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i'm so sad. trying so hard to get a free moment to go out and enjoy the beautiful rare sunny week in sf. leaving my hole of an office (no natural light whatsoever) to see the shadows growing long and the sun preparing to set. it's the most awful sight in the whole world. another day wasted with stress and computers and a neverending task list.

finished "my year of meats" today. a disturbing book. it described a lot of different types of pain that people and animals endure. beatings, death, loss, confusion. it also contained lots of discussion of fertility, and lack of it, and what that means. it also featured men treating women horribly, and people filled with longing and anger. reading it has made me so lonely for something that feels complete and right. some way to separate myself from all the awful things in the book.
came home in a sad and lonely mood and made dinner. as i sat down to eat, i heard sounds coming from outside. it's trash night and some poor fellow was having his dinner out of our garbage can. i considered going down and bringing him some food but wasn't sure whether it was the right thing or if i could really handle it. then had that whole thought process where you wonder why you do anything in life that doesn't involve helping other people -- feeding them. but still ultimately being too selfish to actually devote yourself to feeding people.

while i was still feeling sad and confused about that, i clicked on a livejournal post in one of the communities i look at there. it was a post from a woman about the three month anniversary of a stillbirth. further back in her journals, pictures of her stillborn son's cold little perfect face. the pregnancy had been normal, it was unexpected. i felt a huge wave of sadness for her and the longing and emptiness she must be feeling.

all these things bring to mind some hot questions from my phil-4 class:

let's assume there is a God (in the judeo-christian sense), and He is, as purported, all knowing, all powerful, and all good. he loves us. then:

even if evil IS soul building

why is there so much evil?
and
why is it so grotesque?

came home in a seriously pensive mood.
items to note:

- i have noticed that my writing has been very bad lately. i have had a really difficult time expressing ideas with confidence.

- today i thought about how as i get older and more interested in respect or being taken seriously, i am less interested in posting half baked emotional insights here. that seems like a positive evolution.

- i have felt very introverted and almost "trapped" inside my body and mind lately, especially when i have been communicating with others. it manifests at times as extreme feelings of awkwardness or social anxiety, but it also can feel overwhelmingly like literally being trapped or choking, or a sense of extreme desire which has no obvious outlet. sort of like the "i have no mouth and i must scream" idea. it seems to be affecting my relationship to my body and the physical world also.

- today as i ate a prepackaged "enchilada wrap" in the hallway of a bleak builing at CCSF, i considered that i often think of how much better things are going to be later on. this is a classic pitfall. it seems particularly erroneous to me, because i can remember times when that was certainly not a way i would think. there is some kind of escapism occuring there, and it should be kept under surveillance.

- another thing i realized today at CCSF is that i'm fine with attending classes merely for the sake of learning. though i do have some ideas about ultimate paths or goals, i also just very much enjoy schooling, and am happy with continuing it in whichever context strikes me as interesting.

- it is time for my recurring reminder that life is not something to battle against.

i just spent some time moderating new confessions on grouphug.us. they are mostly all the same: "i cheated on my boyfriend" and "omg i fell in love with someone on aim but he doesn't know i have a baby." but as i was going through them, i found one where the person confessed that he/she flexed their shoulderblade muscles all the time, because that was where their wings were going to grow in. it made me smile.

1. conversation about bloggers rights going on outside office door
2. my body has a strong smell

3. blinking seems very luxurious

4. caffiene level: increasing steadily

5. digesting: salad

6. paranoia level: moderate

7. undirected sense of longing

8. very drawn to "spacing out," or, stopping to let head fall slightly to one side while engaging in slowed down form of aforementioned luxurious blinking

9. sense of pressure about answering that one last question on the midterm. the question about descartes. shit.

10. desire to drown out bloggers rights conversation with headphone action

11. squinting

12. ok.

just got home from being out dancing and hooping. oliver, jim, heidi, aaron, joel, john, quincy. i met jason the hoop masta, laid in a pile of stuffed animals, danced a lot, and generally felt good and comfortable.
i smell so strongly right now!

the sky is a beautiful shade of indigo, and i hear the mourning doves making their comforting familiar call. i've heard them in every home i've ever had in SF.

today, we roamed all around pacific heights. we found heretofore unknown nooks, stairways, and hills. we gawked at majestic palaces of the rich and possibly famous. we shopped, we ate pizza, we went to an abandoned estate sale, and then we came home and oliver made us salad.

now i'm here naked, about to get in the shower and wash off all the sticky dried sweat. oliver rigged up the curtains so we can sleep late into the day in darkness, and now he's making soup. he's really been taking care of me in the last few days. such a sweetie.

the laptop situation is still unresolved, but i don't feel like asking you guys for money any more, it just seems not quite right and makes me feel silly. i have a few readings out of it, though, which is nice. i need to get an astrology resume up, and make some bidness cards!

ok shower and sleep.
hugs.

i am wearing special new pants today. i can't wait for oliver to get done with his bike ride and upload the photo of the special pants.
update: turn your head sideways to view pants