2012

The world didn't physically end, but there can't be new beginnings with out some ends, and there were oodles of new beginnings over the last 364.5 days.

I started a creative writing class primarily because it fit my schedule and it turned out to be the best, most connective class I've taken in college, ever. Seriously, I made at least five friends, and probably one good one, in that course, never mind the guided writing practice, never mind the networking and mentoring.

I saw Mindless self Indulgence and got many, many free drinks thanks to my good friend Mike.

I started a multidimensional, multiyear tattoo project with the inimitable Jimmie Hayes, of Liquid Chaos Tattoos, in Brownstown, Michigan.

I went "boating" for the first time, and the second time, and it was surprisingly fun. It was surprisingly fun with only two people, and I think the more people that join in, the more fun it will be. Next time I'll make it more of an event. (Also, GPS.)

I became an American citizen this year, took the test, passed it, stood and pledged my allegiance in un-ironed, somewhat flattering, trousers and a light grey argyle sweater I can't for the life of me find.

I started role playing again, with a good group of guys, and we all get along pretty swimmingly for the afternoons that we play. I think we'd get along outside that setting, but I won't push the issue.

I've started writing again, if somewhat sporadically.

I started doing performance art this year. I would consider my final project a finished piece, even if I haven't gotten any feedback on it, yet. And I consider Pecha Kucha evenings performance.

I met the director of puppetry and performance art for the DIA and was told I should submit something for their performance art show in February, 2013.

I got a disgusting stomach bug and an awesome octopus mustache and a tea  cup with an octopus inside it.

Ran into my first catch 22 of marriage. Have been, if I'm honest, reeling from this one for the 11/12 of the year, but! 2012, none the less.

Now, I understand why passionate coffee drinkers are passionate about coffee, but I don't know how anyone could settle for anything less, once they'd committed to (what I'll refer to as) The True Coffee Experience (Thank-you, Roos Roast).

I made some new friends through old friends, and I saw my first live cage fighting experience. The two are unrelated, and not unrelated, but not related as the first two strands of thought went.

I started reading plays as art, and now appreciate playwriting and play performance as more separate things.

I am aware a lot of these could be grouped together, that I could sort them out better, that this is just rambling, but I'm okay with it.

This isn't an instruction manual, this is a rumination.

First (majority of) a year as a father, and Everyone's still alive.

I got my nipple tattooed. Yes, getting my nipple tattooed hurt.

Maintained a surprise friendship, a very nice one. It's 2013 now, I think we should go out for drinks now and then, then and now.

That's a scratch on a beautiful scar that is The Year, 2012.

I've spent today trying to convince my wife that its okay for babies to cry until they calm themselves when sleeping in a new room, and watching Gordon Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares, which is about a famous chef helping restaurants that are failing to succeed. He's an incredibly high strung, but very calculating man; he understands the concepts of Agency, Passion, and Beauty through Simplicity. Most importantly, he usually succeeds in teaching or reintroducing at least one of those concepts to the people on his show that he helps.

That's a boring tagline.
Here:
Gordon Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares is the A Team television show you'll wish you had as a youth: All the swearing and helping the downtrodden you'd ever want to sink your teeth into.

Snow Bird

I love being warm, and I love knowing that a car will do what I want it to, on a given road.

Driving on, in, through, snow is no such a thing.

So, what does this look like? If a year from now I'm writing from a meshed in porch in Indonesia, or Thailand? How did I get there?

I know that I am not there 100% of the time, I am still married, still have a son. We have to leave after Christmas, and stay until his school is out, so may or June, if they follow roughly the same educational time table we do here.

Does he learn Thai or Indonesian, in addition to English? I would like that.

I chose this location because it is warm, I know it to be (with research and a guide of sorts) cheap, and it seems reasonable.

Also because it requires a passport. The Puerto Rican islands do not require a passport, but are (I'm guessing) much more expensive, being primarily resort islands.

What am I doing? I am writing, one form or another. I could still be at the Uni(.) but that isn't strictly necessary, as long as we are all being supported.

Sure, but, all the way back to paragraph three: how did I get there? Was I visiting to set up a technology exchange for work? Were we vacationing? Visiting friends? A visiting professor whose acquaintance I made, who we (MW? Me?) became friends with due to children of similar ages and interests closely aligned?

There are weirder things that have happened.

I could be dual appointed, or working for a satellite or sister Uni.


As the sun sets, and E plays with his laptop or his Mega Blocks, I listen to noise canceling headphones while working on a new art installation.

MW haggles politely in the market for fresh fruit and veg and my mom (our families) send us hard to find foods and items via Fedex, once we've run out, around my birthday.

My birthday parties are laughingly described, now, as the most exclusive by all my friends back in Michigan.

Again, we are Indonesian, Thai, Korean, from December 27th through the end of May or June, and I work from my laptop or computer, or with my hands at some local job or what have you. Do I just find jobs once I'm there?

