mine one won 3rd place for ACC's annual collection!

I see my generation

in need of identification.

We are pioneers

directionless,

and without destination.

Our world is a snow-globe:

Unnaturally compact.

We look in, are cozily detached.

Our frontier is mental.

We take our love inside,

where we take our meds.

There's an App for this,

there's a pill for that.

I am too new

to feel so old.

I want to know a world

without excess.

Diagnosis: Blindness,

our eyes trained to screens

instead of to each other,

our faces illuminated

by laptops

instead of by

the brilliance of compassion.

Keep 'Being Back In Staunton' Weird.

Here's an aerial image of my hometown. It's on the list among Durango, CO as one of the top twenty small towns in America. So it goes.. 

Went to the usual bar downtown with a book the other day.

Girl from my high school graduating class was at the bar with her boyfriend of a few years. I’m sure we recognized each other in a flash, and both decided to ignore it. 

She was being shrill, loud, and at least seemed fake when she saw another alum from the class of ’03. After the ‘hello’s and ‘You-look-so-good!’s, the girl from my class started out on a rant about how lame and weird her [our!] class had been. She went on about how our class just wanted to get through high school and sell drugs, and how most had been to jail. Haha! Then she raved about the woes of adulthood and missing the freedom of being a kid.

I was sitting there in grungy garb reading the memoir of Gail Caldwell, a woman who dropped out of college and traveled and spent a night in jail… and she, this drop-out author, she won a Pulitzer prize.

I’m a literate drop-out jailbird nomad, and I’ll probably never win a Pulitzer, but I’ll also never be an accountant and I'll never stop examining my life.

At this rate I’ll also never have a boyfriend-of-three-years… but my patchwork romance quilt is forever brightly colored with the very real love I hold to myself for a small handful of people, TX to CA to MT.. even for Austin’s M.P., because I got to see him through the gauze of his triple-Aries confidence. I knew I saw him, and so did he, and that’s a secret that will remain unstated between us forever probably.

I hope that girl from my class is happy in her world. Listening to her judge our class (and taking it personally), and just being around the judgmental culture borne of Valley boredom… I hope it doesn’t turn me into another gossipy who’d-you-see-them-with? kind of girl.

When someone at the other night asked what my goals in life were, what I want to do, I explained how I’m only concerned with going back to MT next summer. I don’t have any goals beyond that. I just want to live a happy life, and so far so good.

PS – How do the birds know how to quit chirping, all at once? In flight, how do they move in unison? They’re the epitome of a collective consciousness, and proof that everything is one, and that we can work together to benefit the whole.

Did that just happen?

Here I perch, at a smoking bar in my hometown. Virginia again. The last time I posted was from VA.

I have come back from a summer in Glacier Park.

How can such a season be summarized?

A too-close encounter with two galloping Grizzlies...
an adolescent moose crashing through the brush in front of me...
black bear with a cub on an afternoon stroll behind my cabin.

Bonfires, beers, a ride in the bed of someone's truck after midnight coming home from one of the only bars out in the plains on the eastern side of the Divide. 40 degrees, wrapped in a blanket.

First cliff-jumping experience while floating down the Middle Fork of the Flathead River. Sleeping in a snuggle-pile in the back of a friend's Jeep, crossing Going-to-the-Sun Road after midnight.

A mountain lion 50 feet away from me as I went to work in the eerie dark of 5AM.

Forcing myself to wade out and dip under the water of Iceberg Lake, the sense of my capillaries seizing and my lungs seemingly collapsing in the cold.

A couple good-hearted and easygoing love interests.

A few nights drunk and thumping down the hill in the darkness to my place on the bear trail. Such quiet nights - thickly quiet, like you could hear the wilderness watching you. I'd reach my door, place the key in to unlock it, and breathe a sigh of relief.

The Wind.

Twice in the middle of the night, the wind was wild enough to blow my locked door wide open and wake me up.

Granite Park Chalet.
Staying there overnight on a walk from Logan Pass to Swiftcurrent was the realization of a dream.


I arrived in MT too timid of the wild to go 15 yards into the woods.
I needed to fix that, and I did.

