Realistic realizations.

Yesterday, I didn't write here.  That means I made it five days into my projected 100 days that I was attempting to write.  Honestly, I didn't even think about it until it was "too late", and I was home late by myself after a night out with a friend, commiserating about our life's recent circumstances.  Quite frankly I came to this conclusion: I can't and shouldn't force myself to write, nor should I feel bad if I can't make it to 100 days consecutive.  Done and done.  Perhaps I can think of a more realistic challenge as not every single day permits a time to sit and write.  As well, oftentimes I find myself frustrated to feel like I'm writing something worthwhile, adding to the stress of the self imposed personal challenge.  This shouldn't be stressful, this should be fun and challenging, but not guilt inducing.  

At least five times each day, a great idea for writing crosses my mind.  However, it's usually at a time, fleeting moments of inspiration, that I cannot immediately stop what I am doing to write down the idea or to even think much further on it than it being an idea at all.  And isn't that what this is all about; simply finding that inspiration in the everyday "normality" that is my life?  I do not need to expand on every single idea I've ever had to write.  I do not need to put into writing any and every life experience I'm having or have had.  What I do need to do is look at life through the eyes and heart as though I intend to share them through writing.  It makes for richer moments, while I'm having certain experiences that trigger the inspiration; somewhere in the vast expanses of my mind, there is a memory being forged, thus being "written" in my life's tale.  Finding that inspiration is far more important than the act of turning it into some form of data to be stored on the internet.

    

Recipe for disaster.

I had a moment yesterday that was the biggest decision that I had made all day: Do I sleep on my couch or do I sleep in my bed?  I literally stood between the two, looking back and forth for minutes, all the while at a true loss for where to lay my tired body.  Ultimately the couch won over; wise choice.  Gotta love a day where "couch or bed?" is the biggest decision of the day.  

MIRACLES!

I saw something yesterday that I have not seen in about six months.  I saw green leaves on trees.  YES!  I also saw flowers blooming, bees buzzing and heard birds singing.  I have done it.  I will toot my own horn about it for a while though everyone else I know also did it; I survived winter.  And I hated probably only about half of it, another grand feat.  Now as a disclaimer: I am aware that the cold, snowy, shitty weather has yet to fully cease until summer comes with her heat, her minimal clothing, her long days, and her cruiser rides, but winter is over!  Nine months winter free begin today.

Poor pathetic winter.  Must be hard to be so cold, so harsh, so dark and lifeless.  Imagine being something that drives people indoors to avoid it, that makes depressions more pronounced and whitens the skin of Caucasians to an impossibly pasty shade the world over.  And all of this in three measly months.  

I have run away from winter and its cold weather for seven consecutive years.  This most recent winter happened sort of by accident as I would never intentionally put myself through the woes of a Denver winter.  But, alas, I made it through and surprisingly, it went faster than I could have expected.  I also know for a fact that I won't do it ever again.  This snowbird will migrate, likely to a Mexican beach for month or two every winter until I die or decide to stay permanently on that beach.

Spring is here with all its new beginnings, life sprouting on every patch of dirt and winter's pasty whiteness being displayed on the chests of men and the legs of ladies in parks all over Denver.  May the longer days drag on and on and on so that the next nine months feel like another seven years free of winter's bite. 

  

Barber Theory.

I have a long standing personal belief/theory about what will

happen to the earth, how it will heal, when humans are long gone: insects.  When humans are wiped out from pillaging every last natural resource we can, and we have heated the planet to a degree that kills us all as fragile, needy mammals, the bugs will be waiting in the background ready to clean it all up.

I was reminded of this today when I saw an article posted explaining that corn worms have evolved to be able to eat the genetically modified corn designed to kill them.  I was honestly elated at this news as it goes to show that us as humans are extremely foolish to think that we can fool nature with science.  Well, insects have much shorter generations than humans, thus evolve at a much quicker rate than we do and it sure didn't take more than barely ten years for these corn worms to evolve past robo-corn.  That is some tough shit.

I remember hearing one time that there were termites discovered that eat fiberglass insulation.  Ouch.  Sometimes I feel that way after eating something too spicy.  Whether this is true or not, someday I'm sure termites will evolve to be able to do so.  And we all know that cockroaches survive nuclear bombs long after we have been vaporized.  Incredible little creatures these bugs!  Six legs and wings!  Lucky!  

I truly believe that insects will evolve to eat everything from Styrofoam and plastic bags to concrete after humans are decimated.  And who can possibly imagine what other toxic remains we leave behind that these critters will evolve to feast on, turning it all back into perfect nature in the form of insect poo.  I love to think about billions upon billions of tiny bugs fixing all the damage that we have caused as a species, one bite of fiberglass at a time.

The reptiles had their day, well more like their eons of years, reigning supreme in the form of dinosaurs.  Mammals currently hold the top spot on the food chain, and have for a few millennium now.  But the common thread intertwined throughout the history of life on Earth is the presence and necessity of insects to clean up messes.  A bit easier for them when it was something actually organic; a dead dinosaur, a fallen tree.  It will be quite the sight when empty skeletons of skyscrapers come crumbling down because thousands of generations of concrete eating insects have had their way with it.

