The posts that I write reflect specific emotions I felt at the specific time of writing the post. Often I later reread posts and don't relate to the feelings, the wording, or the significance of the posts in general. In all the years of writing on my blog, I have essentially believed that by writing down different parts of me, eventually I'd get a whole picture. That never seems to formulate, though, since there is always more to tell, there are always many more emotions, speculations and understandings that I did not write down. Sometimes it seems that the better part of me is still in my head, even after spilling hundreds of thousands of words out in this virtual intimate diary. I wonder if the beauty, wonder, self-admiration and attempts of self-discovery and self-redemption ever pervade. I wonder if I am and always will be my number-one fan, and you know what, I guess that's fine.

Beautiful Things

I had an incredible birthday, abundant with the lovingkindness of the people I've met here in Bellingham. Without knowing what to do with all the gratitude, I made a little video with snippets of beautiful things I've videoed in the past two years, including me making my first steps on guitar about a year ago:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YJRLjWRTfaY

Cards and gifts from the sweet kindergartners I teach

Here and There

"The thing about dreams is that when I look at the dream - when I aspire to be somewhere - I am an observer. But then when I get there, it's me there. I just walked -- from here to there," and I get up from the wooden chair behind the small round table and walk to the side of the room. "I'm still here. It's still me."

I sit back down. I jot down the idea on the napkin in front of me. The napkin also has musical notes and my friend's name, and two spectrums, to try to understand if "connection" (closeness, intimacy, feeling good with someone) and "dependence" (the inability to see yourself without someone, the need of the person in order to feel good) are two separate issues or if one is the extreme of the other, in relationships.

The warm tea arrives.

Halitatea, it's called. The name of the tea house.

In the center of Jerusalem.

"I say 'wow, that life looks amazing'. But when I get there, it's literally me there. I really cannot escape myself. And in that sense, there is no 'over there'. There is no dream - once I enter it, it is life, it is me, still struggling, still functioning from behind two eyes. Jealousy of other people's lives or of dream-lives (or even just the desire to be somewhere else) derives from the notion that this will not always be the case. That I will in fact be able to go 'over there' without bringing myself with me."

I'm feeling so much gratitude.

A meditation

MEDITATION

I sit comfortably

I relax my muscles,

Starting from the tip of my head

Until the tip of my toes

I relax my jaw muscles

The muscles between my eyebrows

My shoulders

My knees

I sit with my back straight, so that my chest and neck are open

My legs are folded

I take deep breaths

When words come through my mind

To tell me what I'm doing

Or to fill me with dread or other emotions

I intentionally wash them away

I wash away the words

With the river of my being

The current keeps going, flowing

I watch my emotions as they come and go

I watch them, I am not them.

They come and go, they wash away

The river keeps going

I breath

In

Out

I listen to my breath

I listen to the sounds around me

I breath

With each inhale I welcome the air into my stomach

I bring oxygen and energy into every part of me

With each exhale I gently let the air out

I listen

I breath

Words and thoughts are streams in the current

I don't let them linger

I don't struggle, either

I let everything loose

I breath.