As a writier I've always thought I had a fairly well-rounded vocabulary. Certainly there are many words I don't know, but SHERLOCK has forced me to be a bit of a wordsmith lately as I hunt down the meanings of words like meretricious, fatuous, alienist, recalcitrant, intransigent and many others.
Recently I purchased the book, The Beekeeper's Apprentice by Laurie R. King, and although I enjoyed the book, I didn't enjoy the fact that my vocabulary took a bit of beating. I have suddenly become so hyper-sensitive to words I don't know that when I come across one, I will stop immediately to look up its definition and write it down. King's book produced several pages of my handwritten definitions. Perhaps these words are common to some people, but they weren't to me. I grew a bit despondent over my alarming inability to immediately know these words that were popping off the page like a proverbial sore thumb.
I began to think my vocabulary was in serious trouble and so I set out to correct the issue by ordering four books that were supposed to improve me. They are:
The Words You Should Know by David Olsen - 1200 essential words every educated person should be able to use and define.
More Words you Should Know by Michelle Bevilacqua - 1500 more words every educated person should be able to use and define
Word Smart (The Princeton Review) by Adam Robinson and the staff of the Princeton Review - Building an Educated Vocabulary
Pocket Posh Word Power:120 Words To Make You Sound Intelligent - by Wordnik.
Of these four, the first two were far too basic for me, but I do recommend that all parents should start their kids on them no later than the first year of middle school, and that these words should be known by the time they leave middle school. The third book, Word Smart, should be started in high school. All three books are geared towards college/university entrance exams, SATs and GREs.
The last book purely is erudite fluff, full of words you will never need but which can pepper a conversation with the best ivy league clerisy or the hoity-toity art crowd. Even then, you likely will not have heard of 90% of them nor ever have a real need to use any of them.
I am working my way through digesting Pocket Posh, but it will take some time to assimilate those words into my written vocabulary. I have already assimilated one, however, and solved a word mystery from the most recent Sherlock episode, "The Abominable Bride." I had no idea what the line "Viennese alienist" meant, but I do now. It was a reference to Sigmund Freud. It is words like that which can make me feel like a complete moron.
I will soon be ordering the book, 500 Foreign Words and Phrases You Should Know to Sound Smart : Terms to Demonstrate Your Savoir Faire, Chutzpah, and Bravado by Linda Archer and Peter Archer. I am remarkably lacking in that area.
I will also soon start reading the The Monstrous Regiment of Women by Laurie R. King, which is a sequel to the aforementioned book, and hopefully I will be writing down fewer words this time, but she may surprise me. Perhaps my vocabulary beating will be a little less severe the second time around, however.
King, by the way, has a Twitter account for her character, Mary Russell. It is @mary_russell, and she will answer you as the character. Mary Russell becomes the young apprentice to the retired Sherlock Holmes during WWI in the The Beekeeper's Apprentice, and in subsequent books marries and builds a life with him as his partner in solving mysteries.
Saturday, January 30, 2016
Monday, November 30, 2015
Not much stock in dreams
I don't place much stock in night dreams. They are flights of fancy my brain takes by putting together various bits of my day in random order and context.
Last night I dreamed I was meeting someone at a very posh restaurant called IISI. It wasn't set up like any restaurant I'd ever seen. Very ultra modern. It was also somewhat exclusive, not somewhere I would ever go to on my own.
So I went to meet my friend and I had my backpack purse on, and once I got inside I was told, "We don't serve campers." Maybe they thought my purse made me look like a homeless person or something? I don't know, but clearly I was not up to their clientele. Twice I tried to get in, and twice I was turned away. Trouble is that my friend was inside, and I needed them to tell her that I was not, and they just seemed so put out with me. Like I was too lowly for them. It was bizarre.
Last night I dreamed I was meeting someone at a very posh restaurant called IISI. It wasn't set up like any restaurant I'd ever seen. Very ultra modern. It was also somewhat exclusive, not somewhere I would ever go to on my own.
