The Importance of the Background and the Everlasting Image

The cherry blossoms came early this year. We had a 70 degree couple of days, and the two trees across from my apartment were in instant bloom. Huge, full of pink and white blossoms. It usually happens like that with me. I'll be so busy and preoccupied with life that all of a sudden I'll take a look outside and see an explosion of color against a bright blue sky.

It's so picturesque.

Cherry blossoms from down on the Mall from a couple years back.

I only drove by the Tidal Basin on Wednesday on my way to work, and most of the trees were still sealed up, cozy in their buds, awaiting a warm day to start to come out. I don't know if they're in bloom yet, I haven't been back down there to check. The colors of the trees on that Wednesday did make me do a double take. It was such a burgundy maroon color. Such a dark red, but not the winter brown of a foliageless tree. The hue of red suggested a pensiveness for the entire collection of branches. Like they were spring-loaded, waiting for the far flung radiation from our purveyor of life to energize the atmosphere above the right threshold. Those springs were still so, so patient, their thermocouples still obeying the cold, still holding their connections. 

All of this was conveyed via that comforting, all embracing deep red-purple of the branches swaying in the gentle breeze as stop-and-go traffic shuttled me to work that day.

 

 

The sunset in question is to the right of the photo, but the light on Mount Saint Helens was so much more interesting to look at.

I like the grandeur, the dazzling, the spectacle. It is fun to look at. Engaging, exciting, entertaining. There have been many times I've climbed to a mountaintop, shuffled up the dunes, or simply relaxed by the sawgrass to enjoy a beautiful sunset. The colors, the vistas, and awe of it all always pleases my senses. But I also always ensure to turn around and to examine the 360 degree observation. Like taking a photo sphere, but in real life.

 I usually find myself lost in gradients that sit in the background. The seamless transitions of photons interacting with the cones of your eyes. There are rarely bands back there, no defined edges, no lines. Yet somehow the color does change. No matter at what point you look there is no boundary, but nonetheless, move your eyes to another patch of sky, and there will be a different color there.

But it's the more subdued nature of the background that I like as well. The less flashy, quieter and more reserved of nature. The stuff that doesn't make the pictures.

The view backwards from the sunset at Oregon Dunes National Recreation Area.

I've always been a fan of appreciating the background. It's unsung, hidden, almost a collection of its own away from the main attraction. There are multitudes of stories back there, just waiting to be heard, to be seen, to be experienced. Back there is a refuge for those who don't like the spotlight, for those who need a safe place to be. An accepting place to be. A place that has no expectations of what you should be, only that you... are. 

The main act is pretty, it is flashy, but it also are the ideals to which others expect beauty. You go to see a sunset, you kindle disappointment when it's cloudy. You drive on the Parkway only for the vistas to be covered in mist and for the drive to be cold and soggy. You try to get the perfect picture of the cherry blossoms on their branches, only to discover they've all been blown off the trees.

A misty day at Clingman's Dome in Tennessee

I like to see the aura of muted colors that give the clouds their unique light as the sun disappears under the horizon. The enchantment of the forest as you can see the water hang in the air, like a curtain protecting the forest and embracing you along with it. The blossoms that coat the ground like snow and provide such a sweet fragrance to accompany the beautiful vibrant leaves you stroll under. There is beauty in the remnants, as much as there is excitement in the actual occasion itself. An image that lasts onward even though the time is done, but somehow carries forward into the future.

Making it Through Alive

I volunteered today at Peirce Mill. It's hard to remember that I've been volunteering down there since 2017 or so. It's hard to believe that in two years I will have been in our nation's capitol for a decade. I don't like the passage of time. It terrifies me.

But at the same time there are everyday moments where I'm sitting and thinking to myself: I think things will turn out alright. Like when petting the cats, or just enjoying a quiet time sitting out in the brisk 55 degree day waiting for visitors to walk up to me. When it seems like all the ills of the world melt away, and I forget that I am a being who, like all things in this world that I hold close and dearly, will eventually perish.

I tend to go through these swings whenever I am having a great time: In those instant moments with others, I detach myself from the constant entropy that is straining to separate my molecules, and instead I am engrossed in the joy of the laughter, the company, and the assembly of whatever collective I find myself in. I am completely oblivious to the four dimensional pressures constantly issued upon my body and my soul. Only afterwards, once the moment has passed and I am back by myself, do I collapse in my own brain and try to not shutter at the fact that all of this will end. It's a yo-yo effect that I don't like to experience, but one that is necessary if I want to try and make it through this thing alive.

I've also found times of peace when I am with myself. A while back I found myself stuck with a bunch of very fine medically sterilized needles inserted not even a couple millimeters into my skin. (Yes, this is something I willingly subject myself to on a biweekly basis, and it seems to actually help, although I can by no means explain nearly the beginning of how it works.) Anyways, sitting in the chair, I started thinking masks we wear to perform for the infinite types of situations and people we find ourselves around through our lives. Then a heady kind of thought came to me: What if, at the end of the day (or year, or season of life, or hell, life in general) we come home to ourselves and store the masks we've been wearing, only to find:  

There is no true mask that lies underneath. 

What if we have no true, authentic self? 

I get this feeling sometimes when I get a chance to stop having fun, or stop fretting about the ultimate frivolity of all experience. I'll be sitting in the recliner, or laying in bed, and just not put another mask on when I'm with myself. I become this nebulous white noise of a mind, mostly empty, but still conjuring little flitters of feelings every now and then: 

• A concern about something I need to do here
• A twinge of nostalgia about times lost to me there
• My lower back being grumpy and not shutting up about it
• Concern about me not wanting to do stuff I like to do, and being worried it's a new season of depression with the debut episode
  

It's not a complete emptiness of my experience, but a quieting down of the constant stimulus that fills my reality. And once I can shush the sparks of neurons firing away up there in that grey matter, I try to remind myself that: Yes, it is okay to be white noise for a bit. It's okay to just hangout, and, I don't know, just be a rock.

It's comforting. It's not a state I want to be in forever, but it reassures me that changing back from the white-noise-state to another obligation of life is guaranteed, and will happen, and that while it seems daunting to shift back over, I'll want to eventually.

The familiarity of the life that I've settled into is scary. It's not scary because it's something new, but because it's something I'm enjoying more and more by the day. I never thought I would root this much, and my teenage self is still inside my brain screaming for me to stop. I promised myself I would never come to this, let alone actually... Like it. But every day it seems to worm its way farther into my consciousness: 

"You are doing great." 

"You live in a place you like." 

"You have friends you love and adore."

"You are secure."

And the kicker (for me) being that most of these things are made wholesomely true through the collective that has gathered around me and that I've chipped in to help build. I have forged relationships with others that are unlike most out there in the world. Our collective is constantly working to secure our foundations against atomic separation, and to keep those molecules linked together because: We have built something that works for us. And by god, while none of us make it out of here alive, we can make it through alive.

Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing, There is a field. I'll meet you there.

When the soul lies down in that grass,The world is too full to talk about.
Ideas, language, even the phrase each other
Doesn't make any sense.


This Rumi poem came to my mind (as cliché as it is) recently when thinking about binaries. The machine I'm writing this on right now uses binaries for operations, but so much of our world falls outside of the realm of two options. One could argue that even the transistors within this machine are also not a simple "OR" gate. The stream of energy that moves between the two end points can be broken down into a Zeno's paradox of motion when an outside electrical force is applied. The distances become ever smaller, but is there ever an absolute resolution when you have an infinite number line?


