elainegrey

Tuesday i drove into work and we had the iteration kick-off. Long meetings but good because i am not having to worry about deadlines and commitments.

Wednesday was a work-at-home day during which i had a mild migraine-like headache in the quality of the symptoms, although (thank heavens) not in the intensity. I worked throug it, and then in the evening my sinuses reacted as if i was having an allergic reaction to something over a ten minute period.

Thursday i had a commitment for the evening but didn't feel up to it. I ended up bailing. While i wasn't feeling great physically, i was feeling somewhat giddy with getting to do my new job. I'm not sure what the quality was that has changed, but i think i am letting go of the vigilance that has always been with me. My vacation week included more sleep than i recall, i'm sleeping more now. While there may be a low level cold driving it, i'm resting more soundly.

The fuzzy head was gone Friday morning, but there's still some congestion. I slept late (i think i slept late on Thursday morning too) and we had cleaners coming at 8:30. This is the second of three Groupon cleanings: two people for two hours. I'm using the extra elbow grease to beat back entropy, get past what we manage to get done irregularly. Christine decamped, and i started work on tidying the deck, including caring for the plants. The cleaners were 30 minutes late. I pointed them at cleaning the fridge and the shower curtain. The two hours passed incredibly quickly, but i was just about done on the deck when they were ready to go.

I then drove to the city to meet up with a friend from college. It was lovely, but unsettling in some odd way. I think a little of me felt like i was being seen with the ghostly double of my much younger self beside me. That young lady was desperate for friends and connection and i'm pretty sure i dramatized things for JA to Be Interesting. I took her and her son to Fort Point where we met up with a friend of hers who lives in Oakland. None of them had been to Fort Point, a pre-Civil War fort built right at the Golden Gate: the bridge was built over it years later. It is not tourist-packed, it has incredible views, waves break right there. We saw surfers in the late afternoon, a seal or two, a flock of pelicans presumably celebrating the herring run. A little ways away is the Warming Hut with a coffee bar and national park gift shop. We participated in a cannon demonstration -- i think i was almost sworn into the Union Army, problematic in a couple ways -- and climbed the three stories of spiraling stairs twice. They were all delighted with the location.

I left to drive home watching sunset and fog play with the light along ocean beach, the grey-green surf getting in a good game with the light, too. I bought some fast food, intending to go to my evening event, but decided to bail.

It's still winter. I'm not pushing myself.

Last night and today i've been a bit of a lump. I posted some stuff on freecycle and i'm wondering where the time has gone. There's something at Meeting tonight, and i think i'm going to skip the potluck half.

Rest.

It's a little different but i'm giving it a go.

I wrote a few days ago, "i need to ensure i am able to engage in them [hobbies, crafts] deeply instead of flit, flit, flit."

sonia replied, "My immediate response to this was, 'Why? There's nothing wrong with flitting.'"

It's a good question, and, given the day, one i'd like to meditate on at more length.

I know i have a certain need for novelty, but i also have a need for a deeper satisfaction. When i stick with using tools i develop a proficiency that then leads to a pleasure of having a skill.

Part of my flitting is inspired by new school (or art or craft) supplies and the promise of a fresh start, the possibilities the new supplies signify. (Or new books that i don't read or new notebooks i do not write in or new....) I start, and then flit off again. It's very common, i think: the term "UFO" in the yarn world to designate an "Un-Finished Object" points to the temptation even when one stays within a craft. In our culture, for the many who are moderately affluent, it's easier to buy new supplies for a new project than it is to finish an existing project. And if the existing project isn't going quite right, or some of the pleasure has waned, the new project is free of those associations, and exists in the potential of perfection and joy.

So now that i have a new shiny toy, a digital art device, i reflect on the other drawing tablet devices i've bought over the years and have used once or twice, the stacks of supplies, and i want to stick with this and pursue my creation to some level of satisfaction. I'd had a box of 64 crayons and a sketch pad next to my bed for a long time, well over a year, but after discovering an application called Skitch, i'd been doodling on my phone before sleep. It's the consistency with which i used that application -- not very consistent, but consistent enough -- that made me covet the iPad. I had more colors of crayons than i had in the palette on Skitch, but the ease of managing my phone made it easier to use the application to sketch.

Buying such an expensive New Thing did make me think about all the space allocated to the old things, lying fallow. I'd passed on old acrylic paints this fall, keeping the one product line that i really like. I think i could stand to do more lightening. Intensify what i know i enjoy and use, let go of the older dreams that walked through my life.

I can remember a really powerful session scribbling with the crayons, venting anger onto a page. I know that physicality isn't in the tablet. But is that potential need for a future catharsis enough to keep that tool around? I don't think so: i will still have paints to have a tactile physical experience.

Flitting and acquiring are great practices for exploration: i think i want to move on to discovery, be more intentional, let go of dusty habits and tools and decorative items and books.

I can't imagine i will stop trying new things, but new is a fractal experience.

We can look at a young child and recognize a new life, celebrate the newness of a new year, awaken to a new dawn, or even recognize the new beginning available with an intentional deep breath. The cycles within cycles are there, providing new opportunity and novelty wherever one wishes to find it.

So, instead of new tools, new techniques with existing tools. Instead of a new wardrobe, pare away the clutter and worn items to see the core essence of the wardrobe i have. Digest what i read instead of dashing on to the next new bit of information.

There's nothing wrong with flitting: there's a beauty and a joy available there. I'm feeling a need to make a change, like a season shifting, though.

I don't know how much is symbolic, tied to the need for change at work, and how much is tied to spiritual change and practice, and how much is a pragmatic examination of the "total cost of ownership" of stuff.

It's good change though, i think.