So I went to meet my friend and I had my backpack purse on, and once I got inside I was told, "We don't serve campers." Maybe they thought my purse made me look like a homeless person or something? I don't know, but clearly I was not up to their clientele. Twice I tried to get in, and twice I was turned away. Trouble is that my friend was inside, and I needed them to tell her that I was not, and they just seemed so put out with me. Like I was too lowly for them. It was bizarre.
Tuesday, November 3, 2015
Thirteen months later
It still brings me to tears to think about my dashed dreams from 13 months ago. It partly brings me to tears because I feel like it took so long for that dream to travel to the one place on earth I really wanted to see, and now I feel like I will just never get to go anywhere outside of the USA. The basic desire to travel and see things will never happen for me. That's the way it feels. Say what encouraging things you will, but it doesn't feel that way. I don't sense I will ever again leave the borders of the USA. Even now it still brings tears to my eyes. People travel to and from other countries with ease, and I marvel at how they accomplish it. I just don't know why it has always been the unobtainable for me. It hurts. It hurts every day.
So I can say right now that I don't have any dreams for the future. I really don't. It's like I went sailing and wound up completely stranded in the middle of a desert. There is no way to sail again.
To live a life without dreams, without goals... that's where I'm at. There's nothing left I really want except perhaps to live out the remainder of my days in relative peace and quiet and to write as the muse leads me. I have little to no ambition to try anything new. I have no energy or motivation for anything new. I have no energy or motivation to hope for some goal in the future. There is only now. There is only today. There is only my art, my creativity, my writing. Everything else was given away in preparation for being in Europe (and I was glad to be rid of it regardless, although I do somewhat regret the loss of the three framed movie posters, but I had nowhere to store them or way to ship them).
I do not miss my car. That is really something I was so glad to be unburdened from. It was always a stress with street parking and moving it from one side to the other for street cleaning days. If anything went wrong with it, I was pretty much strapped to fix it. Not to mention the licensing and fees and gas, which is why I mostly ride my bike. What a huge relief of stress that has been.
Ah the bike. The bike that hasn't been ridden in nearly a year although I did just pump up the tires. Perhaps now that the weather is a bit cooler I will go out again. That's what I tell myself, but somehow that part of me has died too.
Now, I should also say that since arriving here in San Gabriel that it has honestly been the best year of my life. It has been a year of near zero stress, a place of calm and quiet. I finished writing one book that I was about half way through when I was on my way to England, and I am just about to finish its sequel. Then I will write the third one in the trilogy, but there won't be a 4th in that series. Also, the third book has to be finished before Jan 1, 2017 since that will be when S4 of SHERLOCK airs. As these books are fan fiction based on where the stories left off at the end of S3, they will be null and void when S4 comes out, but I don't care. They are still good books and I've been able to really sharpen my skills on them. The first one is called THE BLACKBIRD SINGS AGAIN, and the second one is called THE BLACKBIRD AND THE SPARROW'S NEST. The title of the third book has yet to be determined. If you have not seen all 9 episodes of Sherlock, they will make no sense.
No, they will never be officially published. No, I will never make a dime on them. No, I will not be submitting them to the creators of the show to see if they want to do anything with them. No. Just no. They are fan-fiction, and they will stay right where they are, and that's all there is to it. However they are still copyrighted works.
Back in August 2014 when I was still two months away from heading to England, a purchasing frenzy happened in London for tickets to see Benedict Cumberbatch in Hamlet. 100,000 tickets sold out within a couple of hours for a show that wouldn't even begin for a year. I was online in the wee hours of the morning trying my luck to get one... any ticket... and I got one. That ticket was for Oct. 27, 2015. I paid the full price which came to about $125 USD, and I asked them to hold it at the box office for me since I didn't really have an address for them to send it to anyhow. I figured that no matter where I was in Europe, I would be back to London in time to see Hamlet. Such, was not the case, and the ticket remained at the box office. I couldn't go claim it to resell it or give it away. I asked the Barbican Theatre to at least send me the ticket for a souvenir, and I just got it. So, it's an expensive souvenir. I will get it framed. I didn't miss out entirely, however, as the production was filmed by the National Theater on October 15, 2015, and it was broadcast to cinemas around the world that same day. Luckily I was able to see it in the same theater where I saw Cumberbatch in Frankenstein this time last year. However, that was another $20 for Hamlet. Now it is playing again on November 10 at the same theater, and I will go see it again. Hamlet has turned out to be quite expensive. I will see it in cinema as many times as it plays, which won't be much.