It is comfortable to believe there are fixed states- but what we know of the universe so far shows us that unchanging possibilities only clarify once we look. That's just my cursory understanding of it at least. I don't think the fields can be used to create straight up magic acts of healing or miracles, but I do believe in the proliferation of entanglement. I like to believe that the bonds we build between elements means something, and can affect the world, even if it is in miniscule, almost undetectable ways. Actions and intentions do matter, whether those be entwinements be electrical paths via our neurons (or possibly even smaller structures), or the more complex acts of vulnerability and experiences we forge with others.


Another good metaphor for this experience could be rainbows, and their indelible bands of colors that have no defined borders. A spectrum of light our retinas can detect when light passes through water droplets, seemingly starting and stopping with whatever range our cone cells within our eyes can handle. We know there are more bands though, well beyond what we can see, and it expands forever into the expanse from the warmth of life-giving combustion 23 minutes away. Connections between atoms that permeate into the infinite, radiating forever.






The beauty of human connections is that they mimic these natural connections. The range of relation holds no endpoints and no finalities as long as consent is granted from the parties, and the electrons can be shared or even exchanged between the individuals. Bonds can be formed in many ways: in passing exchange, in linked chains, or complex folded proteins that twist upon themselves. It takes knowledge and creation to figure out exactly how those attachments work. Sometimes you need to write the communication manual yourself, but often there are existing foundations that will lend you a hand. And sometimes the manual need not be specific, as long as there is agreement amongst all that: Yeah, things are undefined, but we think that's the best way to go about it right now.


And all things change. Those very particles that only settle once observed all have the probabilities to end up somewhere else- on another path, on another destination. Consensus about their connections is not set upon the firmament, to be unchanging forever. It is malleable. The instructions can show you how to unwind those strands; how to rearrange them; or how to let them go. We create our own guides.






But thinking about it too much can draw oneself away from that field. It is okay to accept that your connections are complex, lie in the middle of that meadow, and let your ideas, language, and phrases not make sense.

Good Friday & The Like

On April 14th I attended the Good Friday service at All Souls, Unitarian in Washington DC. It was a tenebrae service, based upon a tradition of worshiping in the shadow of the cross, in the darkness of the crucifixion. I did not know what to expect, but what I experienced was very powerful, and awe-inspiring. The combination of the church's organ and soloist with the story of death, betrayal, and fear affected me. My main focus was not of Judas's kiss, nor Peter's denial.

I focused on Jesus' fear of death.

How he threw himself down in prayer in the garden, asking if his betrayal and death be passed on. How his disciples fell asleep and could not stay with him in his time of thought and need. Jesus was alone with his thoughts of impending death, praying three times, checking in on his disciples between each prayer, and seeing their weakness. I cannot even begin to fathom his spirit's condition at that moment. But I do see a glimmer of my own fear of death and passing on.

It comforts me to see someone as highly regarded and holy as Jesus Christ have a fear of death. So often through the Midwestern narrative of Christianity, Jesus is portrayed as the all and ever loving idol who teaches the unrelentingly loving message of God. There is nothing wrong with him in the least. He holds no anger (except that one time in the Temple), he loves all people unconditionally and without pause, and he teaches lessons that I would eventually use myself.

But during the time in the garden we see Jesus scared and fearful. He is not stoic about his responsibility. He asks if his duty can pass. He agonized over his future death for three hours, at least. This scene allows me to relate to Jesus. While I do not know if my death is imminent, it is comforting to see a holy man fear his death. Many a-time I've stared at the ceiling in the dark after a long day and wondered why I must die as well. What does that mean for me, and the future of eternity after I'm gone? This usually happens after I've had a good day. I wonder why I have to leave this wonderful earth and all of it's beautiful inhabitants.


And then there is the actual moments leading up to, and involving the death of Jesus. Depending on what/how you read the story you will hear different things, but two things stand out to me:

The moment before death where Jesus calls out: "E′li, E′li, la′ma sa‧bach‧tha′ni?", which is translated from Aramaic to: "My God, My God, why have you forsaken me?" This moment means a lot to me. It is a show of desperation from Jesus, and really sends shivers down my back every time I read it or think about it. In his final moments Jesus calls aloud his abandonment in his time if need, and his leaving of his earthly body. Even while he accepted his responsibility in the garden, he still showed his desperation before his death. It just makes me hesitate for a moment, and I hope I can come to terms with my mortality before my passing, and that I will not be fearful.


The second item that brings me hope though is something that sticks with Jesus' all-encompassing love. It is earlier on when he says "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." This phrase connects directly in support of the idea of radical love. Radical love is the method of social change I subscribe to. Radical love is believing that every single human being is good, and that only through an appeal of love and forgiveness can we bend the moral arc of the universe towards justice. The idea/phrase is most associated with The Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King Jr. and his efforts for justice in the civil rights movement of the 1960's. But there was a reason Martin Luther King Jr. was a Baptist Reverend first, and a Doctor second.

But back to Jesus. This moment of radical love shows the emphasis Jesus places on loving everyone, even if they are the ones to crucify him. To me, the fact that through all of his agony, and through all of his trials, he still holds radical love for his executioners, and that they should be forgiven because they have been misled and they hold only a veil of anger and hatred over their ultimately Good souls.

I think that is why I like All Souls and Unitarian Universalism (UU) so much. The UU faith has no dogma, nor canonical literature, but we do have our seven principles, and those come from a plethora of religious backgrounds and faith traditions. Those seven principles guide my life, and help me to carryout the best I can do in my everyday life. They include:

1. The inherent worth and dignity of every person
2. Justice, equity, and compassion in human relations
3. Acceptance of one another and encouragement to spiritual growth in our congregations
4. A free and responsible search for truth and meaning
5. The right of conscience and the use of the democratic process within our congregations and in society at large.
6. The goal of world community with peace, liberty, and justice for all
7. Respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a apart

To me Jesus' story is one of hope and offers a wonderful reflection of a mortal man who had everlasting love for people. It fits directly into the Unitarian Universalist narrative. I've always had a tinge of cynicism about Christianity, especially how it is used sometimes in modern contexts. Yet, there is a way that Jesus' love, messages, and teachings really get to me. I'm not exactly sure of a definitive higher power that gives intentionality to life. But because Jesus claims be the son of that God, I have hope that, if that power is out there, they are an ever-present love that emanates across life.

All Souls, Unitarian DC. Easter Sunday service. Packed to the gills with people, guy playing the organ, choir singing. It was a beautiful day, if not a little warm, and I enjoyed the service very much.

Friendship and Reliance on Others

Those of you who know me really well may know that while I may be happy much of the time, I struggle a lot with confidence and sometimes I can get into some pretty large swings of negativity and self-doubt. This entry is a short addendum to the main blog post I put up over on my main blog "Washington to Washington". Click on the title there, or you can check out the most recent blog post here: "Capital Bikeshare and Exercise in the District"

I tend to rely heavily on friends when I enter into these spirals, and I have one specific friend to thank to bring me out of the negativity after I received the diagnosis of pre-diabetic. I will not name her here because I'm not sure if she wants to be mentioned in this blog, but needless to say I have her to thank for getting me up and out to do some sort of activity.

I try to appreciate and keep up with my friends, but I've been doing a really bad job of it lately. I know I'm not on Facebook as much as I should be, and I'm not as responsive as I should be when friends contact me. I can't make excuses for myself, but I can try to acknowledge some of the great times and people I've been missing since I graduated and we all went our separate ways.

