Thanksgiving is Coming

My coworker has been counting down the days for about a month. It is really his number one holiday of the year. It is actually pretty funny how enthusiastic he is.

I just found out more people are coming for Thanksgiving. We are up to about 20. Yay.

The past few years we have been teaming up with our neighbors, who are 1) really awesome 2) Indian, so they make really really good food, and 3) vegetarians, so I have some sympathizers. Last year they hosted the feast in their home and we had no turkey as the main dish. Needless to say, I was thrilled. We have that 1950s-style tradition where we go around the table and each say what we are thankful for. Last year, the mother of the neighbors' family said that she was grateful that no living creature had to die for the meal. My mom likes the turkey tradition but I suspect she was secretly grateful NOT to have to prepare the de-feathered beast. So no turkey this year either. Wooo!

So we currently have

Eight of us in my family
Four in the neighbors' family
One German exchange student
One coworker from Beth's lab
About six bonus mystery people

My brother and two of my sisters and I are also planning on seeing the film, Milk, while everyone is in town, which looks to be pretty inspirational.

This year I am most grateful for people who truly love me, not just like. Like can make you feel pleasant, but love is what helps you through, takes the time. That is something special, and rarer than it seems.

Thank you friends and family who teach me about real love, who care.

Life Goals

My beautiful friend posted a list which inspired me to write my own goals, as the person I currently am. They will change as I grow in life, no doubt, and some of them will require maybe more than a lifetime's efforts.

See the northern lights, aurora borealis
Help to provide sustainable, affordable, and safe transportation options
Worm composting
Photography
Play the banjo
Learn to love myself and others more fully and deeply
Raise chickens or maybe a couple goats and maybe a couple children if I am up for it
Dip in each of the seven seas
Understand better the nature of the divine
Look at the worlds in a microscope and a telescope
Begin something beautiful (big or small, I don't really care) that spreads around the globe

And finally, when I die I want to be glad to have lived the AMOUNT that I did in the time that I had.

Getting Existential on Ya

If I am awareness, then I can never distill my self, my being, to nothingness. I can never deconstruct myself entirely out of existence, which has apparently been a fear of mine of late.

I have reduced myself to my most fundamental unit. There is comfort in this floor of reasoning.

A Message for Obama

Ok I have been posting photos a lot lately. And I'm gonna do it some more.

I have great hopes for the future of the country. Not just because of the new leadership. I think a lot of people are ready for change. I think they are ready to be proud of their country, and to put in the effort to make a positive impact in their own small ways. If anything can change the world, I suspect it is a collection of many small hopes and actions.

Check out what folks have to say to Obama.

In Pictures

As we wait for the election results...

I always love the BBC's "In Pictures" collections and photo journals from all over the world. Today's were particularly striking:

Just Stuck

Usually the path I am to follow as to what I am working on in my life - personally, philosophically, emotionally - is clear, or at least feels right in some way. I will feel a strange energy to continue pressing forward if it is the way I am supposed to be going. Hard to describe really. I open one door, which leads to another room. I learn what I need to learn in that room and then move on to the next. Not necessarily linear, but at least there is some degree of clarity. However, recently I have been feeling like every door I try is locked or a dead end, as though, no matter what I do, I am trapped in this dimly lit room with walls and floors that are sticky with other people's dried beer, alternately pacing the linoleum tiles and sitting restlessly on the stained avocado green sofa.

For some reason I was reading through all of these old posts of mine and it struck me how silly and naive I sound.

I just want to yell GAHHHHHHHHH and swing the door wide open into the chilly November night, clamber down the fire escape like a wild little monkey, and run through the streets of Brighton naked down to my feet.

I have been working so damn hard at loving it but truly, truly, I am just sick. and. tired of being me.

Dreams

I dreamed that for some reason I was making a huge database of all of the things that make me happy. I gave each item tags based on different ways that they might make me happy, for example, "soft," "tastes good," "funny/silly." Suddenly I found myself awake, and shivering from cold.

I reached to the bottom of my bed and grabbed my red blanket, spreading it on top of my other blankets, and, as I returned to slumber, made a mental note to add the blanket to the "warm" category.