I feel scattered.  My thoughts, feelings and actions in the past month have just been all over the proverbial map, although somewhat literally.  The Move is coming soon.  Two months and a week.  Movement will soon begin too with a kicking baby.  It is a time of most amazing change, all of which excites me to no end.  But I am scared.  The life I've created in Oregon (not to imply it is separate from life before Oregon) has been transforming in so many ways and we are about to uproot it.  I remember telling my dad before I left Jersey that the only reason I was able to do it was because I had such strong roots.  And I felt like if I would have stayed in Jersey my roots would have grown shallow and rotten.  SO I picked up and moved to Oregon, land of trees, rivers, desert (yes, almost all of Eastern Oregon is high desert), Ocean and space.  Land of freedom without the rat race.  Land of opportunity without strings.  Land of eternal optimism and bountiful rain.  Strangely enough, I think my time in Oregon has hardened me more than any time I spent in Jersey.  Because when I got to Oregon life caught up to me.  I could not escape death, disaster and horrible people no matter how far away I went.  New Jersey is not full of horrible people, but everybody is very much in your space, and sometimes that makes them do horrible things.  In Oregon I have had time and space to face myself.  And for a while, I did not like what I was seeing.  Stupid choices and near sightedness stared back at me in the mirror.  Self-absorption masked by humor and false happiness; denial of grief and anger; belief in myself as an entity instead of a person.  It is still a miracle to me that laura stuck by for so long.

But the last 3 years have been different.  I have written previously about facing my demons and accepting my anger and stress and fear.  I have embraced the things I taught myself to believe so that they are no longer part of me.  THEY ARE ME.  And through all of this I have learned to love myself.  Truly. 

Next I will become a father.

There are times when my job really sucks.  I have never been one to complain about work.  I believe that for the most part the world has enough people who complain, let alone about their jobs, so I try to avoid complaining all together.  When it comes to work, I have always felt that to a large extent we choose what we do to earn money, and once we make that choice it's time to do your best and don't complain about it.

But the last 2 weeks have really sucked.  The hard part about this is that often times my job sucks when I am doing my best at it. 

I do very emotional work.  Emotions are the foundation of what I do.  In my last post I wrote about allowing myself to fully feel anger, and in my work I try to help others experience their own feelings.  I love my job and have truly felt blessed over the last 4 years because on a day-to-day basis I love going to work.  And even in the last 2 weeks, I have loved going to work.  But there are times when helping others experience their feelings hurts.  It hurts them and it hurts me.  I've always been able to leave my work at the "office".  I don't vent much because somewhere in my psyche I have the ability to keep my professional experiences seperate from my personal life when I feel the intersection of the two may be hazardous.  In the cases when I do need to vent, a walk with Tubbs or a quick sweat will work very efficiently. 

But the last 2 weeks have been a struggle.  My personal life has been stressful as a result of our impending change of venue, and I have begun to feel anxiety in a way I never have before.  And adding fuel to the fire, the folks I help at work have been experiencing tremendous loads of emotional duress and trauma. 

Anxiety is really a new feeling for me.  I know what it means to be anxious, I have felt nervous, but lately I have a general feel of anxiety most of the day.  I feel honestly that the major reason I am feeling this is that for the first time in my life, I am allowing myself to experience true anxiety.  And ironically enough, it feels good.  Death has taught me to live.  And living means feeling, and being my true self.  I spoke to some kids about that today.  Being your true self means allowing yourself to feel emotions as they come, becoming immersed in those emotions, learning the intircacies of them, and then learning from them. 

It has been several weeks since I have written anything.  I have always been this way.  I go through periods when I am unable to get my thoughts straight enough to extract them from my head.  During these periods my heart's feelings take over and I let myself feel everything.  I believe this is my own survival mechanism.  I have tried to take control of my personal survivalist evolution since my mom died.  They taught me in Anthropology classes that one of the major factors that separates us from most other mammals is our brain size.  Opposable thumbs, a straight spine, and a shifting pelvis started us on our way out of Africa and Asia, but the brain gave us the chance for exponential growth and earth "control".