We generally think of insects and their presence in something as dirty, gross, infested.  The world would be a much filthier place without them; they already clean up so much.  Little do we know that they are waiting in the wings(not to be punny)for us to die off so they can eat our flesh and then our civilization.  I'm sure they will be helped greatly by various fungi and bacteria that also evolves to decompose the pestilential leftovers of human existence.  And the circle of life will be complete

I crack up at the thought of us "all powerful" humans thinking that we are so much more than a stupid bug. Insects have capabilities to withstand extreme temperatures, as well as far harsher environments than us weakling humans.  They reproduce extremely efficiently leaving literally thousands of their offspring in their wake.  Insects outnumber us, they eat us, they kill us, they eat our houses, our food(which they also pollinate), our trash, they keep our soil healthy, they rapidly evolve to outsmart us, and we must accept that they are going to survive long after we are gone. 

Congratulations you sneaky bugs, you have proven throughout billions of years that it doesn't matter what goes on, you'll continue to survive and proliferate life on Earth.  I hope you 
enjoy the taste of plastic.  Thanks for cleaning up the shit.

      

Right reasons to write?

Looking like a fat lady in a moo moo.  Writing in
Santa Catalina, Panama.

The question of why I write publicly(on this blog)was posed to me today and I have to be honest that it really, really got me thinking.  My initial thoughts were, well I do it for myself, not necessarily for the public.  Then I was asked why I don't just write privately.  I have written for myself privately since I was 16 years old.  I was filled with teenage angst one day and being unable to escape the frustration, I pulled out note paper and just wrote my feelings and thoughts down.  I could not believe how much relief I felt after that first time and I have not quit since.  I have written six "books", notebooks filled with handwriting, my life's work, my life. 

Back to the point of this specific post.  This blog began as a way to easily share my travel experiences with my family and friends and whomever else accidentally happened upon this page during their Google search.  I would post photos, share stories, cultural events, and everyday life as I lived abroad in various countries.  This blog has the few precious photos of my time in Guatemala that I posted before my camera became the property of a thief, breaking my heart into pieces.  I also have used Barbers Without Borders to document any other shorter trips I've taken as well as write about everyday life in USA.

But why do I write now, publicly?  This has had my mind going all day...  I am living in Denver, I am not taking any exotic trips anytime soon, so why am I so inclined to write, to randomly ramble about whatever the hell is in my head?    

I do, definitely, do this first and foremost, for myself.  Typing allows things to come out in a way that handwriting does not(and vice versa).  I do this to preserve memories.  I do this to be goddamned hilarious(haven't you read some of this shit?!).  I do this in order to challenge myself creatively.  I do this to challenge myself to be committed to something that is 100% good for me, for so few things are.  And of those few things, I struggle to remain committed.  

Writing is something I can do everyday regardless of the weather.  Writing is something I can do to express things/stories/situations/feelings that might otherwise become forever lost in the vast expanse of my overactive brain.  The internet is a mighty fine storage facility after all.  I have nearly 200 posts on this blog and when I return to the years past to read them, I have completely forgotten about a lot of them and am delighted to be reading my own story.  First and foremost, for myself.

The question remains: Do I truly care if no one ever reads this stuff?  That is difficult to answer.  I am, ultimately, publishing this stuff on the world wide web so some part of me must care if someone reads it. There is something unique in that literally anyone can get at it.  They can judge, they can laugh, they can do whatsoever they please with my voluntary vulnerability.  Because of this, I have been careful writing mostly fun and silly things.  But as of late, I have been more and more bold, truly not caring what others may think of of my overuse of the word fuck.  I suppose part of my reason to write publicly is to see just how far I will go, just how free I will allow myself to be, all the while knowing that the internet and its freedom can and does seriously backfire for many people.  I have had at least one situation where what I wrote was taken out of context, manipulated and used against me.  I won't go back, I will continue to push my own limits, create my own personal writing challenges, see just how far I will go, how deep I will pull from to write something of substance(or not)according to my own standards.

The right reasons to write don't come down to right or wrong.  I have the right to write which in itself makes it right.  I write right handed, does that count?         

My notebook on the sand.  Full moon walk, Egyptian Sahara.

St. Fake-holiday.

Having been out of USA for most of the past ten St. Patrick's Days, I didn't realize it was such a big deal to so many douchebags.  I mean I had people asking me last Thursday what my St. Patty's plans were.  I'm like, "It's next week, and no I don't celebrate fake holidays."  Frankly, I don't celebrate most real holidays. 

I sort of can't believe that people give a shit about it, at all.  But then again, I realize that it's not St. Patrick that these people care about, it's drinking that they care about.  I always chuckle when the general public is like, "But it's an excuse to drink!"  To which my response is always, "You're an adult(albeit a pathetic excuse for an adult), why do you need an excuse to drink?  If you want to drink, then fucking drink."

The barbershop was SLAMMED tonight.  A few of the guys I cut mentioned that they were surprised at how busy we were since it was St. Patrick's Day.  Seriously?  It's because not everyone's life revolves around drinking holidays(somewhat surprising in beer-soaked Denver), and when you need haircut, you need a haircut, green t-shirt or not.  Maybe I'm just getting old and bitter, or maybe in all my time away from USA I am finding myself more and more shocked at how much dumber Americans get by the week.  So damn dumb in fact, they believe that they are Irish.  Durrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr! 

  
  

Here we go again.

I just wrote a big post, decided not to publish it and then proceeded to read a bunch of posts I wrote during my 100 day challenge, that turned out to be about 80 days by the time life consumed me and I had to stop for while.  I sort of can't believe I wrote all of that stuff and I'm feeling quite inspired to write again, to do another challenge, probably 100 days again.  Mostly so that when it ends, no matter how many days it was, that I'll have a bunch of stuff to go back and read.  Boom!  That was the starting gun. . .