I learned a lot about the wilderness of the northern Rockies, and about the wilderness of my heart.

The people I met became my family, in an undefinable way.

"I'm going to Kalispell today, do you need anything?"

I became familiar with Single Shot and East Flat Top, knew their ways, and knew them to be coy on the days of low-flying clouds.

Tourists' comments: "We've been here five days and haven't seen ANY animals!"
"When do they let the goats out?"
"Is there a car wash around here?"

I am now 'home', in Virginia, and this past summer feels like a dream.

Rick Bass wrote in 'Winter' of north-western MT, that, It takes a long time to feel like you belong here.. but once you do, you don't really belong anywhere else.

I got a phone call last night from one of my best friends from this summer. He's a Montanan (lucky!) and mentioned that he was outside of a bar in Whitefish. From my place here in VA, I was melancholy to realize how far I am from that place. . .
. . . but I'll be back.

2013, I'll be back.

Friiiday morning at niiiine o'clock, she is far away...

Greetings from VIRGINIA!
Here I perch in my HOME-freakin-TOWN, feeling weird. Just about everyone here is white, there's no Cap-Metro, no Spider House, no Pride of Barbados bicicleta to ride around... just my beloved momma's car and a week for some much-needed R&R after the insanity of packing, storing, moving, flying, waiting, driving... Uff'da.

On Eastern time, y'all, and in a week and some change I'll be on mountain time. Montana time! Oh golly oh gee, once I'm out there this little town will seem gigantic.

God, seriously though, walking the couple-dozen blocks to downtown from where The Mom works today, I just felt so weird. Some kind of drug you can't take unless you've had the time to grow up in one place and come out of it in one piece. Mercy: Lord have it.

There's not enough Stereolab in the world to cover how it feels coming back here. I've got a grip on my own li'l interior love nest but woof, hello SVA, how are you.... white and weird, mkay.

Badger and I board the train next Friday. Whew.

Mom asked me last night once we'd settled at her house, "So does it feel just like coming home?"
I paused for a second with a little freak-out internal and realized and said, "I've lived in Austin for 5 of the last 6 years. I've just left home. So, no."             ...and 'tis true, it doesn't feel like home anymore. It feels weird.

Keep Austin weird? Um, otay. Keepin' up the weirdness outside of Austin? No prob y'all.

good morning starshiiiiine!

My apartment has my bed in it and some miscellane. Loading it all up, returning my keys, and taking off on a plane bound for VA tomorrow.

Haven't been writing toooo much, haven't taken too many pictures; been super busy organizing and getting/giving as many hugs as possible from the people I dig down here.

I've been absurdly PRESENT. Keeping it up.
My job in Austin is done! I don't have to work again till I start my job in GNP on the 28th!

NO MORE BAGELS SHALL I SLICE!! NO MORE! Ahhhh.... joy.

Five weeks left, Austin!

This evening I went through my clothes and made four arrangements: take to Montana, throw in storage, donate, and keep-for-now-in-TX-and-for-the-trip-west.

Do you know what that means??? It means it's getting REAL! I'm physically preparing! 

I am ecstatic. Musings continue.

So far like Carole King, my life is becoming a tapestry. It's a series of varied and fine vignettes, all across the spectrum vibrantly and violently. No wonder I am engaged to the wild country. Seen too much of some wild people. 

So I have Austin for one more month.

To the culture of twenty-somethings in twenty-twelve, I raise my glass, close my tab at Spider House, and laugh, "Give me a break!" as I prepare to depart. No offense, Austin and friends. I just am not learning or doing or seeing the way I want to. Time to go.

By way of the Blue Ridge first, of course, a detour to my roots.







Sometimes I think my perception is an outside element, that it betrays my honesty before I even realize it. What is more real, then? If perception overtakes meditation... is the gut more honest, or is it the deliberation? Is it the knee-jerk emotion or prolonged thought and subsequent realization? Logical versus Primal... gah. As I always say anymore, when ever you ask a big question you are going to arrive at a paradox.

