (another cool blog/organisation to get into). Be warned though, Britni does tend to discuss things that aren't always so nice to read about, like rape, and this blog does actually come with a trigger warning, which is a kind way of letting us know this.

4. I may possibly have mentioned how I feel about Tavi Gevinson (I'm working on a loved-up blog about her talk at the Opera House earlier this month) but you really should check out her online magazine, Rookie. Just awesomeness. I wish I'd had this blog at my disposal when I was a teenager. Lucky I had Radiohead, that's all I'll say. Favourite posts I've read lately include decorating your room like a tv show or movie and this one about reunions and a lot lot lot more. One of my favourite parts of this website is the random tags section in the bottom righthand corner... there's so much content on this website that it can keep you occupied for hours. I just read this one about body acceptance today, and it's making me want to write a post of my own. In conclusion: rookie.

5. I've been partaking in a 30 day thrifting challenge this month, and while I'm waiting to the end of the month to do my write-up, Modern Girls in Vintage Pearls have been covering each day. It's great, and weirdly addictive, and I think I have spent more money on thrift stores this month than many other months combined, all in the name of this challenge (also, summer is nearly here! and thrifting is cheaper than regular shopping! and other such excuses!). I love her Op-Shop love post best so far.

That's enough for now, but I'm always looking for more things to read (while trying desperately not to get overwhelmed by the sheer quantity of words out there in the world). If you, dear readers, come across anything you think I might like, by all means, send it my way!

treasure: memoir: snowboarding as therapy

" I was twenty-three when I moved to Whistler in British Columbia, Canada. I moved on little more than a whim and a vague sense of the urgency to change what had become dangerously apathetic circumstances. My younger brothers had both spent time in that part of the world and encouraged me to check it out. I went there with plans for a six-month holiday. I stayed for three years. I have to say, it was the best thing I’ve ever done in my life. I learned to snowboard."

You can head over to lipmag to read the full piece here.

I really enjoyed getting my act together to write this piece, and hope to start work on a few more in coming months. If you guys have any feedback or suggestions on what I should write about, let me know however which way you wanna.

Thanks for reading.

treasure: balance and the whatnot

I start back at uni this week. I haven't studied since I finished my BA in 2007, and many things have happened since those good old days. Isn't it funny how each second you live is going to become one of those good old days, eventually?

It's that thought that puts things in a form of perspective for me; it also makes me more appreciative of right now, this time of my life where I remake all my plans again. 

There's a lot going on; the more I write, the more I find I have to say. I have the opposite of writers block; I have writer's panic. The momentum of the past week has been gratifying and inspiring, but I realised tonight when I didn't want to study because I wanted to write (granted, introductory chapters to accounting textbooks don't tend to glue one's eyes to the page) that I have to calm the fuck down. I actually don't have to choose; I can do all of the things.

ALL OF THE THINGS!!

Seeing as I've started on a path of sorts with my writing, I'd like to keep putting things out there that people want to read. I'd also like to study so I am much more employable as someone who can take all their well-meant ideas and turn them into actions. I'd like to work in the non-profit sector eventually, with other passionate people. I'd like my writing to be informed by life experience, always. 

Please, swing me a comment from time to time and let me know how I'm going with that.

I'll try not to blog about accounting.

treasure: the good times, the better times

Can I just offer up a little "yikes, sorry!" for the months of silence? I've been reading back to myself the type of writing I was doing this time last year, and for the year before that, and I feel a little wistful and disappointed in myself for dropping the blog-ball (it's not really a bouncy ball, more a slightly slippery one with a mind of its own).

I'm quite proud of the various bits of nonsense I posted here while I was in Whistler last year and for the years before that. I guess Life As Vacation lent itself a lot more easily to blogging, but perhaps that's not an excuse. I'd like to think I still have some things to say, but sadly just now I do not know what they might be. I have a few more hurdles to jump, like the not being incredibly angry that things didn't work out how I wanted hurdle (I seem to have to battle with this hurdle once every year or so), as well as the make peace with the situation and be patient while you set yourself up for something more exciting hurdle.

Patience is a virtue I hear, (or a vulture, depending on what your subconscious makes your fingers type) which is a struggle for the not-particularly-virtuous (that would be me). I just want to go somewhere, and soon. Honestly I really would be running to escape my head, and the funny thing about the head is, it's attached to the body (traditionally, anyway) and so no matter where I go, or how I get there, there my head will be when I arrive.

So I'll bide my time, save my pennies and hope that by the time I do hit the road, I'm not so caught up in myself that I miss the view, the people sitting next to me, the myriad of funny things that make for good travel writing. This is the goal.

More to come on plans and wishes. And just generally, more to come.