What will play in cinemas in early January, however, is the new episode of Sherlock called "The Abominable Bride." It will air in the USA on January 1, 2016 and have a couple of cinema showings within the following few days. Luckily for me it will be at the same cinema as Hamlet, and I plan to go both days, mostly because I just want to be with some other Sherlock people. I've never met in person another Sherlock fan, and they are out there for sure. I'll make up extra jewelry, especially charm bracelets, and I will take them to sell to other fans.
I won a year of free DirecTV back in June and just had it installed so that I would make sure I didn't miss this episode. It is a one-off and is not connected at all to the other episodes. The producers/writers decided they wanted to do one episode in the Victorian times just as a lark, and apparently everyone loved the story line so off they went and filmed it this past spring. The story line is top secret, but there are official trailers for it.
So yes, there's a lot about Sherlock here, but I write it, so I live it, breathe it and inhabit it.
And yet still there is pain. I won't deny it. Pain of dreams lost that now seem so far out of reach that they can't be reached at all. Pain that still brings tears to my eyes. I know that it was God who shut the door, and no matter how much I wanted it open, He would not open it, despite the way being paved. Despite everything. Was it just to get me out of the situation I was in with rent I couldn't afford and a job that was eating my soul? Was the bike only meant to get me this far and no further?
Here I am, just over a year in this apartment, and I am only just allowing myself to settle in, to put my stamp on it. It is only now that I am starting to feel it is a home for me - not because of my landlord or neighbors but because I wasn't quite ready to say I was settling here. Part of me always feels I am ready to pack the bike and go again, but the Lord doesn't really want me to spend one day without a firm roof over my head, and that's why He brought me here. Make no mistake, I am blessed to be here.
I just don't know how to dream again.
So I can say right now that I don't have any dreams for the future. I really don't. It's like I went sailing and wound up completely stranded in the middle of a desert. There is no way to sail again. To live a life without dreams, without goals... that's where I'm at. There's nothing left I really want except perhaps to live out the remainder of my days in relative peace and quiet and to write as the muse leads me. I have little to no ambition to try anything new. I have no energy or motivation for anything new. I have no energy or motivation to hope for some goal in the future. There is only now. There is only today. There is only my art, my creativity, my writing. Everything else was given away in preparation for being in Europe (and I was glad to be rid of it regardless, although I do somewhat regret the loss of the three framed movie posters, but I had nowhere to store them or way to ship them).
I do not miss my car. That is really something I was so glad to be unburdened from. It was always a stress with street parking and moving it from one side to the other for street cleaning days. If anything went wrong with it, I was pretty much strapped to fix it. Not to mention the licensing and fees and gas, which is why I mostly ride my bike. What a huge relief of stress that has been.
Ah the bike. The bike that hasn't been ridden in nearly a year although I did just pump up the tires. Perhaps now that the weather is a bit cooler I will go out again. That's what I tell myself, but somehow that part of me has died too.
Now, I should also say that since arriving here in San Gabriel that it has honestly been the best year of my life. It has been a year of near zero stress, a place of calm and quiet. I finished writing one book that I was about half way through when I was on my way to England, and I am just about to finish its sequel. Then I will write the third one in the trilogy, but there won't be a 4th in that series. Also, the third book has to be finished before Jan 1, 2017 since that will be when S4 of SHERLOCK airs. As these books are fan fiction based on where the stories left off at the end of S3, they will be null and void when S4 comes out, but I don't care. They are still good books and I've been able to really sharpen my skills on them. The first one is called THE BLACKBIRD SINGS AGAIN, and the second one is called THE BLACKBIRD AND THE SPARROW'S NEST. The title of the third book has yet to be determined. If you have not seen all 9 episodes of Sherlock, they will make no sense.