So it's a toss-up, like everything else. What to expect!?
Accept that you may never feel totally certain about anything. (Dig!) Enjoy the chaotic comings and goings of social hives, of spiritual quests, of personal development, and do your best to keep the outlook (and output!) ultimately positive.

Products of a Sunday afternoon rambling at Spider House!

85 degrees and cloudless, under the patio's leafed-out pecan tree. It has been SO LONG since I baked in the sun. My spirits themselves are leafing out; the sun is beaming and I beam back.

On the bus ride down here I saw dozens of people spilling out from the baptist church on Speedway. I am by no means a member of any scripted religion; at least not one which involves indoor services, has a name, and is practiced across the globe by millions of other people.

The spires of my steeples are the candy-brittle peaks on Glacier's eastern front; Mt Gould presiding over Jealous Woman's (Swiftcurrent) Lake.

I want to do some studying, I've just now decided. I want to learn the proper names of locations around the park in MT. Names with stories and significance. It's a tragedy and it's blasphemous that these ancient mountains are called by names of various white men who 'discovered' them, or in some cases white men who hadn't even visited the area!
Considering ol' whitey from that era (and this one too, using that term as a metaphor), he is just an impotent, greedy, bossy, bratty child. With money made of paper and with an army and his bureaucracy, with words like 'civilized,' and with pamphlets and editions coming out all the time, dictating and manipulating, This is how people are supposed to live. This makes a life. I am disappointed in people in general when I go too far down this thought-track... Redirect! It's a beautiful day!

Back to the topic of church, I did match my cynicism earlier with a proper reverence and even a fleeting sensation of warmth. I will always recollect with fondness afternoons at the old Swoope house in VA - being a little, little girl coming home with mom + dad after church at Hebron Presbyterian. Fleeting images of Mom's old early '90s pumps, her big hair and her jewelry all over her dresser, my tiny feet in shiny black Mary Janes, Mom helping me into my tights, kneeling before me ready to catch my 'piggies' in them.

I think there is a sweetness in church, even if I totally disagree with religion as an institution. It's sweet for people to congregate and be reverent toward whatever greater power. Where's my church of philosophy? I am always grateful for life; I guess I pray every day, in my thoughts as I give thanks. I ask much, if anything, of the universe - I just think thanks. Being here and healthy is more than enough.

How could one ever just pray and ask for things? It's boggling my mind to consider that when people pray, it's often just with a long list of demands! "Dear god, I want this + this + this + this, and make everyone I know healthy."

Many prayers begin with "Thank you for this day," and then they circle the drain with the long list of expectations. Sheesh. If you're fed and quenched and sheltered, only offer love and thanks in return for the graciousness shone upon you by The Great Whatever.


Seems so many people are preoccupied. Wants and perceived needs make people disregard what blessings they already have, make them seem a given. It could all stop at any moment. Walk more slowly and with care while the world is cradling you, baby. Be gracious and kind and ask for nothing but always give thanks.

Being appreciative feels good and since I have started to focus on it, it's unstoppable. I'm compelled to notice things more than ever before. It is a part of the adult woman showing herself in my persona. I am on the edge of my self and I am thankful for the ways I develop.

This is my Sunday service - not from a pew with mournful voices all around, but in the face of the sun itself and with a jubilant internal orchestra.

-------     I took a break from writing to read more Muir, and very quickly in my book I came upon this amazing quote, so relevant!

"No wonder the hills and groves were God's first temples, and the more they are cut down and hewn into cathedrals and churches, the farther off and dimmer seems the Lord himself."




I will be on Glacier's eastern edge in two months, and in three months I'll have been there one month, and in six months I'll have been there four months, and in seven months I don't know where I'll be, or who I'll have become, or what changes will have shaped my mind. . . . . and thank god!

   





   Yours truly @ Many Glacier, 2005, first GNP visit with Mom.

Good morning! Good morning! Good morning-uh!

Coffee and the GNP webcams before pedaling up to work.

In 6.5 weeks I'll be going to VA to reconnect. In 8 weeks I'll be getting on the Empire Builder, and in 9.5 weeks I'll be starting my new job... but who's counting down? Who's beside-herself excited? hmm..

