journal – other animals

I think the dentist might be right about some kind of mouthguard for sleeping. I woke up this morning with some pain in my jaw. And thinking about it, I think I often do wake up and I’m in the middle of clenching my jaw or I wake up and the first thing I do is sort of grind my teeth. I guess I haven’t really wanted to admit it. I don’t really want some mouth apparatus when I sleep. I have enough trouble in that department, although I have to admit that that’s been fine lately. But I’ve also been indulging in the cannabis, which certainly helps with sleep. The other thing is I’m a bit irritated with my dentist. I don’t know if this is the way all dentists operate these days, but I feel like the second I walk in the office they’re trying to upsell me. Do you want the regular cleaning or the super cleaning for an extra $30? Do you want the cancer screening? $50. I just feel, and maybe I’m naive about these things, I mean, I’ve never had to run any kind of business, but anyway, I just feel that if they’re important they should be included and not extra. And it’s just irritating, this constant upselling. And I like the place, but I’m thinking of finding another doctor. We’ll see. But yeah, I think I need to do something about the grinding. I think I shouldn’t pretend it’s not there. I know I can get a cheap mouthguard on Amazon for $20 or something, rather than the $700+ the dentist wants, so that’s definitely the way I’ll go unless I learn that the cheap ones are somehow not to be trusted or damaging or whatever. It’s a start. And I remember asking the dentist if there was anything else you could do about this apart from the mouthguard and they just shrug their shoulders. I remember asking a dermatologist a few years ago about a scalp problem and he sort of had the same response. If it’s out of their collection of pills and expensive devices they want to sell you, forget it. I really miss my old acupuncturist. She was a proper doctor. She was ready to talk and troubleshoot whatever problem you had from a holistic viewpoint. I miss that so much. And maybe that’s something to look for once again. I just feel so tired of it all and so pre-defeated. But I know that’s a stupid way to look at the world. I guess I just tend to wake up in a bad mood and I want to know why and what I can do about it. Maybe that’s the real issue here. I wake up and I feel irritated. Often my back feels like it’s about to give out, and that doesn’t make you want to jump for joy in the morning. But even without that, this is something that I feel has been happening for a while and I’d like to investigate it and do something about it, if possible. I was thinking on the walk this morning that maybe I should try to go back to the metta practice. I think I noticed on the walk this morning—if only it was only this morning—feeling irritated with just random stuff I see as I’m walking around. Oh look at this place, another mcmansion going up, or look at that person walking his dog in some way that I don’t approve of. I mean, it’s all nonsense, I know that. And maybe it’s a good thing that this kind of stuff is starting to be a bit more noticeable to me. I mean, it’s one thing to be irritated by this and that, and then, perhaps, another step to notice that these things are irritating you, instead of just rolling with it and getting more and more irritated by more and more things. And of course, tonight is the night of the little game, so there will be plenty of whooping and hollering from those that celebrate that kind of thing. And I suppose that puts me in a bad mood before we even get there. I don’t like to admit that, but it’s the truth. And I know that goes back to my childhood, trying to read a book and my father screaming at the television because his team did something bad or something good. And what’s the point in getting irritated by that stuff? Is that the way I want to live? But then what do I do about it?