No, they will never be officially published. No, I will never make a dime on them. No, I will not be submitting them to the creators of the show to see if they want to do anything with them. No. Just no. They are fan-fiction, and they will stay right where they are, and that's all there is to it. However they are still copyrighted works.
Back in August 2014 when I was still two months away from heading to England, a purchasing frenzy happened in London for tickets to see Benedict Cumberbatch in Hamlet. 100,000 tickets sold out within a couple of hours for a show that wouldn't even begin for a year. I was online in the wee hours of the morning trying my luck to get one... any ticket... and I got one. That ticket was for Oct. 27, 2015. I paid the full price which came to about $125 USD, and I asked them to hold it at the box office for me since I didn't really have an address for them to send it to anyhow. I figured that no matter where I was in Europe, I would be back to London in time to see Hamlet. Such, was not the case, and the ticket remained at the box office. I couldn't go claim it to resell it or give it away. I asked the Barbican Theatre to at least send me the ticket for a souvenir, and I just got it. So, it's an expensive souvenir. I will get it framed. I didn't miss out entirely, however, as the production was filmed by the National Theater on October 15, 2015, and it was broadcast to cinemas around the world that same day. Luckily I was able to see it in the same theater where I saw Cumberbatch in Frankenstein this time last year. However, that was another $20 for Hamlet. Now it is playing again on November 10 at the same theater, and I will go see it again. Hamlet has turned out to be quite expensive. I will see it in cinema as many times as it plays, which won't be much.
I won a year of free DirecTV back in June and just had it installed so that I would make sure I didn't miss this episode. It is a one-off and is not connected at all to the other episodes. The producers/writers decided they wanted to do one episode in the Victorian times just as a lark, and apparently everyone loved the story line so off they went and filmed it this past spring. The story line is top secret, but there are official trailers for it.
So yes, there's a lot about Sherlock here, but I write it, so I live it, breathe it and inhabit it.
And yet still there is pain. I won't deny it. Pain of dreams lost that now seem so far out of reach that they can't be reached at all. Pain that still brings tears to my eyes. I know that it was God who shut the door, and no matter how much I wanted it open, He would not open it, despite the way being paved. Despite everything. Was it just to get me out of the situation I was in with rent I couldn't afford and a job that was eating my soul? Was the bike only meant to get me this far and no further?
Here I am, just over a year in this apartment, and I am only just allowing myself to settle in, to put my stamp on it. It is only now that I am starting to feel it is a home for me - not because of my landlord or neighbors but because I wasn't quite ready to say I was settling here. Part of me always feels I am ready to pack the bike and go again, but the Lord doesn't really want me to spend one day without a firm roof over my head, and that's why He brought me here. Make no mistake, I am blessed to be here.
I just don't know how to dream again.
Wednesday, December 31, 2014
Last day of 2014
Last day of 2014 but technically it's just another day that will bleed seamlessly into tomorrow as if days and weeks and years didn't matter.For me it has been a year of vast changes that started off slowly and accelerated into September. The slow changes revolved around getting rid of pretty much all of my belongings. I tried to be serious about it, but I was lazy getting going on it. A friend in Scotland and I talked about me coming over, and he kept chiding me that I had to get rid of the piano. What I thought would be my 3 most difficult things (not for sentiment but for trouble) to get rid of were the car, the piano, and all the baking equipment/supplies. The car died by itself in July, and I simply had a tow company come and take it away, and they even paid me for it. The piano was next, and it was free, and a woman paid a professional mover to come get it. The baking equipment sold at the last minute because I made an offer that the buyer couldn't refuse. It just had to go. Everything else was pretty easy to get rid of. I either made lots of hauls of stuff on the bike or I borrowed a friend's car for a couple of trips to the thrift store.
