Day: January 14, 2019

I’m into the research for my latest project and simultaneously into the research for upgrading my classes. These are dramatically different fields of research, but in all of it a pattern is emerging. I am remembering how to be studious and how to be a writer. See, I took a break from the routine of writing as I do after every project. This is known as my continuing mistake. The spin down and eventually spin up require more mental energy than it does to stay on the path. Now I am spinning up, which makes me feel good and helps me to shift my priorities to where they ought to be. It helps me be thoughtful about a great number of issues and concerns in my life, and I feel quite excellent about where my head is at when I am writing.

But it is indeed like those first moments in the pool.

This time I really want to stay on task and that means having the next thing ready and keeping a low grade writing process running in the background of my brain. Writing is my life in so many ways, so to neglect it as I have been doing is a form of suicide. With classes starting up and a conference upcoming, I have a great opportunity to spin up quickly and keep the motor running.

Some Thoughts:

1. I’m not entirely sure I stayed honest to the ten minutes last night. It felt short, and I may have started at :53 vs. 51. I made sure to start at :53 today and do this part first, so I’d be sure. After a while gauging ten minutes becomes organic, but there are times where you slip in and out of the narrative and 10 can seem like no time at all or quite a large slice of forever.
2. Struggling with competitiveness and self worth. I’m at war with myself in many ways. I continue to be on this enormous losing streak in all forms of games and competition and it is growing annoying. Part of it is not wanting to compete but see others enjoy the game itself. Did I go Mike Tyson and lose that killer instinct? It is hard, because that sort of thing seems to have never mattered to my partner but has been the end all for me for my entire life. I’m trying to find a psychological and emotional middle ground, but this too seems difficult. Perhaps the key is knowing when (and how) to turn it on and off. It seems to go off by itself far too often.

The most interesting thing about this past year is watching the slow unfolding of our constitution in a way that, sadly, resembles the first Star Wars (reboot/Anakin arc). This is how our democracy dies. This being the unfettered use of powers and rampant idiocy/transparency of the President.

He already said that he is going to declare a national emergency in order to use money meant for the natural disasters plaguing parts of our nation to build a wall. A wall he knows is going to fail and doesn’t care.

It doesn’t stop there.

He said we are pulling out of Syria which will inevitably lead to a situation where Iran poses a legitimate threat to national interests (read: Israel), which will put us back on a path to war in Iran. In other words, we are pulling a board game move and sacrificing the Syria in order to create the conditions to seek war in and destabilize Iran.

No, this isn’t the president’s doing. He’s not that aware. This is the handful of people at the wheel of that particular initiative. What we’ve discovered above all else is that we have a president who believes he hires the best people and so long as they placate him and treat him with loyalty, they have the run of the place. He is only focused on the things he can tick off as victories or the petty fights that grab his attention.

This is a fundamental problem, because it is also why the senators and congressmen are behind him. They are getting what they want.

Except we aren’t. Not entirely. This shutdown is going to impact at leas 800,000 lives. Those are the people who are not getting paid, many of whom are living paycheck to paycheck and some of whom are being forced to work without pay.

This was a rant. There are a few rants on my mind that I need to just pull out of me and put on paper to feel good about things.