One of my favorite writers is Sue Monk Kidd. (See my post on The Secret Life of Bees) She gives some wonderful insights on the writing process in this lecture. If you are a writer and have an hour, I highly recommend that you view this.
Monthly Archives: June 2017
Local in All Directions
From my vantage point on the eastern rim of the Pacific Ocean:
Local to the East at sunrise this hot summer morning.
Local to the West, sometime in the spring.
Local to the North, sometime this past winter.
Local to the South, sometime last Autumn.
ljgloyd (c) 2017
Paper and the Art of Seduction
I love stationery stores. Not today’s big box stores where you buy copier paper by the carton or paper towels and coffee cups by the hundreds. No, I mean the type of stores that sell elegant linen stationery and fine fountain pens, ledger books, and sealing wax. There was a sensory experience in those old stationery stores that just did not translate to those big warehouse stores. When I do come across an old-fashioned stationery store, I cannot help but slip inside.
In my youth, there was a stationery store nearby that also sold books. In fact, it was the only bookstore for miles around with hardbound books and paperbacks too, with classy books of poetry and philosophy, with not a bodice-ripper to be seen — except if you knew where to look for them.
Books. I remember delicately opening the pages of a newly acquired book, sticking my face in the binding and inhaling the aroma of glue and fabric. You can’t do that with an e-reader.
E-readers do have their advantages. These days I can’t always read the fine print of a book, so that text enlargement function on the readers is useful. I can download the latest publication of favorite authors the second they are released. And when I have the overwhelming need at 2 in the morning to have that book on water dowsing or quantum physics for right-brained people, I can get them with a single tap on the 1-Click button.
However, there is something about a physical book that entices me. There is just something more intensely satisfying about running a slow hand over the soft, warm texture of paper– more gratifying than the cold touch of an e-reader’s slick surface of plastic. It does not even come close.
Paper can be quite sensual in its own seductive way.
ljg (c) 2017
Interior Cartography: Sometimes When You Crack an Egg, She Erupts……
A wise man told me not to repress anger but to channel it in a journal to let it go. Lava-spewing cracked eggs? You think I might just be a little p-o’d? LOL!
ljg (c) 2017 — Found images manipulated in photoshop.
Puncturing Through the Strata
“Jung says that dreams are the woofer and tweeter of the total sound system.” Chris-in-the-Morning, KBHR, Cicely, Alaska (Northern Exposure, ep 1.8)
Lately, I’ve been having a lot of vivid dreams. It’s as if a deep, down layer of my mind that contains my true self is trying to puncture through the strata of my psyche to find a way out– like lava from the earth’s core making its way to the mouth of a volcano.
For example, in the last two weeks I’ve dreamed of driving on the wrong side of the road forcing other cars off the road, getting lost on a maze of wharves and piers, sweeping up leaves of a tree growing in a living room, having a job in a drum store where I am falsely accused of stealing books (in a drum store?), and taking Ayuvedic cooking lessons (pass the turmeric).
Here’s another quote from Chris. (Northern Exposure was one of my favorite shows and I often quote from it ):
“Dreams are postcards from our subconscious, inner self to outer self, right brain trying to cross that moat to the left. Too often they come back unread: ‘return to sender, addressee unknown.’ That’s a shame because it’s a whole other world out there–or in here depending on your point of view.” (Northern Exposure, ep 3.7)
I’ve been trying not to send back those postcards. I’ve been writing them down in a journal and trying to understand what they mean. I think I have a lot of these figured out. A few are a mystery. And some may have more than one interpretation.
For example, the other night I dreamed that I was pulling up the blinds on my dining room window. Light flooded the room. Then all of a sudden, the blinds got away from me and violently snapped up (like a shade) crashing so hard into the top of the window frame that it made a huge noise and shook the whole building like an earthquake. Then I heard my upstairs neighbors walking around, and I feared that I had disturbed them. I heard footsteps coming down the stairs outside. A woman suddenly appeared at my window. I did not recognize her as a neighbor. I immediately said “I am so sorry if I disturbed you.” She smiled and replied, “No problem. I just came to see if you are okay.” Then I woke up.
My interpretation is that new insights I am learning about myself and my life are flooding in like the light from the window, and the woman was telling me that this is good. I shared this dream with someone who offered a different interpretation. He suggested that I was opening a window on my life to the world, showing the world my real self, and feeling free to express myself in ways I have not before. The woman was there to tell me that this is also a good thing.
Yes, both interpretations work for me.