#fmsphotoadaynovember 8. something you do every day

no photo for this one: fallen off the instagramwagon a little bit, and in fact the blogging wagon, again. but don't worry & never fear, for i'm on it.

something i do every day is to lament the general lack of interest of my creative brain in stuff and things. i've loved writing blogs here over the past few years, and i just don't seem to be channeling that need to communicate and create, to write things that make me feel less alone in the world. i wonder, is it working full time? is it having my boyfriend here to tell all my things to, whenever i feel the need? i do find joy in works, in that i love to reflect upon the things i know, and the parts of my life, and the spaces all around, where other things might be or have been.

more to the point, something i do every day is to lament my lack of communication with my global family, the loves of my life who are scattered here there and about the place. i've started writing letters, and i think that i can be happy with that as a start. sending little pieces of homemade hand-written love across the world.


this is another thing i do every day:

secret: the magic that happens when you step out of your bubble into someone else's

i've been out of the country the last week. down in the good ol' usa, soaking up the culture, chilling with some awesome folk (some related, some i just wanted to marry) and having my 6-monthly profound realization about myself and my life.

i've been writing in my journal a lot. i felt like i might put a little of it out there. i will preface it all by saying i am drinking beer at 11am, and Frightened Rabbit is playing as my soundtrack(y'all need to listen to them, specially 'backwards walk' and 'old old fashioned').

i don't think i've posted poetry before, but i do write a lot of it, so here goes:

23 november:

something about traveling always makes me want to write. i must confess i don't feel as capable of literary eloquence as i used to.

no matter how many times i do the drive between whis and vancouver, it still hurts me a little bit, it's so beautiful. i could wax lyrical about the power of nature and the insignificance of man, there is grandeur in this way of life etc... maybe there would be music playing; orchestras and soundscapes...

truthfully i am a collector of beautiful things and this view is just fucking beautiful.

it makes me think though, of how all things and people have their perfection, and how perfection is just so subjective. makes me realize that hey, even i might have moments of perfection. maybe i should occasionally give myself a break, take a breath and kick back, ignore the impulse to explain and excuse myself for everything i do, say or think.

of course it's pretty easy to be this enlightened with such a view.

nov 25

what i am thankful for:

my health

my arms and legs

my family

the open-endedness of all this

my optimism when it comes to love

my patience

my middle class white heritage giving me the chance to spend time on this self-indulgent bullshit.

the chance to move on from what i've managed to learn. the chance to learn more.

and also, i am thankful for turkey, and microbrewery beers.

nov 26

shouldn't

in a sleepy Oregon town

and decisions days away.

America, all your money looks the same

you fools

(me with my handful of dollar bills)

making shapes out of hands,

my accent stripping me bare

in bars where

i'm a novelty

(i had forgotten how strange i sound)

and to my ears, America,

you are anything but.

jokes landing me in the middle of

accepted and nowhere.

i ache from participating;

soccer, Thanksgiving, movies in bed

with longlost cousinfriend

a kindred spirit; her buttons also undone

and lost altogether

the world pushes us,

we push the world

(and i demand: be. less. demanding.)

i pin on my lost cause label

and wander the town.

shouldn't,

but you're either late or my watch

runs early, in a sleepy Oregon town.

nov26

nothing on me.

you're sugary sweet

my brain has you dead and run over

before i even know how you taste.

so i'll take what i've got

and spread it helplessly across the countless

(pages)

like

hands up helpless, like

the endearingly-put shrug of someone

focused on those other than themselves.

the lesson learned is selfishness

spelled F.U.C.K Y.O.U.

with enthusiasm.

you're drunk and dancing

and the band has a banjo playing

we're all drunk and filled with lies

i'm aiming for clever and sophisticated

even charming

but just barely pulling off wasted

and you're all i ever wanted

so the filler is me learning the waltz,

and

in my memory it's slow motion

and i look happy and beautiful

and yeah

nothing hurts in the morning.

and yeah

nothing that small could ever hurt me.

nov 27, A.M.

the year becomes a little blurry 'round this

point, the purpose and

the step-by-step of progress

smudged and inky, held up as mess

in your little hands.

the people you meet,

and their plans for themselves, in a broader

less, or more sense

the people you've met

and their plans

stack up quickly and quietly

a peaceful and imposing threat towards

your disorganized state-

your own stacks of papers

getting blown about

your careful filing system

emptied of its alphabet.

28 NOV, PM

i'm not made of stone, nor apology

and i might stumble a little

over the words, and the spelling

or the delivery (i cleared my throat, but nothing),

you stand careful and motionless

i stand and

aim just shy of forgiveness

my eyes drawn to yours just that little bit

i'm not made of stone,

and you my friend are a quiet and perfect trifecta

can we be liars together, making a whole

alphabet of exceptions?

if you would say yes

just the once

i would be able, more than able

to quit with the futureless daydreaming

to settle myself, write the novel.