These days

So going a little looney these days.  I have not been smoking and have had to deal with a bit of stress over the past few months; so it has been a struggle. 

I saved my dog.

I am losing myself.  Whoever, that is.

Been studying Zen

Trying,

And failing.

Pissing off people at work,

And at home...always at home.

My kids save my existence everyday.

I would just be a puff of smoke on the wind

If they didn't remind me everyday

Saying, "Daddy, you're the best."

I’ve changed my ways a little; I cannot now
Run with you in the evenings along the shore,
Except in a kind of dream; and you, if you dream a moment,
You see me there.

So leave awhile the paw-marks on the front door
Where I used to scratch to go out or in,
And you’d soon open; leave on the kitchen floor
The marks of my drinking-pan.

I cannot lie by your fire as I used to do
On the warm stone,
Nor at the foot of your bed; no, all the night through
I lie alone.

But your kind thought has laid me less than six feet
Outside your window where firelight so often plays,
And where you sit to read—and I fear often grieving for me—
Every night your lamplight lies on my place.

You, man and woman, live so long, it is hard
To think of you ever dying
A little dog would get tired, living so long.
I hope than when you are lying

Under the ground like me your lives will appear
As good and joyful as mine.
No, dear, that’s too much hope: you are not so well cared for
As I have been.

And never have known the passionate undivided
Fidelities that I knew.
Your minds are perhaps too active, too many-sided… .
But to me you were true.

You were never masters, but friends. I was your friend.
I loved you well, and was loved. Deep love endures
To the end and far past the end. If this is my end,
I am not lonely. I am not afraid. I am still yours.


Robinson Jeffers, 1941

From Childhood's Hour

“From childhood’s hour I have not been
As others were; I have not seen
As others saw; I could not bring
My passions from a common spring.
From the same source I have not taken
My sorrow; I could not awaken
My heart to joy at the same tone;
And all I loved, I loved alone.”

—	Edgar Allan Poe

Me.

I love books. 
I love to talk about books.
I think a little too deeply for my own good sometimes.
My brain goes so fast and so far beyond what I am able to control sometimes.
I like old logs, stumps,  rotten old abandoned houses, old concrete walls covered in moss and lichen.
I love cats....and dogs but I am more of a cat kind of person.  I am good with other peoples dogs.
I think about old bones, half exposed in the brush somewhere.  It doesn't matter whether it is human or animal.  I like finding these and trying to tell their story.
I like classical music.
I like alternative and heavy metal music.
Beethoven is my favorite.
I like electronic, ambient, and dub step, too.
I like old woodpiles, and being alone somewhere far away at dusk.
I am meloncholy; sometimes to the extreme.
I love movies and love to talk about a really good one that makes me think.
I love the smell of fresh turned dirt in the spring, the sound of frogs, and the smell and sounds of a good swamp.
And oh do I love insects, bugs, and yeah even spiders.
I grew up with fish and water everywhere so it is in my blood and I love it.
I like to sit somewhere and see what happens; anywhere. 
I think my favorite places to sit are in a natural setting.  I like to just be quiet and see what lives there.
Although, I also like to find little ecosystems in the middle of cities and see what lives there.
I love the little things that make up our world.
The ocean is my place to re-set to zero.  I want to live there.  Not some sunny beach but the Pacific Northwest Coast.
I love the night sky but loathe it too.  It hurts my brain trying to figure out what is out there.  I want to know.
I practice Zen Buddhism and fail everyday.
I know that if I did not have my children I would end it all.  I love them more than anything that exists.
I am lonely but not very social and am awkward.  I try to be a nice guy.  I treat people the way I want to be treated but I don't always want to. 
Sometimes I don't want to talk and there is no reason
I love motorcyles...everything about them.  Tattoos as well.
I just put flowers on my parents grave and cried for an hour.  I haven't done that in a long time.
People like me for some reason that I don't understand.  I don't get it.
I know all these things but do not know myself.  Go figure.

Forgive the grammar.....and the punctuation.

What do you know? What can you do? The only thing I have ever been able to do without extended knowledge is operate machinery. I can sit in any machine you put me in and within a few hours work it like a pro; in some cases better than those that have done it for years. I can sit in a 58 ton machine and feel it like it is a part of my body. I can feel the slightest vibration even though the entire machine is vibrating all over. I can feel it. I have tried to explain this to people I have trained but they don't get it. I got a job once by telling the interviewer that I don't know how to operate but I know how to feel the machine. I replaced their operator permanently in 6 days; he had been operating this particular machine for 5 years. He was mad. I understand but he couldn't feel the machine. So how does this pertain to a literacy journey? I don't know other than I want more knowledge of the things that interest me. I love some many subjects, and explore so many things in this world and I want to know more. I want to know why mound ants, mound. I want to know why moss grows where it grows. I want to know why we dream; and why we fail. I want to know why a porn star is a porn star. I want to know why everyone thinks I am weird. I want to know why I need to have a job and why we need money.

I think most of all I want to express myself better. I have all these things, ideas, swimming around in my head. I want to know how to calm my brain that is going a thousand miles per hour all the time. There is not enough time for all these things in one day, or a year, or a lifetime.

Maybe, through my college experience, I will find a way. I will find a focus. Perhaps I will meet the right instructor to help me in this journey. I am hoping I can get up the guts to be more sociable with my fellow students; and learn from them. I am hoping for long lasting friendships with like minded people; and even those that are not so like minded. I honestly like to know both sides of any issue or idea.

My response to Kants, "What is Enlightenment?"

This is not an essay on enlightenment but on freedom. Enlightenment differs from freedom in that enlightenment means to let go of our daily issues concerning ourselves and what we want and think we need. Kant may be a well known individual however after a fairly short time I could not help but feel beaten over the head with his ideas on enlightenment. I think he himself is stifling enlightenment by putting more thoughts than are needed into heads already confused by what social freedom is. In many ways I don't think he is enlightened himself by his attitude toward the institutions he is describing.

I believe we as a society expect, as other past and present civilisations have, that our government and ruling parties know best how to attain and keep our freedoms and ways of life. That is where we go wrong.

First gain enlightenment, and with that will come freedom. When as an individual you let go of your expectations, you will let go of your need of governments and religious orders that claim to enrich your way of life.

In his book "Zen Mind, Beginners Mind" Shunryu Suzuki says, "If you seek for freedom you cannot find it."

By saying man is ignorant of his freedoms, or his enlightenment, Kant is himself stifling freedom by suggesting that men/women must attain something more than themselves to be free. Freedom first must come from within. How would you know what you wanted from your governmet, or religious order without knowing yourself first?