So, my point in telling you all this is to suggest that you do not ignore your dreams. Keep a pad of paper and pen next to your bed and write down your dreams as soon as you can. (You WILL forget them if you don’t write them down right away). Then spend a little time seeing what the mean for you.
Whether the messages deep down at our cores are a part of us or if they are a way for God to speak wisdom to us, I’m not certain (both maybe), but I do know they are worth heeding.
ljg 2017
Tapering Off or Cold Turkey?
I stopped eating wheat about two months ago. I did not taper off. I just went cold turkey.
It was not easy. Everything I eat I wish were a toasted bagel slathered with cream cheese. Every time I drive past my favorite burger joint on Main Street with their big, soft sesame seed grilled buns, I begin muttering to myself the mantra: “Don’t stop, don’t stop, keep driving, you can have a nice bowl of brown rice when you get home.”
Modern wheat has been likened to heroin. Seriously. The wheat that is grown now is not the same wheat consumed for thousands of years. It has been genetically modified to create a larger crop yield. Unfortunately, this genetic manipulation has increased in wheat a substance called gliatin which is an appetite stimulant. The more wheat you eat, the more hungry you get. And it is a substance addiction that is hard to break. Here is an easy-to-read article about this here.
Since I’ve stopped eating wheat, I have better digestion and more importantly, my joints do not hurt anymore (apparently wheat consumption causes inflammation in some people– me included). I did not realize how much my body hurt until I stopped eating wheat and the inflammation calmed down.
Now, for my other “addiction.” Caffeine.
Twenty years ago I did not drink coffee. Then when the “green mermaid” coffee houses started opening up, I began to frequent them for ice blended mochas and other sweet drinks. Then I graduated to the stronger stuff. Now I get a vente dark roast drip almost every morning. If I don’t have my morning coffee, I will have a screaming, skull-smashing, debilitating headache by late morning that no pain reliever will conquer.
Cold turkey, therefore, is not an option. I will need to slowly taper off if I am to survive this very real withdrawal symptom.
I am starting this morning. I will get a half-decaf, half-fully leaded vente. I have to start somewhere.
Is there a coffee equivalent of the DTs? Gosh, I hope not.
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Post-Script: I really did go down to our building’s canteen right after I posted this to get some coffee, and I noticed that they are now selling “bagel buzzes”, which are bagels made with 32 ounces of added caffeine. I’m not making this up! Now one does not have to “pick their poison”; they come together in one easy to manage package.
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Oh, and by the way, nothing here should be construed as medical advice. This nutritional advice was given to me by a medical practitioner and works for me. You need to go see your own practitioner before you try this.
ljg 2017
Taper at The Daily Post
Back on the Circuit
The volume of pain in my knee, from which I’ve been suffering for quite a long time, has dissipated to barely a whisper, so this morning, I did something that I have not done in nearly two years: I went out for a pre-dawn power walk.
When I was at my best I could do three miles through my neighborhood in about 45 to 50 minutes — pretty good for someone my age. Then life circumstances and a bum knee made that all but impossible.
Three months of acupuncture and an anti-inflammation diet has turned the pain around.
This morning I woke up at the hideous hour of ONE o’freaking clock in the morning and could not go back to sleep. I read for several hours, tried to go back to sleep and then finally gave up. I decided it was high time I got back to exercising. I was out the door at 5:15 in my ratty but still serviceable trainers. I decided to start small: one pass on the one-mile circuit I had mapped out two years ago.
I powered along in great spirits because I was not feeling any pain in my knee. Until — sigh — I was a few yards from my front door when that familiar stab of pain went screaming at full volume through my knee. I slowed my gait to that of a snail with a hangover.
It took 21 minutes to walk one mile.
I am not discouraged though. Right now my knee is not hurting, and I intend to put some heat on it in few minutes to make sure it stays that way. And I have an appointment with the acupuncturist tomorrow and he’ll fix things right up.
Small steps, sweetie, small steps. You’ll get there.
ljg
About Pelicans
If any of you are wondering about my apparent fascination with pelicans, it comes from an encounter I had with one a few years ago. Pelicans are actually indigenous creatures where I live but I never saw one while growing up. DDT and other pesticides killed them off, but when those substances were banned, they made a comeback. A number of years ago, I was hiking along a sea bluff and I came across a juvenile or a female — hard to tell which– perched on the railing. She did not startle when I approached. Had I wanted to I could have reached out and touched her. Instead I just marveled at such a magnificent creature. Right then she became a symbol to me of one coming back from the brink. Whenever I am feeling defeated, I think of her.
And this is an image of her, THE pelican, on that day:
ljgloyd (c) 2006, 2017
Miss Pelican's Perch 