SXSW with its chaos and its energy really reignited my affection for this city, and it's been fueled even more since SX is over and I get to relax and know that 'my' town is back to how it's supposed to be for now. The influx is over.

SX is almost like a miniature seasonal gig for those who come from all over the world. A couple weeks in a new place, the locals apprehensive - friendly, but wary anyway. I've seen shirts that read something like "I LOVE AUSTIN! Please don't move here!"

I'm thankful to have gotten my b-day gift from the Mother Badger early in the mail - my very own 2-hour Flip camera! They've been discontinued and I wanted to snag one for my adventures because it's so easy to use. Why would Cisco stop manufacturing something so popular? Tough to say. I suspect I have a greater understanding regarding the economics of ecosystem as opposed to the economics of contemporary business.

I am approaching the cusp -- I have been two months' waiting, and I have roughly two more to go. Whee.. Over the hill!  It's almost time to start making lists - almost time to collect boxes, look into storage units, deposit all my precious LPs with Dad for safekeeping!

I glance over at my beloved bicycle and I feel like I'm abandoning a beloved pet; it doesn't know it's going to be stuck in a storage unit for several months and I feel extremely guilty. It's just lunacy, to attempt to take it up there first somehow to VA and then across on the train.

If I do join the seasonal tribe, I'll have to save up and get a car..

And there you have it! Thursday morning all! 32 in St Mary currently and almost 60 here in Austin. I won't be missing the triple-digit heat this summer.

nicest evening ever / Andrew Bird weather.

Man oh man I am in love with what's happening right now. Damn.

SXSW was amazing and it totally wrecked me in a great way, but it's nice to be done with it now and to have a quiet, chilled-out night at the nest alone.

Get this.. after work I got groceries and walked ~20-30 blocks in the windy overcast atmosphere of 6:20pm or so.. a nice walk, great theatrical weather. Birds were flying without much apparent purpose, like scrambling to get some last-minute stuff done before the storms come in this evening.

At home I took out some garbage, did dishes, put up groceries, straightened up and organized.. oh man. I'm gonna make a great hippy housewife some day. I just really love to, um, -bake- and clean. [/gigglebox] Good God man, and tonight is just perfect Andrew Bird weather. 

Noble Beast is closing with 'On Ho!' as I type this up... ah, sigh. Something about the violin and the crazed wind prior to the thunderstorms.. oof! I love it!

That is all. : )

SXSW makes me sick!

...Inadvertently, at least. 

Here I sit, 10PM, hot tea steeping at my left. Ooh la la. 

Dr Dog on Friday was SUPER cold and wet and I got blasted and I screamed and sang along with all my might. Then I worked all day Sat., then all day Sun. followed by a metal show at 29th St. and plenty of well whiskey thanks to their $1-drinks-till-midnight thing.. then worked all day Mon., Tuesday off so I tooled all over town on my bicycle and made it down to Beauty Bar for Grimy Styles. Pedaled home and crashed, woke up this morning and felt like total ass.

Whatever. I shall deal with it! 

Only, while I'm gross, I should take this sick-time and put it to good use! I am done with my bummer attitude. Oh yeah, dear bloggery,did I forget to mention that I have kept at bumming smokes, and ended up at about 7 yesterday whilst killing time all afternoon with the people I love at Spider House? Yeah. 

In this way, being sick is a blessing.

Also, Grimy Styles plays again on Saturday night at Flamingo. I shall use sick-time to rest up and be prepared to get my dancy-feet on for REAL! 

And Saturday night will mark my 4th full day smoke-free after this non-smoking sick-time, so it will be a celebratory event for SURE!

In the meantime, in keeping with digging it, I want to express how damn imperative it is to daydream all the time.


Instead of thinking about how much a sink full of dirty dishes depresses me when I'm sick... I'll think about living in a nice old house with a wraparound porch and big fragrant eucalyptus trees growing tall on the lawn... being able to transport yourself into your imagination is a great + effective tool to use when you feel like ass.

The end.

"Do you get dizzy on the ground?...

...Must be somethin' going around."

Dear Bloggery, my primary care physicians are Dr. Dog! Straight up AMAZING show tonight.

