...Until Next Time

[Pathless]

I am not an angry girl
But it seems like I've got everyone fooled
Every time I say something they find hard to hear
They chalk it up to my anger and never to their own fear
And imagine you're a girl
Just trying to finally come clean
Knowing full well they'd prefer you were dirty
And smiling

--Ani DiFranco, Not A Pretty Girl

'Cause I know the biggest crime
Is just to throw up your hands
Say this has nothing to do with me
I just wanna live as comfortably as I can
You gotta look outside your eyes
You gotta think outside your brain
You gotta walk outside your life
To where the neighborhood changes

--Ani Difranco, Willing to Fight


Posting here has been a bit of a compulsion for me over the past year, one that has outlived its usefulness for now. I came to this site four years ago when I was on an Eastern religion trip, asked some questions, got in some debates, and got hooked on the give and take and the textual dynamics that lead to so much thinking and considering and defining of the self. I left for a while, then came back after a hard year, needing some intellectual stimulation and challenges. Over time, I've found myself no longer the seeker that I once was. Now, rather than looking for answers, I have them. I have the answers and values that I need to know how to live my life. They certainly haven't all come from this site (that would be sad, and you all know it), but I've definitely been coming here to sharpen my convictions for a while now.

It's gotten to the point where I don't have much to offer that would surprise anyone, certainly. Because I'm not interested much in discussing religious systems or even patchwork spiritual systems at this point, I've been pretty much sticking to the politics and lounge areas. In the lounge I can be goofy, and in the politics threads I get to yell and be outraged. It gets old for me and for some of the members here, I'm sure. I've been having more and more moments where I don't want to be calm and rational, where I become personally offended--sometimes by things that were maybe not meant to offend, but which just push my buttons and then I go off--and have taken to interjecting more and more curse words into my posts. Sometimes I just want to punch out a string of bad smilies to tell y'all how I feel, but really, come on, we all know that the emotions get lost in the translation in this imperfect medium we're navigating. The thing is, it doesn't feel healthy or even make a whole lot of sense for me to get so emotionally whacked-out by just looking at a screen lit magically by electricity and powered by refined crystals ripped out of the earth, cased in plastic.

So I'm taking a break. I am going to go get married later this month and then my wife and I are going to head on down to the Caribbean beaches and jungles of Costa Rica for a while. Then I'm going to come back and focus on writing stories and making art and playing music and cooking food and selling books. I'll let y'all know when my first story is published, even if it's in a few years. In the meantime, I'll link to some of my other internet incarnations at the bottom of this here adios and you can peek in on me there if you are so inclined.



I came across these words of Frantz Fanon today, from his book Black Skin, White Masks:

"Fervor is the weapon of choice of the impotent."

"...it is for my own time that I should live."

"Man ... has to give up projecting onto the world an antimony that coexists with him."

I have been reading and listening to everyone that I've dialogued with in CR. Have you been reading and listening to what I have to say? I know we all have our preconceived notions, and that we are not all going to agree. I don't expect us all to agree. What I do expect is respect and to be treated as a human being, as someone who has valid thoughts, opinions, and even emotions. If I have ever been angry with someone here, if I have ever been rude to someone here, if I have ever seemed arrrogant or hastily dismissed someone's arguments here--well, I think those people need to be more careful about how they frame their own words, and how they look at and treat other people. I know I'm biased, and I also know that I am a considerate, peaceful person who--believe it or not--does not anger easily. My anger stems from and is aimed at the deep ignorance and arrogance of a society that thinks that it has everything figured out, or that it will figure everything out given a little more time, that thinks that no fault can be found in it. My anger is at a society that enslaves people, animals, vegetables, and minerals, and has no respect, compassion, or regard for anything other than its own.

Today I took my regular walk to work. On my regular walk to work, I enjoy the sunshine, the trees, the plants, the weeds, the pools of water, the birds, squirrels, people (especially children), rabbits, and any other living or life-giving thing that I encounter. I talk to the birds and rabbits and even the trees. Today a large cluster of trees that I pass everyday had been uprooted and discarded on the other side of the path from where they had grown for who knows how long. I know that a family of magpies has made its home in that nest for at least the year that I have been walking by it, probably much longer. I hope that the babies in that family had grown enough to leave the nest before the tree that it was a part of was ripped out of the living Earth by a yellow piece of machinery and tossed onto another piece of ground like it was a paper cup or aluminum can. I am sad for that family of magpies, and angry at the pieces of yellow machinery that played a part in that destruction, and I'm angry at the people that make a living operating those pieces of machinery and have been duped into thinking such a mode of earning a living is okay. I'm also sad for those people, but I'm more angry at them because they should know better. Why don't they know better? It's not their fault, I know. It's a problem that runs deep in our civilization. So I'm not nearly as angry at the people and machinery as I am at the colossal, dumb machinery of thoughts and values that underlies a whole civilization bent on dominance and destruction.