The idea of living without the social security net of a steady job is frightening, but is it ultimately better or worse than the alternatives?

I suppose we either find apartments --this would be ideal, for me (travel light, move light) we find apartments each time we move, or we rent out our house in the States and rent out or pay for the apartment/condo elsewhere even when we aren't in it (lend it to friends, or play host to families that need the space.)

Notes From Class, 10-09-12

Petra Kuppers and her partner Neil Marcus came and spoke to our class today. That day. October 9th.

They are crips, cripples, people with disabilities --these are all phrases they used to define themselves.

The first thing I learned, but will often forget, is that compliments are inherent, and words aren't to be wasted on them. Specifically, I misunderstood "Accent?" as "Excellent." And said thank-you. Then, thankfully, I was corrected, and explained that I was from Stratford, England.

Before all this, the class crucible hit its boiling point and three separate groups merged and chatted playfully.

I was reprimanded for not wearing my cowboy boots.

I stayed after and helped two classmates with their pieces.

When we left the stage, people were still milling about talking about forming a writer's group, for practice and workshopping outside class.

Here are the notes I took on my phone, so I don't forget them.

• "Storm Reading" is  play I should read.
• The Olympiads (Olympians?) is a loose, disability advocacy and performance group
• Neil does not like the phrase "Crip" instead prefers "Shape Shifter" or "Twisted Pretzel Alien."
• Sara Kay(?)ne is a stage writer who committed suicide, and who was brilliant according to Petra and a classmate
• Same classmate and I created a performance based on the line "Tell me of your body." Our performance was well received and will be added to for a final assignment, I think
• The (German?) word Ichfrasis, over and over
• The phrase, "The commutative, connotative world."
• The phrase, "Small c catholic." 
• On the 24th of October there is a disability outreach event at UofM, then another on the 25th, both based around or pertaining to the concept of Ichfrasis
• The performance piece, with four people, could (might) have 
• 4 stages
• life
• ascendance
• descendance 
• death
• People turn and sync or unsync
• all ask one speaks
• all speak, one asks
• speak for other people
• the spacing is important:
• moving closer, staying equally far apart
• Location role vs Player role

I honestly don't even know where I left off, so we'll call whatever whatever and start with this weekend. Son fell asleep on my shoulder, Thursday and Sunday. Class assignments aren't due until Wednesday, as far as I can tell, and I successfully discovered both classrooms. But is that love? I mean, these are good things, but they don't compare to the blossom, the cherry blooms in my soul, I get when I son and I connect. So let's dig a bit deeper, eh? Plotting out a MMA curriculum with a good friend was lovely. I'd call that love. A plan for working out. A bevy of look-but-don't-touch --Yes. Cheap thrills can be love, too, or lovingly administered cheap thrills, at least. Chatting with my brother in law. A strange, Yin kind of love. I loved it. Friday night was full of love: the roar of the crowd, the sweat and racing hearts and testosterone --I love both those, all those things. (friday night I went with some friends to a live MMA event and it was amazingly exciting, if mildly disappointing.) The juxtaposition of something so personal and yet so public was interesting in the extreme, and I loved it. Thursday, what'd I do thursday? I had a beer with a friend, apologized properly for being rude the day before. Those acts aren't love, but the relationship is. Love is worth working for. I enjoyed, but didn't love "Super 8." it was Dazed and Confused + The Goonies with a splash of Aliens. I think I will love "The Avengers" But we shall see. I dreamed about my other blog last night, a genuinely happy reminder to update it. I suppose I forget how much I love writing.

SUNDAY:
Went to the Henry Ford Museum (in Michigan, USA) and saw a VW car with a Mexican license plate. We went with our son, and my wife's father and his wife and this was after brunch at a coney island (Americana) restaurant midway between our houses.

In addition to the trains and the car exhibits (of which there were many) we went through a Titanic (Yes, the ship the movie was based on) which was very interesting: lots of recovered treasures on display.

I took a nap, held my son a lot and had pizza without cheese for dinner, and the heaps of toppings made up for the lack of cheese.


SATURDAY:
I had brunch with my wife and son at our favorite local restaurant: Beezy's, in down town Ypsilanti (Michigan, USA). We met a nice woman and her daughter (Evie) but didn't run into Jameson or his parents and the woman taking orders remembered both us and our names, which is always heartening.

Then in the evening, I went and practiced martial arts (Ju Jutsu, [Ju Jitsu?] specifically) with an old friend. After training we went and got some food, and there we chatted about our lives and where we thought they'd be taking us. It was good, and there were lots of recurring themes, which (i think) means we are getting close to the core of some ideas.