College is still a time I look back upon nostalgically. Yeah, the last days of college were over three years go, but I still remember many a nights playing Rock Band and Mario Kart on the Wii, and dragging Magic The Gathering games out for hours. But the smaller instances are starting to fade. Like many of the great times in Gladfelter, and the in jokes and experiences I had when I was a freshman and sophomore. That was almost over 7 years ago now. Four years in college seemed at the time to last forever. But then the day came when I had to say goodbye to the campus, and leave my room for one last time. That was a weird night. I relied on my roommate and one of my best friends for that.

I also remember the many times at Waffle House at 3 in the morning with a couple of guys. We'd go out after hours of game play, and we'd sit at the bar and eat our breakfast plates and drink our coffee.

One of my fondest memories was driving around with friends. Be it to get a game, see a new place, or simply go into town. I loved to be with so many people.

I would call myself an introvert, but introvert in it's true form of the word. I'm not one who is shy or ambivalent about going somewhere (although I would say I sort of am now being alone a majority of the time), but one who needs to recharge after being in a demanding social situation. It doesn't mean I dislike the social situations. I just need a break from them every now and then.

This blog is more of a rambling stream of consciousness style rather than anything too thoughtful and constructed. I did have a negative section here, but I decided to take it out because I really wasn't in the mood to share my low feelings. It's been a couple of days, and I've read over this a little more, and realize that life is good, and that while bad things have been happening, we have victories as well. And I really need to take more time to look and reflect more on those instead of living in the past.

Needless to say, thank you to all of my friends who I have relied on in the past and keep touch with me to this day. I know I may be more hidden and holed away now more than ever, but you all still play such a huge role in my life, and I couldn't imagine a world without you all.

Columbus, COTA & Race

I went on an adventure today.

Columbus has always been a looming city over my small town mentality. In all of my exploring of cities around the country, and around the world, I never really took time to get to know the city that has been closest to me for the longest. My mentality of discovery never seemed to apply to Columbus.

It is probably because I grew up here. I was raised in the time when the media only portrayed the city as the "bad place" where the "bad things" happen. Where people who were different from me would do bad things to me if I went anywhere near where they lived. There was always a "bad" part of town, and rarely was there a "good" part of town. The line was solid and bold. There was an "us versus them" attitude. Yet I left to go explore other cities that held the same connotation.

Once I made it out, I had the culture and the media dampened from my senses. No longer was the city a "bad" place, and the countryside a "good" place. The dichotomous perceptions fell apart and fractured. I wasn't hemmed in by my surrounding culture anymore, and I was free to explore and discover. Yet I started small.

I stayed within the small comfortable zone of our college campus for a while when I first started at Warren Wilson. The whole experience of going to college was such a huge impact for me that I couldn't start exploring quite yet. When I eventually made it to Asheville, my drive for uncovering "place" really began.

My first bus ride in was exhilarating, yet terrifying. I had never been on a public bus before! Show your ID to the driver, and that's it? Okay, well I take it I'll know when I get into the city. I don't know exactly where I'm going. Wait. The bus doesn't stop at every stop? How will he know when I want to get off? Well crap. I reached the end of the line, at the terminal, with no idea/clue of the city I was in.

Secretly I enjoyed every minute of it.

Asheville remained the largest city I routinely visited for four years. I thought it was everything a city should be. It had everything! A transit system, a vibrant downtown, lots of shops, festivals, and really great food. Then I moved to Vancouver, Washington.

The population difference still astounds me to this day. Asheville, the hub of it all for the Blue Ridge Mountains only clocks in around 87,000 people. Whereas Vancouver adds up to over 160,000. It is so much more, that you have to add a new place to the number. Yet it did not feel as vibrant as Asheville. Nowhere as unique, vibrant, or exciting. There are two areas of Vancouver worth talking about for any middle class white person: Uptown and Downtown. Asheville had Prichard Park, Lexington Avenue, West Asheville, the River Arts District, the Grove Arcade, along with several within-easy-driving-distance outlying communities like Black Mountain, Fletcher, Woodfin, and Weaverville.

Needless to say, Vancouver was not the city I was expecting it to be. The city was too residential, and not unique enough. While it was larger than Asheville, I felt trapped by it's size. In the interim I've explored all kinds of cities on short notice. I spent six weeks in Barcelona, and found refuge in Portland (across the river from Vancouver.)

Seattle, Pittsburgh, Washington DC, New York City, Indianapolis, San Francisco, Las Vegas, New Orleans, Santa Fe, Albuquerque, Chicago, Omaha, Cleveland, Wheeling, Knoxville, Lexington, Cincinnati, Tampa, Spartanburg, Birmingham, Saint Louis, Dublin (Ireland), Charlotte, Virginia Beach, Charleston (West Virginia), Tarragona, Huntington. These are just some of the cities I've visited, passed through, and explored.

Yet here I was in Columbus. On a bus riding down Livingston Avenue, going for an adventure once again.

The landscape of east Columbus is quite striking. First you pick up the bus at a Park & Ride in Reynoldsburg, a nice suburban town with little pedestrian infrastructure but overall nice layouts. Crossing into Whitehall you then get the glimpse of what white flight can do to a neighborhood. Houses are boarded up, crumbling, and the bus violently shakes with the potholes in the ill-kept road. Businesses have bars over the windows to prevent break-ins, and are painted with that 70's shade of white that is not quite there. As if on queue though, this is where the bus picks up the most amount of it's riders.

Up to this point, I am the only white rider on the bus. It was apparent that I was the odd man out. But not many people seemed to mind, and while I was uncomfortable (for reasons I knew very well of, and talk about in other posts), I enjoyed feeling unsettled. It offered me a chance to reexamine myself, and to ask: Why do I feel this way?

While I can't speak for other routes or services, it is clear to me that on the East side of Columbus, COTA is mainly utilized by people of color. I did not see anyone remotely close to my skin color on the entire route. We passed right through the affluent (and white) Bexley, and didn't pick up a single person. Why don't white people ride the bus here? In Vancouver there were lots of white people who rode. Granted, they were lower on the income scale, but maybe it is because of demographics?

Actually, just researching this, I got a new clarity on demographics. Columbus' population is 28% black, where Vancouver's population is only ~3% black. Even enlarging the region to include Portland would explain the demographic gap: Portland's population is 6.8% black. That would explain why I was the only white guy on the bus.

Or would it?

While the proportions may be a large influence, there was still an inconspicuous lack of white people on other routes I took around town. Why aren't white people riding the bus?

Let's get real folks. It's race. Remember that feeling I talked about at the beginning of this entry? Where the city was "bad" and the country was "good"? That was good ol' rural American racism talking. When we saw terrible things on the news, it always included people of color. The good stories always focused on white people. Where I was raised was the reason that, even though I have exposed myself to all kinds of people, I felt uncomfortable on the bus. It runs deep. And I'm working against that which my culture hammered into me when I was young.

And it doesn't reside solely in rural America. I would guess the exact same reason is why we did not stop in Bexley, and why I was so often the only white face on the buses throughout that day.

And I love the fact that I can go and observe and learn. Because it makes me a better person. I would recommend others do the same. Go take a bus ride around your town and simply look. Listen to the people on the bus, their stories, and their struggles. Go eat some food you've never tried before. Experience others.

Travels, Work & Updates

Over this past couple of days I drove my sister back down to Tulane University in New Orleans for her to resume her freshman year of college. I didn't quite know what to get from this kind of journey because I had a rental car, did a lot of night driving, and visited Mammoth Cave again for a second time.