I did some good editing yesterday but I’m more and more thinking about what to do with the journal bits. I had the idea over the years of trying to do some kind of novel where there’d be poetry interspersed through the bulk of the work. I suppose I was thinking of something more or less like one of Basho’s travel diaries, but not necessarily anything to do with travel. Anyway, I think what I’m doing with Fragment is more or less that idea in reverse. So in this work I have the main prose poem and then the journal bits interspersed throughout. So one idea I was playing around with is just to break the journal bits up as though they were poetry. Maybe see if I can hammer one of the journal sections into a sonnet or something. Maybe that’s a bit silly, but I’ll have to play around with it and see if it goes anywhere. Who knows? But there’s enough of the book and enough of the journal blocks that I can play around and try something new with every section. I don’t think I’ll do that, but I like that potentiality. We took the little one on a nice walk yesterday. I guess she was feeling more energetic than usual, so we ended up doing more than an hour with her. Then we went out for some lunch at Tomato Tomato. I enjoyed a sandwich with mozzarella, arugula, tomato, balsamic reduction and pesto. It was pretty good. I think this is a new menu item from the last time we were there when they screwed up our pizza. And Rachael had her pasta with seafood. I also enjoyed a little glass of whisky, which was nice. I hadn’t had any since 1/25, so that’s not too bad. I mean, I’m not going for the record or anything, but I’d be happy to have fewer poisons in me. Though those various poisons that I love sure are tasty… Still, I feel better when I try to be better about that. The other thing I was thinking about recently (thanks to the last episode of Back on the Broomstick) was sigil work. I don’t know much about that, but I feel drawn to it, no pun intended. I like the idea of drawing your own magical symbols and then eventually putting them to work. But it’s almost more the drawing aspect of it that I’m interested in. I imagine I would start off with an intention to form a sigil for this or that purpose. Then I start to draw with the intention in mind and then I guess just keep doing that until it clicks. I think keeping the intention in mind and repeating and honing and improving the drawing in accord with one’s intuition seems to be a way. Again, it’s all trial and error. See if it works, see what can be improved, etc. I guess I’ve been looking for things to draw recently. I did enjoy it back in the day, but I also felt that I didn’t have a lot of patience with it. When I think of trying to draw someone’s face it just seems like a lot of work. But I have enjoyed sketching this and that, like trying to draw the dog when she’s sleeping or the trees outside the window. It’s just that it doesn’t quite stick. I feel like the energy goes out of it so quickly. And maybe I just need more tolerance for not being very good at something. If I can just accept that I’m going to suck for a while, then maybe I can improve. I mean, I remember playing Mario Kart, doing the grand prix circuits. When I first started, even the 50cc was kicking my ass, and then in a few days I was lapping the AI drivers in the 50cc races. So of course I know I can get better in whatever area I choose to focus my attention, I guess the question is where I want to spend that attention. But I do like the idea of forming some hobbies or habits or whatever that don’t involve apps on my phone or watching more TV. I was just allowing myself yesterday to sit and listen to some music and I had to fight against picking up my phone, checking social media, flipping through a book, etc. And that bugs me. But at the same time, like anything else, it’s a skill to be developed. I’m not saying I’m hoping to be forever free of Facebook and Insta and reddit and whatever. I would just like more control and less of falling down rabbit holes.

The problem with starting to post these journal pages to the WP site is that now that’s in my head as I write them, but I suppose, like a documentary film crew in the office, you must get used to the idea and eventually it fades into the background. We’ll see. And we’ll see whether or not I even keep it up. I suppose if there’s any uptick in interest I’ll keep going with it, otherwise, back to darkness. Anyway, I was feeling like I was getting into the groove with the editing of Fragment yesterday, which is about right as the weekend is now here and that will screw up my schedule. But I’m still pleased that I’m still pleased with the work I’m doing with that. I’m still not sure, though, about what to do with the journal bits. One idea I had was to treat them as poetry and break the lines where I would if those bits were poetry. I was thinking that the “poetry” of the work is treated more or less as fiction paragraphs would be. Sure, they’re unpunctuated and yada yada yada, but I think the idea more or less holds. It’s something to play around with. But I do like the structure of the piece. Paragraphs of 100 words is a good base, I think. So part of me doesn’t want to abandon that structure, though I suppose even if I were to break the journal bits into “poetry” they would still all be 100 words, so that does preserve the structure, or perhaps hides the structure? I don’t quite know, but I will experiment with it. I did like the idea of at least starting off with just throwing the journal stuff in as unbroken 100-word paragraphs, at least for the first 10 or so sections, then breaking that up for 10 more and so on until we get to a place of more freedom. I’m hoping that this will help to get the ideas of the journal bits in the mind