And then it was down to leaving for Scotland on October 1 in a trip that right up to Heathrow seemed perfect - even getting bumped up to business class. And then God shut the door at customs and I was hurled back to Los Angeles on the next available flight. So many dreams shattered. I was crushed, gutted. But God had a very soft landing for me back here. I stayed for 2 weeks with my friend, Jeanette, and then I packed all my bike gear and began what I thought would be a ride across the USA. 2 days into the ride, arriving at a friend's house about 10 miles east of downtown Los Angeles, however, I was offered an apartment for free through Feb. 2015. No rent, no utilities. I had to share it with the two cats that lived there, but they are Siamese and I'm not allergic, and i was more than grateful. Of course, I had nothing but what was on the bike. Gifts from the landlady, Gail, and her family, started pouring in. Clothing, food, bedding. Everything I needed was provided, including a little extra cash for odd jobs around the complex. Gail's caveat: just rest and recover.I did rest and recover. I shifted my entire life for a dream that was shattered, and I had an extremely soft landing of love and support. I was able to finish a book I was writing and start another one with even more books of various subjects in mind. Because besides being a cyclist, I am a writer.
Getting rid of the trappings of daily life helped a lot. Giving up everything helped a lot. Having a new goal of bicycle touring and freedom meant everything. I know I was born to do more than just pay the bills and die, and when you're in a dead-end job with no future, you lose your hope. It isn't as if I could say, "Oh, I'll just go get another job." No, they're all dead-end to me at this point. Mostly they are just dead... just a means to pay the never-ending same bills for which there will never be any ownership. That's a living, but it's not a life. I needed life, and all I'd had were years of living... and many years of just living at subsistence level.
I am not ashamed to be poor. I am the financially poorest one of my siblings, but I have nothing to prove to anyone. I have had some incredible adventures in my life, incredible times of God's provision. Christmas time comes, however, and they want to pitch in for a more expensive gift for my parents, and I say that I need to just do my own thing at my rate.
Well, tomorrow, Jan. 1, training begins again. Back on the bike.
Tuesday, December 23, 2014
Bike Mojo
In the handlebar pannier I have a small ziplock baggie with little bits of mojo in it. Now, I don't really believe in mojo per se, but let's just call them little bits of sentiment. Mostly small notes of encouragement from friends and supporters. Then there are the theater tickets - from seeing the Nation Theater version of Frankenstein to seeing The Imitation Game last night. And there's also a picture of my family that I cut out of my parents' 2014 Christmas letter. It's a picture taken from their 60th wedding anniversary this past June. Marty Bear isn't mounted on the bike at the moment, but he's another piece of bike mojo, and that's really it for the mojo.
I tried to explain to a friend yesterday that my journey is not just a trip across the USA. I am not bound anymore by a job or an apartment. I am not bound by the bills others pay. I am not tied to possessions in a storage unit. No, I gave almost everything away. What else I have is stored privately.
I can start and stop my journey as often as I want. If I need to stop and work for a bit, I can do that. If I need to move on, I can do that. I can go where I want, when I want. I can see what I want. I don't have to be anywhere. I am not on anyone's timetable.
My only timetable is right now... that I have through Feb. 28, 2015 to stay here. If I am to stay here longer, God will need to open a door for that to happen. Right now I'm not seeing any leads for that. I am, however, among dearest friends, and I would hate to leave them.
Friday, December 19, 2014
2 months of rest
I have now been in this apartment for two months, and it has been almost three months since my entrance into Britain was rejected. I should have something profound to say, but I don't.
I do know that God is giving me rest, but I also know that I am still planning on being back on the road by March 1 unless God brings something completely drastic into my life that would compel me to change plans. Right now I have no indication of that.
I try not to think of Britain. Perhaps it because I feel the burn and scarring of the experience still, and my hunger to be there is not nearly as great as it was. I'm still a little shell-shocked from customs at Heathrow. Yet I know that someday I'd still like to see Britain from the seat of a bicycle.
I know there are people who think I was absolutely foolish to give up my apartment and my job and car to set out on a bike adventure. Basically homeless. But I was living a life of not living. I was existing. Existing from one bill to the next. Nothing ever changing. Nothing ever getting better. Now I have broken free of that dead-end cycle. I am in a place of God's complete grace and rest, and it's not the first time God has put me in a place of rest. The first time was in 1985. I was twenty-five years old, just out of university with no job prospects having had an extreme roller coaster ride of stress in the spring of 1985 (upcoming graduation with no job prospects, senior recital (voice), and the other lovely little thing of thinking I might be pregnant (I wasn't)). I had had a job in the town where I lived and went to university, but that was not a job to have (fast food) after graduation. No, no. I had student loans to pay.