Let's get the exciting trip stuff out of the way first:

At Mammoth Cave I took a more detailed cave tour than I did the first time i was there. The tour was the Dripstones & Domes tour, and led down 300 feet of vertical cave shafts and across a long cave passage to the Frozen Niagara formations, and back out the other side of the ridge. It was quiet a spectacle to behold.

Sadly I didn't take many pictures because I was too busy being in awe of everything around me. Also I've been developing this question of why I should take pictures when I should be experiencing what I am doing in full when I am doing it. (But that is for another post.)

As a compensation, have a picture of me driving the rental across one of the last rural ferries in the Eastern United States:

After visiting a creepy church built in 1842, we drove down to Birmingham, stayed the night in a hotel, and then the next day to New Orleans.

I moved my sister in, and then we went to a nice dinner and had some delicious ice cream among the mid 60 degree weather. I booked an Airbnb for the stay that night, and then in a small suburb south of Nashville called Spring Hill for the drive back North. While in New Orleans I did meet a really sweet cat outside my Airbnb whose name was Fergal, and was so docile and wanted attention. Sitting down on the porch, petting him, enjoying the damp, cool air, and hearing the bustle around me. I was truly happen then, and just wished I could keep that fleeting feeling.

The pretty Fergal baby. This was the only time I could get a good picture of him,
other times he just kept rubbing up against my arm.

All in all it was an uneventful drive back North; the same way I'd come with a little deviation to Jackson, Mississippi because I thought I'd be able to drive the Natchez Trace Parkway back to Nashville. I didn't end up driving it because it had gotten too dark by then.



So the search for work goes on. I am in a bind because i want to be in a place that values work and where the employees are dedicated, enthusiastic, and invested in what they are doing. The places with job openings are old, traditional, and/or status quo, and I usually don't have the experience to apply.

The places I want to work don't have open positions, or haven't responded to the one's I've applied to.

I'm worried there will never be a place I want to work. I'm worried that all of the places out there are dedicated volunteers working for little to no pay, or are miserable desk jobs that sustain a living. That there is no equal medium. But I try to not let that worry me too much. I just have to keep saying I will find something. (I mean it's only been a couple of months, so I really shouldn't be worrying too much yet.)



As for my personal life: I don't know what to really think. The holiday depression comes and goes, and I take solace in the fact that there are people out there who love me, and care about how I am. Now that I am in a hopefully short transition between two points in my life, I am reevaluating what decisions I've made, and how I can go forward from those decisions to try and make things better.

I also keep telling myself that it is my brain that plays these tricks on me, and that I need to keep up with the checks I have in place to make sure I can reign it back in to a manageable level and get my headspace back on track. I need to muster up the effort needed to overcome my apathy and get some shit done.


I feel as though there should be some nice ending to go here that is all inspiring and stuff, but I can't quite seem to get anything. I'm sure things will turn up. Just gotta give it time.

It Takes All Kinds

Today at work I had a volunteer with a disability come in and volunteer for a couple of hours.

First and foremost: I use what is known as "people-first language". I'm no social justice warrior or super involved activist: I just believe good use of language helps beat back stigmas and stereotypes about people. Throughout this article, when referring to people who have a disability, I will use... Well that exact term: A "person with a disability". See, people-first. It's not that hard, is it?

Anyway. A part of my work is discovering, recording, and addressing transportation needs for people with disabilities. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out why transportation resources would be important for these folks: Wheelchairs, walkers, and lack of sight or hearing don't make well for independent driving.

As part of my AmeriCorps VISTA* work I did lots around said above topic. So I met this person a while back, and they just joined our team to help implement the 1-Call/1-Click Transportation Resource Center (1/1 TRC).** Today they were testing out the website, and giving some feedback and looking for bugs and user experience issues.

We talked before about anything they may need to better help their volunteer work at the office, and eventually we agreed it'd be best for them to bring a personal laptop since it's already setup for their circumstances. And today I learned all about those awesome alternative setups for computers, usability, and work.

First off: A Dvorak keyboard layout-

As you can see, it's a little different. This is the "Right-Handed version, which works wonderfully for the volunteer because they can only use their right hand.

I was showing said volunteer the website I wanted them to test, and I kept slipping up and just automatically going to my QWERTY keyboard layout that I had learned on. Every little automatic result that I was trying to do h7z wq orbune un 7 ay.quen wswicq tswicq ya uwb8s7 cy.qwg***

After that, I was hunting-and-pecking typing, feeling like I was back in grade school.

Another observation/privilege check I discovered was navigating the web and technology in general. I was able to fly through Google Maps and directions, opening tabs and searching things to my hearts content. On the other side of the equation, the volunteer had to take their time navigating through the web. One hand would only get you so far when whizzing around the Windows GUI.****

Not realizing this yet, I was quite surprised when they asked for a phone book to look up addresses with, instead of just directly searching for the resources in the community via the web. Of course we found them one, and they went about their volunteer shift.

But who would have known, right?

I took the rest of the day after the volunteer left to think about my abled privileges and how they put on the blinders and shielded my view from a full 114° of reality. I took a moment to think: "Wow. I haven't even remotely considered any of what I learned today."

And then I sat back and was reminded of a line from a poem I heard once read aloud at an open mic:

"It takes all kinds lord. It takes all kinds."

*VISTA = Volunteers in Service to America

**This has basically been the last two years of my life. If you want to know more about it, just ask sometime.

***See? I just changed the keyboard to a Dvorak layout and that's what came out. Put's your QWERTY perspective in check doesn't it? (The actual thing I meant to type was this: "had me typing in a foreign mumble jumble of impsua lorem."

****GUI = Graphical user interface. Also, the volunteer could use a little bit of their left hand, but their disability prevented them from using it for complex and taxing tasks such as navigating a QWERTY keyboard and/or the web.

Points of Light & Planes

So here we are: Three weeks and one hell of a ride.

My life has been in spitz and spirals as it goes ever upwards. Planes are funny things. There is a point on the Interstate 205 Glenn Jackson Bridge where you have a great view of Mount Hood. But under the auspices of the night all that you have are the Portland city lights. And the airport.

Now not an enthusiast for the Portland International Airport. I think it's silly that there is currently a campaign to save the 20 year old carpet. (See more here for that.) But I have found it a nostalgic place for my time out here. For over half of the folks I have hosted and showed this place, I've met them, and dropped them back off at the Portland International Airport. Do I think it's America's Best Airport? Not really. I really, really hate the Jeopardy! game show font and style they use for informational signs on the TV screens. The airport is not really that big, and therefore doesn't really have any good options for those late night flights.

I do like crossing the I-205 Glenn Jackson Bridge at night, and watching the lights of the airplanes coming in though. It's a perplexing sight really. The airplanes take an approach perpendicular to Interstate 205 to land on the runways that somewhat parallel to the Columbia River. So as you see planes coming in at night, they usually sit simply as a point of light in the distance. Their shape doesn't change until they are very close to the highway and airport because, from the drivers point of view, they are flying directly towards you. And because there are usually multiple planes coming in for approaches, there are usually multiple dots of light just sitting around the highway.

This is actually the moon. It was ridiculously large that night.
I don't have a camera good enough to capture incoming planes. 

Things are different from the flyers point of view. If you take an easterly approach during the day, you pass over the Cascade mountains, and follow the Columbia River (if you can see it) into the Portland area. The view is beautiful and the plane gives great views of ultra high mountains in the region. It is a very amazing thing to see in the distance.