Right after my mom died my heart took over.  I overthought things to the point of pure headfucks and thus allowed my heart to take over.  I have always been sensitive but this brought me into hypersensitivity.  It took me some time to channel this.  It has taken me 10 years to fully allow myself to feel angry, and I'm sure it will take me another 10 to learn how to express my anger enough to allow others to understand it.  Joy , happiness, confusion, sadness, depression I have come close to mastery since Jon died.  Star Wars is a great movie for so many reasons, but perhaps no reason is so relevant as Yoda telling Luke that fear leads to anger, and anger leads to hatred.  My evolution in learning to express my anger is based in the practice of expressing fear.  These days my fear feels largely impersonal.  I fear for others, but rarely for myself.

No fear is more prevalent to me than the fear that humans love to suppress their anger.  We are trained to do this, and it is incredibly counterproductive. 

What started as a plan many moons ago for a brief weekend in San Francisco turned into 4 days of pure California bliss.  The trip started with a short slant over to Medford to spend the night with Casey and Sage and the dogs.  Good night. 

We slept late and stopped in at the Ashland Co-op (is there a nicer coop anywhere in the world?) for some good food for the road.  We took off near noon and headed into California.  Rain in Oregon and over Siskiyou Pass, and within 40 miles we were in Cali sunshine.  We took our time getting to the bay area, and finally arrived at the Fuscos dinnertime.  It was our first time meeting Obadiah and he was such a treat to be with.  We had a rockin jam session with Obadiah (2 y.o.) on drums, Laura on Xylophone, Larry on Recorder, Jeremy on Harmonica, and me on Shaker Bell.  It was TRUE indeed!

While I love to be able to travel without a purpose, this trip definitely had some purpose.  The initial motive for the trip was to meet Jeremy in San Fran to see him off on his worldwide journey.  This plan was made sometime last summer.  Equally as motivating was seeing the Fuscos, who we had not seen since Jon's funeral more than 2 years ago.  A baby and many moons had passed since that time, so spending time with them was so warm.  Finally, we got to see Adam and Jen on the west coast, nearly a year after they made their move to San Fran. 

The bonuses of this trip were many.  Considering our purpose fully realized, we got to howl at the full moon, enjoy the Chinese New Year parade in Chinatown (a block from our hotel) eat some amazing food, play in Golden Gate Park, meet a new friend, take a beautiful drive up the Northern California/Oregon coast, and spend some serious quality time with amazing family.

As we were driving up the Cali coast through the Redwoods, I was reminded of why I moved to Oregon in the first place.  This weekend was such a quintissential left coast experience, and I was temporarily reflectively saddened by our impending move.  But more than anything, I felt elated and incredibly blessed to know such special people and to be able to share wonderfully intimate moments in beautiful places with them.

When we got to Bandon, which is about 20 minutes from home, I got pulled over for speeding in a notorious speed trap that I am always either cognizant of or reminded of by Laura.  I knew as soon as I saw the cop that I was getting pulled over.  I told him I had no legal reason for speeding and that I drive through Bandon often and that I was well aware of what the speed limit was.  He came back to the car and issued a warning, saying, "You were honest with me and didn't try to make an excuse and that goes a long way with me".

I'm not sure I could think of a better way to end the trip...

As Long As We can Distract You With Blondes

We will continue to destroy them with Bombs

Watch the TV and Read The Papers

The Important News Will Be Hidden With Vapors

Smell the Fumes and Inhale the Scents

And Allow us to Pulverize the Dissidents

We'll Distract You with the uninteresting Blondes

While We Destroy Them with our Noxious Bombs

Once in A while we'll give a false account

Of Vicious Deaths of absurd amounts

Place the blame on each other without taking recourse

Cause the only answer is more and more force

Democratize nations with bullets and shells

Build belief at home that our policy sells

We'll Distract You with Blondes

While we End Life with Bombs

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Good stuff

The denizens I have written about recently profit and succeed on one simple premise.  They count on the fact that We Don't Care.

They trust that we don't care about the effects of our day to day actions.

They trust that we don't care about the people and places affected by our decisions.

They trust that we don't care how the products we purchase make it to the shelves of the store.

They trust that we don't care how the products are created in the first place.

They trust that we don't care about the future.

They trust that we don't care about the present.

They trust that we don't care about the past.

They trust that we don't care about each other.

They trust that we don't care about ourselves.

They trust that we are afraid.  They depend on our fear.

Are they right?