of the reader so that when we get to a more sort of jumbled or, well, fragmented place, the reader is able to handle that and follow what’s happening. That’s the plan, for what it’s worth. Again, I need to experiment and see how it all feels and looks and such. But I think cutting each section by 100 words is a good start. I think this is going to tighten it up and lose a lot of the weakest stuff. We’re planning on going to WF today to get some of the pasta shapes that we like. They seem to be the only place that carries the radiator shape. And it’s a nice little lunchtime errand, so why not? I had to stop myself this morning going down a rabbit hole after I looked up a book I was interested in. I checked out the book, then saw another one that looked interesting, then another, and… Half of the books I looked at are already on one of my Amazon wish lists, of course. But the more important thing is that I have so many half-finished books right now on my kindle and on my desk or the table downstairs, or… So I want to get going on those. I was enjoying re-reading At Swim-Two-Birds recently. I think it’s a good time for me to re-read stuff as I’m in the middle of a big project and I just can’t seem to get my head around anything too new. I was also enjoying reading the more paranormal stuff lately, like Keel’s Mothman and Eighth Tower, so you can feel his descent into paranoia as you read those books. And maybe he was right. I’m sure he had a lot of evidence to back up his worldview, but of course, the phenomenon, whatever it is, has that aspect of confirming what you want to hear, at least in part. Sometimes it puts your world through a blender. But anyway, I’ve always liked the strange and I’m happy to get back to it. It makes for a good break, if nothing else. And then re-reading Berryman’s Dream Songs is always good, for me, anyway. And I want to get back to Augustine’s Confessions as well. And Awakening Shakti, and, well, I’m not going to list every half-finished book I have lying around or I’ll be here until lunchtime, which, of course, is where I’m going to be anyway. Anyway, I should get back to it.

I found a community on reddit this morning that might be able to help with the hip problems. It was some technique called kinestretch, I think. I only started to check them out this morning, so I don’t know much about it, but I like what I’ve read so far. I tried yesterday to get the virtual PT thing sorted out, but after texting and talking to someone on the phone, they’re saying that I’m not eligible. One person said that it might just be a lag in updating records as Rachael’s company just switched us to a new insurance in January. But either way, it’s just so time consuming to figure these things out and they make it so difficult to navigate it all. I just want to give up. So that’s why I’m trying to search for anything that might help me that I can do on my own. We’ll see how it goes. I mean, being fed up with the insurance nonsense doesn’t mean that I should give up on it, although I really want to. But I do start to wonder if this problem with the hips isn’t related to or contributing to the back pain. I mean, it’s a pretty close thing, the hip muscles and the muscles of the lower back, right? And if I have a weakness in the one I probably have a weakness in the other. I think that’s a safe bet. So I have a few ideas on how to help myself. I got to the halfway point yesterday with Fragment, so that’s nice. I want to make sure I don’t cut out too much from the first half that is referenced in the second half. I still feel a bit uneasy with the editing. I hope I’m not trashing anything that I might want to keep, but then I can’t think like that. I will look at it again and probably again after that, so there’s time to make sure everything works. But I guess part of me is still a little worried that it lacks a certain spark. And I’m not sure what to do about that. Well, I guess cutting it back and then reviewing it again and again and just thinking as much as I can about it. Something like that. I know there’s no silver bullet or whatever as far as getting this thing done goes. I just want to make sure that I’m thinking about it as I do it (obviously) and making the best attempt I can. I guess that’s about as much as I can do. But of course the whole project is riddled with neurosis. But I guess I was just sort of realizing in the last few days that it’s taking something out of me, some not insignificant amount of effort, to cut this stuff. I liked the stuff that I had before, sure, but I am also seeing a lot that is weak and that could be cut. I guess I won’t be able to judge it until I’ve done at least one pass of cutting. But anyway, I’m just realizing that this is sort of sucking a lot of my attention and energy up. And that’s fine. I feel like I can’t really start another project fully until I’m done with this. So those Cantos will have to wait a bit more, as will Gargantua and Pantagruel and so on and so forth. I just feel like I only have so much bandwidth. And maybe that’s why the cannabis is so extra appealing to me now. I feel like I’m slogging through the muck. (The scene from The Naked and the Dead where they’re moving some artillery through the jungle through thick mud always comes to mind.) But it’s muck that I’ve made and muck that I will deal with until I can turn it into, what? clay? a nice-looking yunomi? Have I gone through the other end of this metaphor? Anyway, I’m deep in the mud but I am walking. I’m not stuck. As far as I know. I guess it just has taken so much work up to now and it looks like it’s going to take a lot more work, but what can you do? I’ll get back to it and I’ll get it done. I hope I’m making it better and not removing and load-bearing walls or whatever.