If you are approaching at night, despite your direction, you usually can see Portland off in the distance. As you approach the city, you start to descend, inching ever closer to this large black ribbon that cuts right through what looks to be the city of Portland. You may get a good pan of the city if you need to take a westerly approach, as you bank, but as you lower down, you get closer, and closer to that ribbon. Then you find out it's water. And that is indeed, as you thought, a massive river, and maybe this plane turns into a pontoon landing! But there is nothing to worry about. The runway is literally a quarter of a mile from the waterfront, and the plane lands safely on dry land.

Flying in and out of the region has given me that all familiar privileged feeling of landing back in a place you know. If you've flown, or even driven places, you know that feeling. That feeling that you are back in your comfort zone, one that you've missed for even a little bit, and things will keep moving, and will continue.

The Quiet Section of the Library

I find that I come here often to just simply catch up on life, write, reflect, and enjoy the shared silence among everyone. It serves as a really nice place to simply come relax and unwind after the workday.

It is raining today. I'm listening to Death Cab for Cutie, which is one of my favorite things to do when the gray envelops the world. I will admit it. I'm a sucker for cheap indie music.

It hasn't rained here in a while, and I think that is overall a good thing for the land. Snow pack and reservoirs are running low and dry, and it is well needed for all. Yet there is something that strikes me as an initial dulling of the senses as it rains. The condensed air crowds around the city and hills, and is draped over all the region for miles. It's almost a trapped sort of feeling, not letting you move around and explore. Keeping you confined to your house, your place of work, or your mode of transport.

As if on queue, a fire is lit up behind me in the fireplace, warming the area, and helping to drive the sense of a closeted cold away, and bring life into the space. The Chinook did this same thing during their winters, making sure the fires were always stoked and warming their plankhouses. There is something about the warmth of it all that counteracts the splashing sheerness of the rain.

I do like the mystery of the rain and the clouds, and how they lay low across the city. It's amazing to watch a slow crawl of gray cover the very buildings you were once looking down upon just moments earlier. But I have yet to embrace it. In light of all this, who knew there could be so many feelings for rain?

Being in the Northwest has given me many different feelings for a simple form of liquid vital to life. I never was aware that it could take on such an attitude, personality, or complexity. Who knew that such a simple condensation could bring and take life from a place, and manipulate the emotions of a person so much?

Commitment

I am rambunctious. I work to go to the deeper issues. The issues that prevent the whole harbor from moving skyward.

Many of you may know, but I am a fan of the saying "A rising tide lifts all ships."

Being at another conference, I am again enriched with the idea that there are those out there that take pride in what they do, and that they are helping others live the lives they want to. But there is still something missing.

What is it about enthusiasm that brings out a sense of hope in people? Is the working world really devoid of that many people who take their work seriously and produce a quality product for time invested? Are there really not that many passionate people out there?

I always knew being passionate was a good trait, but every time I speak somewhere, it seems as though people are really, really taken aback by my commitment to my work and my task. I know that the non-profit world moves slowly, but has the current of innovation and investment really slowed to a sludge?

I like to shake things up. I like to get at the deeper issues. Past the surface level celebrations, and into the core problems of why we need to reexamine and begin to shift the underlying paradigm behind why these issues exist in the first place.


Example:

So many people at this conference I'm attending simply act like the fact that the car-centric planning of suburbs and different communities is a solid, concrete fact and something we must deal with.

I say let's trash the car-centric view, and not put up with having to lament in the fact the public cannot simply walk to many of their community services. Let's build new communities and infrastructure to combat these core issues. We can promote community health, personal health, and a better landscape and future for all! (Not to mention the economic benefits of saving on transportation costs, and the return on investment for new businesses in pedestrian corridors!)


Or hell, let's not even trash the car-centric view! I believe the automobile is an essential part of American culture as much as any historian, but it's time we relegate it to a new spot among our everyday lives.

Let's use the automobile to go on personal exploration trips. The long haul places it was designed to conquer back in the 50's and 60's. The automobile is for personal discovery and enjoyment, not a simple, throw-away object to use to get back and forth from somewhere in a mundane cycle. Put that on transit operators and our sidewalks!*


This all leads me to my experience at the Mobility Management conference over the beginning of this week. It strikes me that I keep getting praised for "all the work that I've done" over the past year and a half, and that I have "made so much progress" with where I'm going and what I've been doing. I guess I don't quite get it.

I am not trying to be humble here. I know I've worked in great lengths and capacities to get to where I've gotten. I'm just surprised that others have taken so much notice. I genuinely do not understand why I have gotten so much praise and respect for something that I just consider a job well done that any entry level person could have done. I mean, VISTA isn't necessarily "entry level" skills, but it is a unique work style, and not very conducive to productivity and product completion.


I also don't quite get the questioning of why I am excited about developments that don't affect me. I talk about developments around transportation for seniors and people with disabilities as a little kid would talk about ice cream. I'm so excited they are happening. And then people ask "Well why are you excited? You're not old!"

I mean, come on people. It's not about me.

I've been thinking of what to do if I were to give a public comment at a C-Tran board meeting. I know doing so is very risky because of my VISTA position, and I do not want to mess that up. But if I were to do so, it would go along the lines of this:


I am Nick Ford, citizen and regular rider of C-Tran. I come to you today just to share a couple of ideas around transit and the future of your agency.

I am privileged enough to drive my car to work back and forth from work everyday, able enough to freely and easily move about, young enough to run and remember systems, and overall, would, in any other case, not need the transit system. Yet I choose to ride. Why?

I gripe about the inefficiencies and the backlogs. I complain about the comfort of the ride and the poor setup of our modern day dwellings and systems. But all that does not matter.

At a meeting recently I was asked as to why I was excited for an Honored Citizen All-Zone Day Pass. "You're not old!" someone exclaimed. See? That's why I ride transit.

I ride transit, because every time I do, it's a vote of confidence. One more rider to boost the numbers for access. One more boost to make sure that those without can.

That's the thing. It's not ABOUT ME. It's about EVERYONE. It's making sure that young family has a way to take their baby to the doctor. It's about that person in the wheelchair having a way to go to the park and enjoy a picnic on the grass. It's about the grandmother and grandfather being able to get fresh groceries to stay healthy.

See? You and I both have the privilege to do all of these things on our own, without needing assistance. But they do not. And it's not like I'm even playing them up to be inspirational stories or anything. I am looking out for their needs as human beings!

We need a system that is better. We need a system that is good. We need to bring ALL people into the transit system to ensure that folks who NEED the service get a better quality of service. We need not be selective in who the system helps. We advertise for all. We get people around, no matter their need.

So let's start planning, building, and living like it.

Walking the Path of a Novel

I was listening to a RadioLab/TED Radio Hour episode the other night about how we should look upon life, and it makes me think to those times when I live and see life.

I have often talked about this special feeling I get when I am absolutely comfortable with what and where I am living, and I feel at ease with things.

That feeling almost always happens when I travel back east to Ohio or to Warren Wilson College for homecoming. It has started to happen here, when I am out and about on a walk, hike, or geocacheing mission. I have started geocacheing, and I think that it has helped me see more of the places I'd otherwise not see. It gets me to investigate the micro level of things, and to get down and really dig into the dirt to find an cache. It also leads to points such as the image above, where you can see downtown Portland from up on the rise in Vancouver.

In that RadioLab/TED Radio Hour episode, they talked about the time and age old question of struggling with the fact of where this life leads us, and how we cope with death and the departure of what we think of as life. There was one part of the episode which really stuck out to me, and has helped calm my senses of where exactly I am going.