MONDAY:
August 13th. The Thirteenth is when we got married, the date, at least. February, sure, but the 13th is always special to me, and this one was great. We've been going to couple's therapy, but we cancelled, skipped out, and saw "The Dark Knight Rises" together instead, and laughed at all our self conscious first date half jokes and held hands and swore at the right points in the movie, and gasped appropriately, too, and it was such a nice experience the weather did its awesome cloudy, warm, and electric thing for us as we left the theater.

Almost an Entire Another Week

I'm not sure I remember two weeks ago. It has been two weeks since I've saved any memories and the problem is: These memories are the ones that float so easily to the surface. If I try I'll still have them in a few years, if I try.

Yesterday
WEDNESDAY:
my sister's birthday, my brother in law authentically laughing at a joke I made; my sister holding my son and them laughing quietly, wholly, together.

TUESDAY:
Calming my son down, easing him into being away from his mother with hide and seek around a curtain and a shadow.  Before that, the profile of my wife hunched curvaceously around her sewing machine.

MONDAY:
I went dancing, chatting with a blue solider girl from the video game Team Fortress 2. Before that I found my often lost often found white hooded sweater with my Ironic "Anachronism" tattoo on it.  More importantly, I wished a friend happy birthday, he's 22 today, but he's older than me in the online spaces we share --far, far older than me, there, and so convinced I'm worth effort.

SUNDAY:
 We had dinner with my wife's dad and his wife and us men went foraging for food (haha) and came back with far too much milk shake. During our foraging, it was nice to hear his spiritual nature manifest.

SATURDAY:
I must have spent with family as well, my wife and I watching television or what? Embarrassingly, I can't remember what I did last Saturday.

FRIDAY:
I also spent with my wife's dad's side of the family. We farted and laughed and watched the first two "Pirates of the Caribbean" movies.
. . .  And I love this? I love holding my son, yes.

Reboot: August 2012

A reboot, yes. No voices but my own, no thoughts but mine. No fictions, no embellishments (unless otherwise noted).

A reboot. A start, because I love my life, and I want to document the things that I love, and that bring me peace. I don't write enough about those sorts of things on my other blog (fmfopl.blogspot.com). Over there it's all transitions and calms before storms.

Here, though --here I want to be happy memories. So, once a day, like an affirmation, or a prayer, or incantation, I'm going to write about at least one thing that brought me joy. Because it's Sunday, and I think I can do this, though the chronology may be mixed up, I'll recount one thing from each day that brought a smile to my face, or a mild (or more) euphoric moment to light.

MONDAY
At work on Monday, I hosted two interviews for an open position. I was appropriately dressed and appropriately vocal during both interviews and my boss complimented me on my performance after the second debriefing session. (On Thursday afternoon we unofficially finalized which three candidates would come back for second interviews.)

TUESDAY
Sat behind a local dairy queen, watching my son scarf down some soft serve and gum ineffectually at the soggy cone. It was warm and sunny and in addition to the two of us, my wife and another couple, some work friends, were there too. We all cooed and did the "Adults-adoring-a-tiny-human" thing, which was nice, but the happiness bursting from my son's face as he dove at the ice cream was I really remember.

WEDNESDAY
Laughed my ass off, sitting at a table of new friends, playing a role playing game like we were in high school. I find it mildly ridiculous, but I like all the other guys I do this with, and it's a social event where there's always delicious, delicious, healthy food and good beer. Super proper grown up nerd time.

THURSDAY
My wife had a friend over to do crafts --they're making cloth diapers for our son, so we can stop renting diapers from a service. The service is nice, and I'm sure there'll be days where we miss having unlimited diapers, but the monetary savings will be a really big help, and it's nice to see my wife actively creating and engaged with something. And I get to take care of our son while she's crafting, which is always a joy.

FRIDAY
Wife went out to the bar with for her mom's birthday, leaving me and my son home alone. This is awesome, but also scary since he's but a smart nine months old. He smacks his diaper if he's wet too long, and has a few favorite activities we can rotate through, including eating something, before he falls asleep in my arms, which is one of those hard wired "awwwww" moments you won't understand until it happens to you. (Even my telling you that, you can relate the situation to a similarly singular experience, but it doesn't actually come close.)

SATURDAY
Walked to the county fair with my wife and son, expecting corn dogs and elephant ears. Instead were treated to a goodly chunk of a jousting tournament, then a fresh steak dinner, replete with locally grown corn and someone's secret potato salad recipe.

SUNDAY
Sat and listened to early fighting stories from a friend's life in a far away state. This after my knees loosened up and we practiced martial arts for a few hours.

P***y, Money, Weed

Yesterday, driving to my mom's house with our son content in the back, my wife(!) ran out of skips on her pandora account and we were stuck listening to a rap song, titled "P***y, Money, Weed." While her moaning about the crap state of rap was funny, watching her laugh-cry when the next song was by Nirvana and I managed to fit the chorus from the rap song into the verses of the alt-rock song was heartening.