Last night Laura and I watched Michael Franti's documentary, I Know I'm Not Alone.  Michael Franti is a musical activist who is the lead in the band Spearhead.  The documentary is about a trip he and his crew took to the Middle East in the midst of the war (wait, technically I believe it was after the "Mission was Accomplished...") to see what life was like in Baghdad, Palestine and Israel.  The film is musically wonderful (as all of his music is) and really touches some interesting nerves.  I don't want to write about it too much because I want to encourage you to rent it and watch it. 

I think a great deal about what I can do to spread the word of peace and I constantly find my head banging up against a brick wall.  I live peacefully, I teach kids to resolve conflicts without fighting, but what am I doing to change the world on my own time??? 

One of the thoughts I keep having is that the movement of peace in this country is a grassroots effort.  We have to talk to each other and we have to assert to ourselves that we do in fact believe in peace.  One of the interviews in the movie focuses on a young man who had been a member of the Israeli army who is now speaking out against the army's policies and he said that the hardest thing he had to do to start speaking out was to face himself in the mirror.  Once he was able to do that, the speaking part was easy.

I have felt this and it really hit home for me when he said that.  I have faced myself many times, but my conscious (note, not my conscience) has defeated me and kept me from speaking out in the name of peace.  I have always been afraid of what I would be labeled or how I would be seen if I spoke to loudly.  There is still a piece of that when I look in the mirror, and I still have not been able to overcome my battle to speak my words to strangers.  But if you are reading this, it means that you care  (I think) about what I have to say, and so it is to you that I am speaking now.  Let's start with the people who care about me and see where it goes.

I believe in peace.  I believe that love is the only answer to the world's problems.  I believe one act of violence is equal to one million acts of violence, no matter who the perpetrator is.  I believe that responding to violence with violence is not only utterly and completely inane, but is also a horrible example to the children of this world. I see this every day at school.  (Ready for a jump?).  I believe that the so-called political leaders of this world are 100% self-serving to the extent that they create laws that will benefit themselves with total disregard for the common good.  They are the worst of Darwin's theory.  I believe that if you handed George W. Bush a gun and asked him to go to Baghdad he would flee to Canada and hide behind a bottle of whiskey.  And then he would point the gun at me and send me. 

I believe that you and I can make a difference.  I will write frequently about the importance of voting with your money.  I will not shop at Walmart.  They treat their workers like garbage and make a huge profit at the expense of their customers (just because you are getting cheap products does not mean you are not paying for them!).  I will not drive unnecessarily.  I will not buy food that is grown using conventional agriculture because farmers using these techniques (re: chemicals, exploiting cheap labor, receiving government subsidies, polluting waterways) are destroying the world many acres at a time.  Organic food is more expensive, but when you buy the cheaper alternative you are paying with your life and the lives of others.  I will not complain.  I will act. I will speak out against injustice.  I will not allow myself to be exploited for another's profit.  I will love my friends and my enemies unconditionally because that is the only way to peace.  I will hope, pray and believe that you will join me. 

Laura just told me that she has confirmation that the strange lines of cloud we saw in the sky the other night were chemical trails released from planes.  Apparently the state of Oregon has agreed to allow the federal government to test their ability to change the weather over the skies of beautiful Oregon. 

I remember when we were kids living in dirty Jersey they would spray over our communities with chemicals such as arsenic and DDT to make sure that we weren't inconvenienced by too many mosquitoes or spots on our fruits and vegetables.  I remember playing outside with friends watching the planed fly above us.  Our trusted elected leaders told us not to worry.  The fear of mosquitoes was much stronger than the need to understand the consequences of the spray.

When I voted in the most recent election I did not check a box that said "It is OK to allow the government to experiment on me".  I also mixed the one that said "I have no problem with particles of carcinogenic chemicals being dropped form the sky".  I'd rather choose my own carcinogens.

Shooting from the hip

With a loaded clip

Aiming for the sky

Will I get that high?

The best I can do

Is entertain you

With words that rhyme

Am I keeping time?

My thoughts feel unclear

Though my heart is near

If the truth is told

Can I still get old?

At times I do feel sad

Then it turns to mad

But the source of grief

Is like a leaf

Veins in each direction

No need for correction

Just sit with it a while

And try to crack a smile