The speaker said that we should think of life as a book, with a beginning (birth), and an end (death), and that we should not worry ourselves with anything that came before the beginning or after the end of the book. Instead of being the outside reader of the novel, we are the characters in it, unknowing of what lies outside the story, and we should accept that. And it made total sense to me.

When we are reading a novel, watching a film, playing a game, or listening to music, there is only one method of storytelling tool that separates us from the narrative: the fourth wall. The idea that all three walls are there, setting the stage to let us look in, but the characters of the story are still separated from us and the outside world via the frontdrop, one which they cannot see past; the forth wall. Yet it is transparent to the viewer, and allows us to see through to observe the novel.

As you've probably heard before, there is a technique that takes finesse to pull off called "breaking the fourth wall", and it involves the characters of a narrative addressing and acknowledging the reader and the context outside the plot. Sometimes it's done terribly, sometimes it's done beautifully.

What has given me some calm about this though, is that as far as I'm concerned, I don't know if there is anyone reading my narrative, or if I'm living within a four walled and roofed story, but whenever I get overwhelmed, I keep in mind that the end chapter is there. And that I shouldn't worry about what lies outside my narrative, because my job is to experience the best of it that is there, and roll with the story.

But whenever I do get worried, I do at least know that all the walls aren't solid, and that windows do exist, and I can at least look outside and ponder about what may be beyond my narrative. But I try not to get too wrapped up in it all, because there is a whole novel to experience, and I want to keep on through those chapters.

The Winter Gathering

I sit here with at my triple screened desk tonight in wonder and amazement. I'm not quite sure how everything went down, but it was an amazing day.

Let me start out with a preface though:

I have been volunteering over the past half year or so with the Ridgefield Wildlife Refuge System at their educational Chinookan Plankhouse. The main season is during the summer, when the refuge is open, it's sunny, warm, and a great place to visit and walk.

Throughout the summer I am a docent who guides and interprets the Plankhouse and it's many artifacts to folks who visit. It's a very satisfactory job, culturally interpreting a traditional Chinookan structure, with many recreated and authentic artifacts inside.

I started the job to explore more about the native cultures of the area, and to learn what the Native American experience was on this side of the continent. So you probably could envision how excited I was when I was asked to volunteer at this year's Winter Gathering.



That is where my day begins.



I wake up around 8:00 AM, shower, and get cleaned up for the day. It's starting to become habit; waking up early and going to bed early. (I fight sleepiness even at this hour of 10 PM on a Saturday) Once I start driving, in a typical Northwest fashion, the rain picks up.

What a lovely day.

Once I arrive, only a handful of organizers are there, those who I have met and talked with before. I know most of them by name. I have not come prepared, for there is lots of mud. Lots of rain. But I run on the excitement of the day ahead.



Once my duties are done for the morning, I go to "hang out" in the Plankhouse, where there is a fire started in both of the pits, and folks are just beginning to trickle in and start chatting. Immediately I notice the fires, and how they bring the house to life.

I have come to have a passing friendship with the vice chair of the tribe, and as he and I talk, I can really see in him the identity of what it means to be "Chinook". He speaks of how the ceder begins to breathe, and how the light works its way onto the walls. The gathering of descendants of the ancestors helps to build the house again, and to reconstruct it's very meaning to the Chinook peoples. And I feel it too. I can see the warmth of the house coming to, radiating from the hearth.

This is in stark contrast to giving tours of the Plankhouse. When we give tours, we try to describe what it would have looked like back when Lewis & Clark came across the actual village of Cathlapotle, and how it would have functioned in the early 1800's. But there is no denying it. The Plankhouse is usually a dusty empty place usually devoid of the very culture we are interpreting.


That is why attending today was so important for me. As a steward and a volunteer docent of the Chinook culture and peoples, I want to experience the tribe today. I want to see the modern Chinook tribe. Their richness, reality, and retrospective on the past. And that is what I got today at the Winter Gathering.

I will not go into too much detail, as many parts of the Chinook culture are sacred and are not openly promoted or explained. I am extremely privileged and thankful though for the experience I saw and heard today. I acted primarily as an observer, taking it in. The only time where I even remotely participated was when I was invited to receive gifts for my volunteer service. I was allowed a chance on the floor; the sacred and blessed floor reserved for those of the tribe only. And with that invitation I received some tea and a beautiful necklace from the Chinook tribe. What amazing gifts that left me speechless.

All I can say to that is mahsie; thank you.

I've Got the Idea to Become a Professor

The more I think about it, the more I want to become a professor.

I was talking with one of my former professors from Warren Wilson today, and he has slowly started to convince me to look more and more into grad school and the profession of teaching.

When I talk about teaching, I guess I should add this little caveat: I do not, under any circumstance, want to teach primary, secondary, or public school. There are way too many politics and regulations around that field that I have seen too many good souls get crushed by.

I want to influence the next generation of thinkers through post-secondary education. I want to teach young students (such as myself) not what to think, but rather how to think.

There is such value in knowledge. Knowing your context, geography, culture, is hugely important. But that information is mostly out there through the wonderful medium of the internet. What you cannot get through the internet (or at least yet) is the face to face instruction to personally influence people to start to think on how to process the huge amount of information out there.

As in computer science, the way our mind parses information is quintessential to where it goes, and what the output is:

If you learn that the only way to learn things is through simple facts and "big figure" concepts (I would argue the "traditional" way to learn), you lose the intricacies that make up the whole picture. You see the macro-forest.

But if you learn to learn things through the small lens, you end up with a micro-forest, losing the bigger picture of greater meaning, and how things tie across places.

Going to a more primal way to view things, there could even be the idea of providing that "intrinsic motivation" as my professor called it. The actual curiosity to learn and not sit idly by.

I've noticed that in my travels and my rough transition into the "real world" I've found that a lot of people are not very deep or inquisitive thinkers. I don't mean this as a "deep thinker" way of philosophy, but rather just as a general curiosity about life and how and why things work. It just seems like a lot of people don't have that "intrinsic motivation" inside them.

I like to teach that to people the best way I can. There is a finesse to it. I try not to seem like a jerk about it, but I like to throw questions back on people, and see if they can solve it first. When I worked on the GIS Crew at Warren Wilson, this was my ethic, and usually it worked. When it comes to tech, I love to point people to the direction of Google and the wonderful search box/omnibox.

But why do people not look to these places as their first option? Is it simply that I am available in physical "meetspace" for immediate help? Do people get lost in Wikipedia articles? How about libraries? Is that something that I just assumed people do?

I ponder these questions, and I come back to the metaphor of the computer processor:

The brain acts like a computer. It takes information and data in through the senses, processes it among the billions of neurons and synapses of the brain, and yields an output, in the form of a cognitive thought or a realization.

How do other people's processors work? Why do they work like that? Are there overarching systems we can see among these thought processes? Or is teaching something you just "do"?

And why does it seem like some people's processors are wired to simply accept what is in front of them, and not investigate, ask questions, or search for more? Where is their "intrinsic motivation"? Isn't that a key human trait? If it isn't, then what else do people live for?

The Urban Forever

I miss being running around and being genuinely tired at the end of the day.

I've been galavanting around Portland for the second half of the day. I am beginning to re-realize the beauty of the public spaces in large cities.

I originally came in to meet a professor and hangout for a couple of hours. I arrived via transit (MAX Line), departed at the convention center, found him, and off we went, catching up on the past year and a half.

