building is better but breaking is easy

So now I am in Hollywood. I have been in bed for about ten hours. I was on a bus all yesterday, and sat in my room in San Francisco all the day before that.

The whole purpose of this trip is to push through my comfort zone, but it is hard work (no it isn't) and I am tired (I am making excuses).

I tell myself I am tired of having the same conversation repeatedly. And to a degree, yes. A hostel life is one of comings and goings. I met at least three new people each day. And we're all traveling, and we're all curious to know about each other's travels.
No. We are curious to find out if we'd be interested. It is not "tell me about what you've seen/done/learned," it is "where are you from/where are you going?" I can tell you with certainty, s/he is from Germany or Australia, and s/he is going to Las Vegas. Once the conversation has gone there, it rarely goes elsewhere.

I should keep Ungame cards at the ready. Oh, hello Lucien-from-France. Tell me about a time when you felt disappointed.

Jeremy returned from Hawaii because he'd made life into what he'd made it back home. That's what I did in Seattle, too. That's what I'm afraid of doing now. I've got to--GOT TO--push through this veil and attack the world.

Starting with getting out of bed.
Good morning!

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Late to Start

I am pretty well understood to be a procrastinator. So without surprising myself, I put off packing for this trip until the last minute.

Unfortunately, packing took longer than that minute, required a few more. The first day was just a matter of "I should have started sooner." The next day (today) was shipping and selling books. (I made $54 from selling, spent $223 shipping.) And now...

I have spent the past two hours trying to get everything into my backpack, and then into my backpack plus another bag. I've halved the amount of clothes. Still no. So tomorrow I will buy a new, bigger pack and, since I'm still here, may as well get my paycheck too.

So Saturday is the new Tuesday.

I maded a manifesto.

My motivation is not to make a commune (nor is it to avoid this). Simply, I love the land I grew up on, and would hate to see it broken up and sold as lots. Simply, I have come to realize that the life I (and 99% of others) live is a game, and I was never asked if I want to play. Simply, I disagree with the ideas at the heart of modern civilization (mankind should rule the earth; civilization should not be abandoned at any cost, even extinction).
I have met people I love more than most flesh-and-blood family, and these are the people I feel accepted by and acceptable around, and these are the people I would love to spend the rest of my life living, working, and communicating with. I believe our similarities are what set us apart as a tribe, if not a nation, of people, and that our differences are what set us apart from any zombie cult or the mainstream. I believe there is no one right way to live, but that this does not mean we every one must live in a different way. I believe that the clearest way to affect change is to "be the change that you want to see in the world," and I have seen the world I want to live in, and I intend to represent that change. I believe that a revolution is necessary, but I do not believe this requires the overthrowing of ANYTHING except our own gravitation toward weakness and submission on personal levels. I believe by simply stepping out of line we have begun and completed the conversion to "revolution," and that having done so we may inspire others to step out of line also (preferably if they believe it is the right thing to do); we are also free to step back into the line (preferably if we believe it is the right thing to do). I believe that nobody knows the course of life, and that life is an experiment. I believe that we are responsible for our own survival, and that survival requires community, and that survival requires abandoning anything if it is in favor of something that works better. And I believe that in order to find something that works better, some people need to go looking for it.

And I don't want to sit around and wait for someone to find it for me. I'm unhappy now, and I don't need to keep jumping on this bed of nails when there is clear ground all around.

Animals awake and rise! It is the striking time!

Jenny and I broke up. Then, the next day, I was turned down for the job I'd been interviewing for. I was looking for an apartment to share with Elijah, and maybe Pookie, and maybe Adrian, ut while I was looking at apartments, I realized I didn't want to find one.

If I have learned one thing from the past ten years' experience (and I could accept that I have only learned one thing) it is that I have to be for myself. I would love to help Elijah and Pookie out with their situations, but staying here at this point would be miserable. I would have nothing but my job; I would not have Jenny's family nor my own to be with for Christmas.

So today I put in my notice at work, and I have two weeks to get rid of tons of stuff. On 30 November, Court Anonymous goes back on the road.

(Eep!)

arcana

Just now: I lit eight candles in the patch of grass in our backyard, north, south, etc. I sat in the center of the candles with a beer and a cigarette, under the full moon.

I was thinking of two things, simultaneously: I was thinking of going to Arizona in January, and I was thinking of setting something up at my farm in Tennessee.

And then: a slug climbed a blade of grass which, weighted, tipped it into one of the candles, and extinguished the south-west.

xtranormal

This took three of four hours to make, but I like how it turned out. (Based on this blog from 2008)

On the Fleach

Monday, approximately 1130PM: Jenny found a flea on Bellatrix.
Tuesday, approximately 4:00AM: I woke up to Jenny thrashing around, and discovered that we were covered in fleas.

I've been reading On the Beach by Nevil Shute, and it's amazing. The gist: the story of six of the people living in Australia two years after World War Three, as the radiation caused by 4,000+ nuclear bombs in the northern hemisphere makes its way south. The main characters have few illusions, and it's understood throughout the novel that they are all going to die in the coming September.

I came home yesterday with flea shampoo for the cats. Lucius handled the bath badly, and Bella (as usual) handled being in, and covered by, water very well. That killed a lot of fleas, and afterward Jenny combed the kitties, and put what remaining fleas she found directly into a cup of the poison-shampoo. After that madness, Jenny needed a cigarette, and I poured a glass of wine.* We sat on the steps with our vices and our books, and I finished both of mine as Jenny went inside to shower.

It was a strange symmetry. In the book: a man sets things right in the yard before joining his wife in bed, where they intend to poison themselves. At my house: I finish reading my book in the yard before joining Jenny in the shower, where we intend to pour flea-poison all over ourselves. With our roommate Lisha on vacation, it seemed just as isolated as the couple's home in the book. Even though our problem was just a common flea infestation, it was hard to shake the feeling that This Was It. It was pretty moving, for a flea-bath.

After that, though, things picked up. We had to get out of the house (the cats were flea-bathed, we were flea-bathed; however, the house was still flea'd), so we went out to eat, and then to the store to find Die Endflohlösung. I called out of work for today, and we went to bed, comfortable with the knowledge that we'd be bombing these little buggers all day long.***

- -- --- ---- ----- ---- --- -- -

*I'm noticing a pattern. A month previous:
Lisha: The laundry room is flooded!
Jenny: I need a cigarette.
Me: I'll open a bottle of wine.

**I'm at the library, spending time until I can enter the house. Which is in two minutes, so I'll wrap this up...