I have to say that I feel almost optimistic right now. I feel like maybe I have some momentum with the editing and that maybe it’s the right thing to do and that maybe the book will be—I don’t even want to say it. But I hope it. I feel maybe a new freedom? I’m not sure. I want to say that I feel a bit more in the groove. A bit more that I’m, well not exactly in a flow state, of course, but something like that but more generalized, if that makes sense. I feel like there has been a shift. And I felt this a few days ago. Imbolc? I dunno. But I’m going to try to go with it. I ordered the copy of the Burney relief of Ishtar or Innana or Ereshkigal or of someone else whose name we don’t know. I think it will make a nice altarpiece. I like the fact that it’s a bit shady, a bit of a mystery. That we don’t really know who it’s representing, apart from a feminine deity. But I think that’s appropriate. There’s always some mystery with the divine, at least on this side of the veil. And the fact that we don’t quite know who she is or what the iconography means adds to that mystery. So I like that. Plus, it’s just a stunning image. I debated about it for a while, but I think I’m pleased that I did go ahead with it. Where I’ll put it is another question. And I guess another thing that I’ve noticed is time. So often these days when I look at a watch or the phone the time is one digit repeated, like 5:55 or 3:33. I don’t know if that’s something or not, but I think back to those college days. I think it was Kaila who turned me on to that idea of 11:11, or maybe her friend Jen? But that kind of opened my mind to those little synchronicities and I feel something there. I don’t quite know what, but I guess I’m feeling like that’s another sign that I’m on a good road lately. And I guess maybe I feel a little less depressed than I had previously. I think working on the book, and finding a format that works going forward, probably helps. And more space away from the big 5-0 probably helps. And also the decision to loosen up on myself with the cannabis helps. I don’t know that I want to smoke forever, but I don’t want to worry about that right now. There will come a time to taper down or off, but I feel like that’s not now. And I have had some good ideas for the book when I’ve been smoking. Of course, you have to take those good ideas with a grain of salt and see how well they perform in the cold light of dawn, but still, I’m pleased with the direction of the book and with the cutting down that I’ve been doing. I hope I’ve found it’s final form, but then I’ve thought that before. I just don’t know how many more times I can recut the thing. Though I have been wondering if I should abandon the form of the 100-word paragraph towards the end of after the middle and play around with that some more. I sort of like the block of 500 words, but that also feels like a pretty dense thing to get through. But I might play around with that and see how it feels. I think I still want the first 40 sections to be fairly straight, but then I might play with it. I was planning to do that with the journal bits instead of the main text. I like treating them more like poetry and treating the poetry more like prose. Who knows? I’ll have to experiment once it’s cut down. I’m nearly at that midpoint, so today I should be past that, all being well. I think this is a crucial time for the work, though. Once I get past that midpoint I’ll see if I’m getting rid of stuff that I need for the second half. I don’t want to lose too many of the resonances that I have set up, but at the same time, if I lose a few, then that’s fine. I just want to make sure that the second half still feels like the second half that I has envisioned all those centuries ago.