I had attended homecoming the year before, but since then the radar has fallen silent with professors and academia at Wilson. To be fair, I've been off doing my own thing, but catching up, talking about the college, and finally coming to terms that I have left, was very, very helpful.

I found a sort of closure talking to a professor about how the college is changing, and what that means for students, and the way forward. All the big stuff happened right after I left, so this year round', I was fully prepared to hear about all of the new toys and tech the college got. But I simply heard stories of improvements upon the previous awesome things I had seen the homecoming before. It was nice not having the "cool" things continue on like they had the first round.

I'm coming up on my second year. Second year in AmeriCorps; second year out of college; second year in the "real world". I guess the first year was the anti-honeymoon phase for me. I struggled. I really did. Thrown into a life of constant difference and discovery, my mind and body was very overwhelmed. It did a toll too, leaving regrets and thoughts that still need fill to this day.

But now I am going on. I am working into my second year. The area is familiar, the situations have been practiced, and I believe I'm a better person because of it.

Yet, I have discovered and solidified more of an idea of what exactly I want from life. Where I am going to live. What I am going to do. And it is becoming clearer to me that Vancouver is not what I want. I don't know if Portland is either.

But it sure comes closer.

The way I know? Because when I come into Portland for work, play, or study, I always never want to leave. The city is too big. Too beautiful. Too full of things to discover and enjoy. I want to bask in that wonder of the urban forever (or for a longer time than I can), and live in it. To experience it.

But it always turns out to be another Barcelona. Where I go in, I see, I like, I participate, but I never fully get there. There is always a cap. And I am always stuck on that hill at 6 in the morning, longing for more of that city I only barely scraped the surface on.

Lazing Around on the Grass

One of my favorite things about meeting new people is the things you do with them. The conversations you have. The sun you take.

But my god. It takes. For. Ever.



To be fair. I wasn't giving it much initiative, and because of that it was giving me little in returns.


Breaking out of that mold cast around yourself is tough. Well, it is for me.

Its strange, but when looking around, I guess college was much of the same for me. By the end of the first year and into the second year I was starting to take off. Maybe that will happen here? Why did it seem like I was so much more depressed when I was here?

I think it's because I came from something so beautiful. But I won't let that overtake my happiness I have right now.

It has been nice, being invited out to hangout with people. For some reason this time it was different.

There wasn't an air of "Go! Go! Go!", nor "We will have fun!". There was no guarantee of that on this trip. Nor really a promise of relaxation or enjoyment. Basically it was phrased as "You're pretty cool people. Wanna go out for lunch & ice cream? I have no idea what it will be like, but we've seen each other a couple times at "group" functions, so lets go do something cool together now?"

And it was wonderful because we did... Absolutely nothing.

Well that was somewhat true. We did have lunch and ice cream.

But then we just went to the lake, spread out a blanket, and sat and talked for three hours. And it was effortless. Sometimes when things were not meant to be said, we just sat in silence, and listened to our surroundings. The beautiful day. The park, with its birds, families, and waves.

It was so. Slow. It was wonderful. I haven't been able to slow down like that with people in over a year.

Sure, I've been able to do it by myself, but you know, I can only do so much slow by myself. Once the discoveries are gone, you start asking yourself ridiculous questions to pass the time. Whether that be hours in a car over a well worn path, or days throughout the same old neighborhood.

So being able to slow down with people provides an entire multitude of options. Instead of one set of eyes, now you have three, and they compare their perception with yours, and that takes up hours by itself. Let alone that some people haven't been to where you go before? That can entertain days.

Slowing down has been on my mind as of late. There's been a lot of talk of it at church*, in the air around work, and on the Facebook feed. But as much as people tout trying to slow down, I have yet to see evidence of someone slowing down.

Sure, there is an escape for a bit. But to get to that escape: Go!

After that escape: Go!

An escape in a car: Go! Can't be late! Gotta make (x)** deadline!

Taking off shoes after a long day and sitting on the couch: Go! Your butt needs moving!



I'm not saying people don't know how to get away. Not at all. Everyone gets vacations.

It's the fact that for many, the journey does not mark the beginning of an escape. The open road cannot call them back down to 5 mph over the speed limit instead of 15.

Can people not drop their rush when they say they do? Its just a Go! culture, I know, but I feel so alone (less so now) because I don't know many people who say "Wait. Just. Sit down for a minute."

I'll conclude with another experience I had with these wonderful new friends:

After eating some ice cream, we went out to the street, and just stood there talking for 20 minutes. Really. We just kind of ambled in the sun, then ambled into the shade, and then decided to go stop ambling and just sit around for a bit.

I've been missing that wonderful sense that at some times, time doesn't have to be the end all for whatever you are doing. The end all can just be when you get hungry for dinner, or a lull pulls you into sleep.




*This "church" is a Unitarian Universalist church. It's not like your average churches. I'd recommend it if you are questioning your faith, or can't find a place to be spiritual without being religious. Folks are REALLY accepting, and will welcome you no matter what.

**This deadline is usually completely made up. There is no meeting, or court mandated time. Its the person's own psyche telling them to complete the task at hand as quickly and efficiently as possible.

The Ramparts

It's a great life; it really is. But its complicated. Horribly complicated.

It's almost impossible to think of a macro-version of life. Too many decisions, too many fates, too many sliding scales for varying aspects of the human condition.

But I say almost because of our ability to draw maps, conceptualize consciousness, and make exceptions.

There was always a map/diagram down in the bottom of the science building at my alma mater, Warren Wilson College. I mean, to finish that thought, it always perplexed me. To this day I still don't know exactly what it was describing, but it was as tall as your standard wall and about 7 feet long. I think it had something to do about mapping the way proteins fold to replicate and build DNA, but I'm not quire sure.

Anyways, that map/diagram always caught my eye when I was down there. (Usually the few opportunities I had to have basic General Education classes for my science requirement.) I wondered if such a map could be drawn to explain the intricacies of the human condition. Or if it would just end up looking like a spectrum of different sliders, somewhat linked in a tentative dashed lines in certain places.

With the human mind, it's really impossible to classify something because of our ability to recognize opinions, and to choose them on our free will. I find it exceptionally annoying, but mandatory at the same time to retain the wonderfulness that fills us.

I see a lot of friends struggling with self-identity/life issues, either with themselves, or while comparing themselves with others. It's something I struggle with as well, like that ever present background app of "explorer.exe". Necessary to keep open (it is essentially your user interface for your computer, if running windows), but you can't exactly see it working because you are too busy using it to get to other applications.

Then you stop and examine each and individual bit running that background program. Its huge, unfathomable, and takes some time to "get" the picture of a system. Then it clicks. Suddenly you can see pretty much all of the classes.java which exist, and how they reference, link, and work with each other. Sometime a map helps (it sure does for me), but some folks can work it out on their own.

The mind is the computer, and it finally compiles the code, and returns it with no errors. You have the blueprint set up, now its on to debug the damn thing.

Debugging will lead you through how the blueprint is constructed , and that is where I am right now. Working through the problems. And I think that is where many of my friends are at as well. We've setup the framework, and gotten it all arranged correctly, but actually executing that code is giving us the hardest time in the world, and we are learning that working out the kinks is a littler harder than we thought.

But for now, we have the blueprints for the ramparts of our castles. Now its time to build a sight to behold. And the best part is: We all have our own unique designs.

So far our foundations are looking great.

