Meanwhile

On the list of things I need to do at some point is to read poetry at an open mic at a coffee house. Making progress on that …going to perform in a cabaret show for the next three weekends, in which I get to speak a great poem, and sing for the first time from a stool! It seems a lot more natural and comfy than standing, I like it. A couple others on the long unwritten list are being a mostly-vegan and a triathlete-in-training, so I thought I would get started on those today after leaving work early because I was crawling out of my skin. Tofu is baking in the oven making the house cozy (it’s definitely spring in Wisconsin, we’re on Day 3 of Cold and Rainy) and I just had a delicious salad of mixed greens, crumbled soy cheese, two kinds of nuts, raisins, and vinagrette. Mmmm. Yes, I do believe I could give up eggs, since there are ready substitutes available and the main reason I like them in the first place is because they satisfy so simply. I’ve never cared for their origin, though the image is eased by buying cage-free. Had a great conversation with David the other night, which was continued it with Noel. The gist is this: global warming is a fact. Even if we stopped our energy consumption right now, it would still continue. Therefore, it must be addressed in addition to whatever conservation measures we might be taking. The best way to reverse global warming is to plant trees. Lots and lots and LOTS of trees. What if Wisconsin were turned back into the beautiful forest it once was and in parts still is, and the sprawling dairy farms could gradually shrink down if consumers began to limit their consumption? The high levels of casein in milk make it unfit for humans anyway, says Dr. Norman Walker, my juicing hero who lived to be 110. Thus, the veganism. As for the triathlete part, we’ll see, maybe just in terms of enjoying the three sports of running, swimming, and cycling. And the next? To contribute to the health of the human race as a midwife/medicine woman. Here begins my new career.

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By Juan Antillon Montealegre, translated by Joseph Richey

I somehow managed to poison myself yesterday and laid in bed nauseous from 8pm to 8am this morning. it was a glorious 12 hours during which I decided that I didn’t in fact want to have children at all ever even though my obsession lately has been studying childbirth, because there would be the possibility of nausea during the first trimester and I would rather go childless for a lifetime than experience that feeling for 3 months. (don’t worry I got over it). Today I got my reward for the fast - that feeling of being light and airy and calm from not eating, for at this point all food still seemed a disgusting thought and I wondered why I ever eat at all and maybe I should be like the skinny hippie vegan I admired at the coffee shop the other day when I was picking up a jasmine green tea…she seemed so simple and calm and free. after a pleasant day of not much consumption except lacroix and soup and some junk that was in the office i returned home from work and cleaned and rearranged in a silent meditative state because my landlord is coming tomorrow and noel is coming home in 2.5 weeks (yay!) i considered reading or writing or doing anything intelligent but instead found myself staring in the mirror contemplating the blackness of my pupil, and somehow in the deep blue planet of my iris i had a not-so-new revelation that the calm I was experiencing was actually my brain beginning to shut down and that I really had everything in common with the skinny hippie vegan girl I had so admired - we were both just FRICKING HUNGRY.

hear me whisper

Time is understood in terms relative to the scope of the human mind.

My mind is back. It was sleeping, my heart sputtering. But now both are alive and flourishing. I am back and on my way. All things are possible. Be it from returning to school, love, caffeine, all three.

I know of what things are made of. How be healthy. How to feel free.  All this knowledge is out there. What a privilege, to be taught to fish rather than fed!

You who I might not know at all, I am going to let in and see. Because it’s my belief that if we did that more we’d find what we have in common at the core and we’d all be better off without all this privacy.

you have to wonder if there is an ideal balance of experience and reflection.

from summa cum laude to silent bohemian, i’ve swung from extreme to extreme but miraculously emerged from my formative years calm and centered and in love with the world. along the way i was somewhat compulsive about recording it all by way of random thoughts scribbled on every spare scrap of paper. today these survive in piles along with drawings, letters, journals, and notebooks filled to the brim. my biggest fear was that i would die and someone would have to sort through it all and wonder at my sanity. my second biggest fear was that it would all be for naught - either get lost or thrown out, leaving all those years of emotion and discovery wherever it goes for most people who forget what it’s like to grow up…

paying tribute to the girl who wanted to be sure of no regrets, here in these pages shall i archive the old alongside the new, creating closure while bounding off joyfully to my new life of love… indeed, in the spirit of carpe annum, existing in a constant state of departure while always arriving…