Before I wear out the Dr. puns, let me add that they prescribed the perfect medicine to warm up the crowd, since it was like 45 degrees and misting/raining!

Earlier today (we're talkin' like 2PM), I took a 20-30 block walk in the rain to S. House and sat outside with the few other regulars braving the frigidity. 

I was out in 50 degrees and rain and wind for like 8 straight hours! I realized Dr. Dog lyrics mention Rain a lot. 

Inside Stubb's pre-show w/ beers and bbq, my friend and I got to see the band come sit right next to us at the table by the bar. They got some food in their bellies pre-show, and they definitely used all that back-up energetic juju to fuel their set, man, they were completely amazing!

The set list was balanced real well taking their recent albums into account.. of course I got to wig out on every song from Fate, since that's the one I first heard and I've f'in loved it for evah! I'm so glad I caught their show @ The Southern in Charlottesville (VA), that show was in like Oct. '09 I think.

So now I've got the heat on full blast and ooh man... It was such a damn great show, and so great to on top of it be in NASTY weather but to not give a darn about said nasty weather. Who cares how cold and wet it is when you're up front and toasty and getting down to Dr. Dog LIVE, on the cusp of SXSW!?!?!?

And on top of all of it, I've never appreciated being warm and dry this much. Mmmm. Dee-lish!

Here's my Dr Dog midnight recuperation process! Look at this dorky girl!

\m/

SXSW descends upon the ATX

Hey there, dear bloggery, it's approaching music craze time here in Austin. The official SXSW insanity begins in just days, and I am excited! Luckily my predictably shitty food-service-industry-slave job closes at 4 or 5 every day, so I have every single got-dang evenin' off to czech out free shows and to meander downtown and take in some people-watching!

I'm going to be armed with my crappy purple kodak digital camera!

Tomorrow night I get to see one of my ultra-faves, Dr Dog, at Stubb's outside. Anxious: It's s'pose to be in the 40s and 50s tomorrow and like misting/showering. Gross! But... as in The Ark, Dr Dog say "God - he called for rain!" And... as in recent times, Austinites say (or ought to say) BRING IT ON! Hydrate this good country!

Sunday night the plan is to look into a buddy's band at one of the usual spots; couple great bands I've seen before also playing - Sweat Lodge, Ssserpentsss; fun and free show with some other kids I know.

Tuesday = Beauty Bar: Art Invasion w/ MF-ing Grimy Styles, only The band that kept my sanity together in 2009 whilst I was slaving away in a cubicle doing fuckoff data entry for a @#$!-ing insurance agency! ECK! Grimy kept it together and kept me barefoot at all times on the floor in front of the stage at Flamingo and The Parish, I miss their shows so when they reunite perennially for stuff like SX, I celebrate.

Serendipitous: Saving money by not $moking. I haven't purchased a pack of American Spirits (or any other smokes) since about Feb. 23 or 24. Hell yeah! Granted, I've smoked about (collectively) a pack since then, bumming of course, but my lord! A pack in two weeks versus a pack in two days?? CanIgetaAmen.


Alright mang, I'm going to bed. I am very much still in love with my apt, it's been my bff.. also in love with my bike, and very much still in love with my self, since I've gotten to know myself a lot more and I've taken better care of myself than ever over the past 10 mo. or so since I got out of a suuuuper shitty relationship. So, Digging it? Yes. I am still very much digging it.

Here comes the but.. but it's not a very big 'but'.. 

But: I am kinda squaring with this healing + knowledge + happiness I've been digging for so long lately, and I'm grumpy about not being interested in anyone.
I have too much else to be in love with, and I leave soon for the true western country anyway. I'm in love with the future, in love with the options, in love with the uncertainty, and in love with the writings of John Muir!

It's annoying to be so level-headed sometimes. This lonesomeness doesn't last long when it comes, it's just like existentialism  plus  lonesomeness, and I guess it  equals  ... staying up too late at night all self-absorbed and blogging about this stuff!

Jesus Christ! or, as I say carefully at work when the new young and religious employee is around, Cheese and Rice!