Family Visitation

I am really unnervingly excited for my family to visit, and I'm not sure why. Maybe its because none of them have been to the Northwest before, and I am the pioneer tour guide to lead the way.

Maybe its because this place is so different than the East Coast, and I am excited to show my family all of the differences and natural beauties of the West.

Maybe it's because my family is undergoing the same westward process that brought me out here, and are participating in their own westward expansion and some strange amazing feeling of manifest destiny.

I really think many Easterners (as in the United States) have a feeling of manifest destiny for themselves. I encountered it on my entire journey here, and sealed it with my visiting of the Pacific Ocean. When I took my shoes off, and waded into the frigid waters of the North Pacific.

It was some sort of weird connection with the "pioneers" of Lewis & Clark. To stand at the point where they saw the ocean for the first time, and sealed the American conquering of the continent. The point of no return, when Americans then knew that their territory was destined to stretch from "Sea to Shining Sea".

I had made that journey. The long drive and move across the continent. I traveled much of the same path of Lewis & Clark, and during the other stretches I paralleled the trails of others who moved out here for their fortune or new opportunities.

And at the end, I had done it. I had reached the Pacific in all of its rough and cold glory.



But before we get sucked up into this Pioneer Square filled historic fantasy, we have to step back, and realize that all of this is a farce.

I am white. I am from European decent. Me partaking in this journey is a disgraceful expression of the inherent privilege I was born with. As much as I romanticize it, I am unconsciously embracing a history of conquest, expansion, and cultural, biological, and societal genocide. As much of beauty of this country that I have seen and experienced, I must always remind myself that it is not mine.

One could say that it is "mine" because of my ancestry going back to the first humans, but I do not think that justifies anything. That does not justify the erasure of culture, the spread of microbes, and forced relocation carried out by and genocidal acts committed through my European ancestors.

I cannot speak for the Native American cultures across this continent. I can only help fulfill justice through acknowledgement of the European wrongs which my ancestors fulfilled, and realize that I am in no way entitled to this land in which I live. I am here on loan, as with any part of the world I live in.

I cannot truly claim a home on this earth without the explicit consent of those before me who live and have an ancestry that came before me. I cannot claim a home unless I continually work to make right what is so very wrong through the actions of those who came before me, as well as those who live with me in the very same location and time. I can never belong somewhere until I work my hardest to help make that place... Better.

The Generational Gap? (Or Are They Just Not Listening To Me?)

Throughout my AmeriCorps VISTA year I have written about the struggles I have had related to the "generational gap" of my work.

To preface:

I work in the city of Vancouver, Washington. It lies directly north of Portland, Oregon on the border, and is a community which grew up on and around the Columbia River. Its identity is formed from the contrast of itself to the "other" (in this case, the city of Portland). The two cities have differing politics, different attitudes, and different reputations. 

Portland is the progressive liberal eco-concious golden child of urban planning, while Vancouver is the forgotten dirty conservative addition to the Portland Metro area nobody pays attention to.

Vancouver is the conservative family values bastion which provides the relief, income-taxless freedom of cars and bootstrap success, while Portland charges a tax on everything for useless projects to help a population which isn't going anywhere.

See what I mean? It can be spun both ways.

Maybe this is what attracts older folks to this area? A retirement home cheaper than Portland, but with access to the city and the job base of the urban area?

The region I work in spans five regions. Our office is in Vancouver, but I work across Wahkiakum, Cowlitz, Clark, Skamania, and Klickitat Counties. The average percentage of folks over 65 across this region is 18.56%. The area is aging rapidly, and this is an issue the region is only beginning to plan for and around. So maybe this is where my problems occur?

To the present:

Recently I participated in a meeting and received a message after that meeting which distressed me more than anything has in a while.

During the meeting I was providing updates about my project (which I have been working on over the past ten months) and explaining surveys, new directions and options, and how I would proceed with the project.

Over the past five to seven months I have been soliciting feedback from any and all partners I could contact. I have been pouring my efforts into learning all I can about the area, the systems, the people, the towns, and how I could begin to think about how I could help with transportation and mobility needs.

During the meeting, I proposed beginning to talk about potential solutions, one of which could be an integrated volunteer driver network for the two counties (and others beyond), to help expand what volunteer driver services exist. As soon as I proposed this, two members of the group began aggressively telling me about their volunteer driver programs (which I knew existed and worked really well). I tried to explain that I thought the new VISTA positions would be a good opportunity to try to expand the transportation services, coordination, and volunteer driver programs across the two counties. I believe that these new VISTA positions may hold a great opportunity for expanded services for the region!

Today I got a voice mail from one of the people at the meeting, and it said that before I go ahead with any press releases for my surveys I need to meet and talk with the services to learn what they do in and around the county. I was appalled.

Once again, they just assumed that I had learned nothing over the past ten months, and that I have just been ignorant to the wonderful service they offer within their counties.

What really gets me ticking on this issue is the fact that I actually prefer the communities out in the Gorge and in the rural counties. They remind me so much of home.

I am attached to Stevenson because it reminds me of Baltimore. The mountains surrounding White Salmon remind me of the mountain tucked Swannanoa. Goldendale reminds me of Lancaster; a community in shambles, but refinding itself in the new millenium.



I also don't understand why these folks are always so surprised when I tell them I have made a decision to do something and act upon something. I have included them in all of my correspondence via email, meetings, and phone calls. I have invited their input on all of my materials, and I have tried my hardest to cover all of my bases with all of our partners across the region.

So are they not listening to me? I even distributed everything through my supervisors, and what responses and suggestions I got back I incorporated into my work. I don't understand why people are all of a sudden responding to things I decide I want to do, saying that I should step back and seek input, when I have already solicited it from them.

So are they just not listening to me?

I really am tired of folks not being able to be mature and act like adults. We are not playing a game of "This is mine and I won't let you have any of it!", we are playing a game of "Let's get as many people mobile as possible so they can have a good life."

Here's a Hymn To Welcome In The Day...

Over the previous weekend I went camping with friends and last Thursday I saw the Decemberists perform their album "Castaways and Cutouts" in full, along with another hour long set of their favorites.

All this music and these experiences have made me begin thinking, and even though the weather has changed, I still feel a sense of deep loneliness bounded up within me.

I don't like to complain, and I try to hide it from the people I do hangout with right now, but I miss what I had in college. I really do miss the previous four years of my life, and the amount of love, friendship, and acceptance I experienced at Warren Wilson College. I really have been struggling after leaving.

It seems as though the "real world" is full of people who talk slander on others, who use derogatory terms like there is no tomorrow, and have to respect or acknowledgement of the complicatedness and sensitivity of reality. It's a deep problem, which many good hearted people have outside of college. I guess I was just too eager to get out of the academic sphere, and painted too fruity of images of what everyday life would be like.

I also was in proximity to my best friend at college, someone who I miss terribly, who I really would like to see again. Its amazing how much I didn't realize I would miss my friends and the atmosphere of being in college. Or maybe its just the people, friends, and atmosphere at a college such as Warren Wilson College. I don't know.

The Decemberists have also got me longing for a romantic connection again. The lack of a physical connection has done a toll on me. I really want a person to show intimacy with, and to hold and embrace and share a connection with.

So it only makes sense that during their performance of The Crane Wife (all three parts), I couldn't help but silently sing along, wondering where that crane may be.

But alas, its hard to find a crane, especially when there are so many people who don't accept you for what you are. And when you think you've found someone you hit it off with really well, or at least acknowledges your existence as a decent human being, they are either already with someone, and/or off to Alaska.

Ugh. Life.