That anger needs an outlet, and these forums are not a proper place for that outlet. Art is.* And art gives meaning and beauty and contributes to the restoration of a balanced, more natural world. So that is where I'll be putting my CR energies for now. It will be good for me to have such a sizable chunk of time suddenly freed up for my work that is also play that is also healing.

Anyway, it's been good, it's been bad, it's been real. I am thankful for this place, no matter what. It has helped me shape, defend, and comprehend my values--no small feat for an abstracted ethereal internet nook. But it's been all the people here, of course, who have helped me do the work that I needed to do here. That work has pretty much played itself out, so I'll be around a whole lot less.

So long, and thanks for all the fish.



oh and, just for kicks



If you want to keep in touch, I can be seen and reached at these places:

Full Spectrum Creativity

Resisting Progress

MySpace.com - Cinmaya

Z Space - Cinmaya



"Just follow your heart. That's what I do."

--Napolean Dynamite

* and just for the record, by "art" I mean actual physical visual art and writing and music--not the kind of art that juantoo3 talked about in our exchanges in the selfishness and society thread.

[juantoo3]

Touché.

Pathless, I wish you well, especially on your pending wedding. Congratulations to you and your intended.

I hope you know you are always welcome. Whenever you need a brief respite from the full plate you have before you, c'mon back and visit. Let us know you're OK.

Good luck, and best of wishes in all of your future endeavors!

[17th Angel]

Originally Posted by Pathless

Today I took my regular walk to work.

I for once dropped by again, which is quite a rare thing for me currently... Attention drawn to this thread, I wish you all the best Path. Oh and that walk, there is nothing regular about it Peace be upon you my brother.

[Ciel]

Hi, Pathless,
You know you have been a valid voice here and your posts shall be missed.....
Good luck for all your new ventures, travel light and let the love light shine.
The care of the world is with you.

And if you find yourself in Costa Rica check out this ............

Pacha Mama - Transformation Cycles, Silence Retreats and Activities around the year

Love Ciel

[Ciel]

Alex P,

What's going on with you?

- c -

[17th Angel]

Originally Posted by Ciel

Alex P,

What's going on with you?

- c -

No idea lol..

[wil]

Namaste Pathless,

Call me confused, befuddled, bemused and elated.

Congrats on your engagement, have a blast on that extended honeymoon, I like the focus on intellectual property (tis where the real satisfaction and real money comes from), wish you well on all your endeavors and see you round the block brother.

peace

wil

[Paladin]

It's been great having you around Pathless, I feel like I'm losing a brother but there are wonderful adventures in store for you so that makes me deliriously happy.
If you ever need someone to watch your six let me know

[dauer]

Good luck Path. It's been nice knowing you.

[Dream]

You aren't be the first guy to disappear after getting married and you won't be the last. Don't tell your kids about this place. They'll find it on their own!

[Faithfulservant]

Good luck and congratulations

[Tao_Equus]

Oh your leaving are you!! You #*@%$ %&@+/**!! just cutting and running like some @%$*?#} >*5£@#!! Well then my friend you have a **** load more sense than I do!!

I doubt I read your every word but you have made some very memorable posts. I think you and I had little in the way of dispute and so we never exchanged much really. But I liked the way you think, and respect you immensely. So you will be sorely missed.

The wheel of life never stops turning. You are going places and taking hold of your destiny in wonderful ways. My congratulations on your forthcoming marriage and all the joys that will bring you. And I wish you every success in your creative enterprises, which I look forward to seeing the fruits. Please do not do as I do and start too many projects and never finish one is my one bit of obvious advice to you.

I am very grateful that you took the time to do this post and not just disappear and for the links which I will bookmark. Farewell from here my gentle, peaceful and erudite fellow. You deserve every happiness, and people get what they deserve.


Tao

[China Cat Sunflower]

You'll be back.

Chris

[Francis king]

Pathless... hope it all works out amazingly for u- which, lets face it, it probably will... I don't pretend to know u much, but... I make inferences, and they are.. that ur not a bad egg, and although we have tussled mildly now and then, I think u rock... peace be upon u, and upon your houses, and remember to wear suncream on the beach!

god bless

xxx

[seattlegal]

Take care, Pathless, and congratulations.
{Please be forewarned that nothing ever dries out in the Costa Rican Rainforest, so once something gets damp, be prepared for it to remain damp for your entire stay. }