On looking back - An allotted 3 smokes.

To celebrate the successful completion of yet another busy weekend at work I decided to head out last night and grab a couple drinks, see who was at ye olde Spider House, and while I was there for a few hours I bummed 3 smokes over time. That's the limit. And I was curious to see how they made me feel, since it had been about 3 days since my last one.

I don't need cigarettes, hark.
As I sat alone and writing out there, I noticed that a cigarette put me at ease because it gave my left hand something to do. Gave me a carte blanche to stare confidently off into space, thinking.
...but my own secondhand smoke started to irritate me. I ended up feeling embarrassed for smoking, and I felt my stomach unhappy, felt my head get tingly, knew my veins were constricting... It's like I heard my lungs and heart groaning, "D'aw... really, Beth? Really?"

Ze point is, I don't need to do it.

Not smoking, I'm even less compelled to drink. Being released from the nicotine has me in an already-healthy mindset, and it's like I want to keep it that way as much as I can. Huh. Interesting. So... quitting smoking helps me dig myself. Hark!

And y'know my favorite uncle Mike passed away at the end of January this year. He'd fought with mouth cancer since '05. That's when I started smoking. Monumentally I guess as he passes, so can my addiction.

After the three smokes I had last night I woke up with a headache and with a little ol' bump near my chin that wants to turn into a stupid zit, and I'm also of course disappointed that I had any at all, let alone 3. So, fug it.
I am happier and healthier and prettier when I don't smoke.

RJ Reynolds, Winston-Salem, we had a good run. Now F off.

Digging it,
Tha Beef

Uhh! What!! .. I mean, Whut!! OOF! WINning.

Czech this out even if you don't care. Well, unless you really don't. Carry on. But if you DO care, make some popcorn this is a good one.

It's like, Saturday night right? Right. (Why do I type like a valley girl? Maybe it's a punk protest to my internal eloquence hag.)

So anyway. [like whatever] I was smoking about 7 smokes on work days and anywhere from 12 to even a full pack of 20 on days off - depending on how late I was out, if I was drinking a bunch, ET fuckin' CETERA.

Last Saturday I had a cigarette in the late afternoon, and I haven't bought a pack since.
That's a full week! I'd been buying a pack of American Spirits like every two days!

I've had a whole 15 cigarettes since last Saturday. I'm bumming... so... sorry, y'all. I do offer up $.50 for one.. and even a spare lighter in one case.. or perhaps a really good hi-five.
Keeping track of my smoking like cray-zay, I'm doing so damn well.

Here's the rules mkay??

* Not smoking at work.
* Not smoking at my apt.
* Not smoking alone.
* Not buying a pack.

* ONLY smoking when social, and NOT more than 3 in one day/night.



This ish is outta control, dear blog diary! 


Dag, yo! I am doing what I said I'd do! When did I start this, like what, October? It's the beginning of March?

Hey mang, I's smoked from age 17 on... After almost 7 years, taking 5 months to get to this point is alright with me.

Pedaling around is easier.
                          My chest feels tighter when I inhale deeply.
                                           I get antsy, like I don't know what to do with myself (which is why I'm back to blogging about it.. and even dusting off an ancient unused tumblr account to keep busy).

BUT... I'm not anxious to have one. I didn't go out last night or tonight cuz of early work shifts, and I didn't have a single one yesterday and as the 10PM hour starts off, I haven't had one today and I won't tonight. If I have one tomorrow it won't be till later at night if I go out into the world.

Point is, when I work in Montana, I want to breathe the alpine air to full capacity. Plus, I hear smoking's bad for ya.


Now I will practice frowning with disdain at people lighting up near me. Just kidding. F that.

I am so fucking happy!!!
I am so fucking happy I am afraid of becoming annoying, afraid of acting like a jackass because I'm content with life and with my self!!!
I am so fucking happy and I could watch Amelie over and over but I don't need to because I live in my own imaginative world!

All my colors are out, dear bloggery! Year of the dragon just like when I was born, I'm ready to set the earth on fire and roll around with it chasing herds of trees and breathing regeneration into the ground.





Also, I might be in love with John Muir.