real time writing

or, how to make time for this writing thing even with everything else that goes on around here. or because of it.

something about reading henry miller a few months back that inspired me. something about the concept of writing things exactly as they are, as they came to him. i wonder at the truthfulness of this in his actual work. i wonder about reading a bit more about him and by him to get to the bottom of it all or if i will cease and desist, letting what i think about what he means linger in my mind rather than trying to prove it's truthfulness. whatever that is.

i did get the idea to read something {more} by sartre while reading and thinking about authenticity today. this in particular caught my attention-

authenticity is connected with creativity: the impetus to action must arise from the person in question, and not be externally imposed.

from there, and even more to the point, for me at least, was this quote about erich fromm-

Thus a Frommean authentic may behave consistently in a manner that accords with cultural norms, but for the reason that those norms appear on consideration to be appropriate, rather than blindly, simply because they happen to be the current norms. Fromm thus considers authenticity to be a positive outcome of enlightened and informed motivation rather than a negative outcome of rejection of the expectations of others. He described the latter condition - the drive to primarily escape external restraints typified by the "absolute freedom" of Sartre - as "the illusion of individuality", as opposed to the genuine individuality that results from authentic living.

oh ah. obviously i will be searching out some more information about authenticity with that in mind. believing i do not exist in a bubble as well as wanting to listen as closely to my own heart as possible, and all that.

...with the caveat that i don't believe the words of others can necessarily explain our own experience for us, although sometimes they may very well point us in the right direction. or sometimes not. sometimes the direction we hadn't thought of is the one where we finally hear our own voice, listen to our own heart and trust that this- wherever we are right now- is simply where we are. and that this is true for each. of. us. and that this- this trust in ourselves- is where we all started out and where we are all headed, regardless of the how-of-it or even the why.

frogs and butterflies

I didn't post yesterday. I am posting today. I notice that I feel better when I do some sort of writing and this is definitely some sort of writing. The inspiration today is in the writing and not in the content, although goodness knows there is plenty to be inspired about when I remember to look around a bit.

We went out to Sauvie Island the other day and were lucky enough to find a few frogs down by the water. Eva caught one and held him for a while and then we took turns passing him back and forth until we decided {actually, it was after he peed on Samuel and Samuel said, "what IS that?" and I said, "it's pee," and he said, "you didn't have to tell me that."} he might be tired and Eva put him back in the water. When we went over to the other side of the lookout thingy which I can't seem to place with a name today, we looked for more frogs but found instead what Eva is calling a wild guinea pig. It did look quite a bit like what we think a wild guinea pig might look like and it also looked quite a bit like what we know a baby domesticated guinea pig does look like and also, to be honest, it also looked quite a bit like a vole or a small woodchuck who ran very fast and was not nearly as interested in being found by Eva as Eva was in finding him. He has been dubbed "the wild guinea pig" and probably shall remain so ever after.

We also saw several garter snakes, both down by the water and up in the leaves basking in the sunshine. And our first butterflies this year. I looked them up and one was {probably} definitely an orange tip. The other two were those little blueish-periwinkle butterflies. Are they blue copper butterflies? I'm not entirely sure. I know I have seen them before. We followed the first one around with our eyes and feet for several minutes revelling in the thrill of a butterfly in our midst. The second one came along when we were on our way back to the car just as we were telling Samuel about seeing the other butterfly and he was bemoaning how he would have liked to have seen that butterfly too and we all looked over and sure enough there was another one. Right there. And I pointed him out and said something very excitedly like, "hey look there is another butterfly just like the one we saw before!!" and he looked and Eva looked and I looked and we watched with our eyes and big smiles as the butterfly flew around us and across the path and out into the grass.

Then we walked back to the car and I helped Jack climb in because he is a senior dog now and doesn't resist me giving him a hand. It felt so good to have him with us today while we walked in the woods. He didn't seem to mind being kept on the leash the whole time. It seemed a small price to pay for feeling well enough again to go walking in the woods with us and the butterflies and the frogs. When we all stood still in the sunshine we could still hear the frogs singing out in the water beyond.

{understanding}

Birthday plans went off without a hitch and the birthday boy was thrilled to bursting with his big day. And then another mellow but still burstingly big day to follow with a second trip to toys r us to return what had been bought the day before (well, one thing was returned, but the clone trooper blaster was definitelly a keeper). {Did the parentheses break the flow? It needed to be said. We can't very well go on and on without understanding holding everything up. Not unless you want to dive right into mis-understanding...and where will that lead you?}

But of course you can. Go on and on {and on} without understanding holding everything up. In fact that's how it often works, with understanding waltzing in a little later, after all the drama and stories have already been told. And everyone looks up at understanding, sauntering in {late!}, surprised he has come at all. Each time, mystified- or irksome, as in "Where have you been! We have been waiting for you?" And he asks- "Did you stop the story telling and wait until I arrived to continue?" {Matter-of-factly.} And we sheepishly answer- "No." and think, we forgot. Again. Things really took off. We didn't think you were really coming this time. You were late.

Late? Right on time? We are glad to see him when he does show up. There's nothing left- no snacks, no drinks- the party's nearly over, everyone worn out from the drama, piecing together what they heard in the stories. Searching for understanding. Or not. Some never search for understanding and are happy for the diversion the drama gives. Some begin searching before the story begins.

If we are surprised, it is because we had begun to believe the stories. We thought understanding was to be found inside them. And he may be- sometimes- helping us tease out what will help us, what truths are lingering there. But sometimes he is not and the stories become a dead end that we wrestle with- holding tightly to them with clenched fists certain we will fall apart if we give them up in favor of understanding. Who would we be without our stories holding us up?

Understanding comes in his own time, when he is ready, when we can hear {and understand} him. He speaks in poetry, in bursts of lightening, with clarity, pulling together loose threads streaming out here and there, bringing them together, bundling them up into bits of peace and love. Setting us free. Or not. Sometimes there is nothing to understand. Things are just as they are, nothing more or less. And continuing to search for understanding at these times can bring the same kind of madness that not searching can bring at other times. But wait, did understanding sneak in here while I was busy telling stories about him? {Of course if he had come in sooner, there would have been nothing to write about today, and for that I am grateful. What would I do without writing to hold me up?}

I just saw this and I guess I am a little slow on the uptake this month, what with my filled up hard drive issues and all. How about blogging most days from now until the end of November. I don't really think I particularly need extra inspiration to blog daily. I don't always blog daily, but I do blog fairly often enough for me to feel regular about it. Still, I liked the week-of-Albert-pictures and I like the inspiration behind NaBloPoMo (National Blog Posting Month) for sure. Incidentally, the inspiration for NaBloPoMo comes from NaNoWriMo or National Novel Writing Month, which I am also partaking in this month and which has proven to be an amazing experience so far. I don't doubt it will continue to be so.

Now, though, the sound of my children's laughter has reached that fevered peak that only night time rough housing seems to bring and they are coming to me one after the other, over and over again, with bumped heads and sore toes. It must be that time again. Time for bed.

Samuel is literally spinning around like a top tonight because at long last the game he has been waiting and waiting for, New Super Mario Bros. for the wii is coming out tomorrow. He told me this morning that I shouldn't plan on doing very much for a few days because our days from now on will be spent mostly with this game and the wii. I laughed. This is a marked difference from his requests over the past week when he woke up every morning asking me to plan something extraordinarily fun so that the days would go by as quickly as possible. Apparently we are now approaching a time when we will want the days to s-l-o-w-d-o-w-n so that we can savor them to their fullest.