I don't remember what day I graduated university with a triple major in music performance (voice), History and English, but it was in May 1985. I moved out of my little apartment in Pueblo, Colorado, and back in with my parents in Colorado Springs. Of course, it was meant to be temporary until I found a job and could save up enough to move out. But I couldn't find a job... a job that would pay enough for an apartment and all associated bills plus my student loans. It was quite a low point for me.
Then in late June I got a call from a life-long friend, Karen Magistrelli. I had known Karen since 1971 when she was a girls' camp counselor at a Christian youth camp and I was a little camper. I got an invite to her 1972 wedding, and despite our age difference, we have been best friends since then, and she saw me through many difficult, angst-filled teenage years. I have seen her raise her children and now have a quiver of grandchildren, and we are still best friends after 43 years. But she called me because that same camp where I had been a camper was needing a cook. I didn't have anything else happening, and all the R&B was covered, so I went up... and I didn't leave for 50 months. Yes, I became full-time, year-round staff at Eagle Lake Camp, located in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains above Colorado Springs. Elevation; 9,500 feet. In the summers the camp swelled with staff, counselors and kids, but in the rest of the year there was only a skeleton crew. No room and board costs. No utilities. No phone bill. And I still got paid. It wasn't much, but i could pay for the student loans. During the quiet months I felt my heart and life begin to heal... and I found the strength to forgive myself. I knew God had forgiven me, that I was cleansed by the blood of the cross, but I couldn't forgive myself. God had to speak very gently to my heart that His judgment was the only judgment, and for me to not be forgiving myself was to place my judgment above His, making my authority higher than His. I had to let go of my own unforgiveness of myself. God gave me just over four years of rest there. He healed my broken spirit and gave me new vision... a vision for screenwriting, and my efforts paid off with my acceptance into master's program at The American Film Institute in Los Angeles in 1989. I graduated in 1991 with a MFA in screenwriting.
So right now I am in another place of rest, and I will be here until Feb 28, 2015 unless something else happens. I should also mention that I had brief places of rest in the summers of 1981 and 1982. In 1981 I got a job at a different kind of Christian youth camp in Manitou Springs, CO. I would say it was more of 2 weeks of intensive schooling for the kids. This was Summit Ministries. Room and board + pay. Then in 1982 I went up to Cripple Creek, CO, a former silver mining town (elevation 10,500 feet), and worked as a cocktail waitress in the old melodrama theater at The Imperial Hotel. R&B+ salary again provided.
Right now I feel a little disconnected with the bike. Mostly I feel it is unsafe to ride around here. Unsafe, that is, to ride in the main city streets. I'm not really used to riding in traffic like is required around here. I know people do it all the time, but I don't like it. The good thing is, my foot is pretty much healed up. I'm not limping anymore and that's good. It's nice to get out of bed in the morning without hobbling to the bathroom. When my landlady took me to the shoe store and bought me new shoes a few weeks ago, I was still in a lot of foot pain. It didn't matter what shoe I wore, I was hurting. Now I can once again be on my feet for a normal amount of time without limping off at the end. I think the old scar tissue from lots of ankle injuries just gets strained and pulled now and then, and scar tissue is not as forgiving as normal tissue. A few times I even soaked my foot in basically scalding water just to force as much heat into the area as possible. I think I will also temporarily lower the seat on my bike a little.
I have been making lots of English Toffee in the past couple of weeks. None of it has been for me. Now I need to make some for me (2 batches) and I still have 3 batches more to make for the landlady.
Life.
I do know that God is giving me rest, but I also know that I am still planning on being back on the road by March 1 unless God brings something completely drastic into my life that would compel me to change plans. Right now I have no indication of that.
 |
| Britain is a lost place of my past - a prenatal existence. I was born a few months after my parents returned to the USA in 1959. |
I know there are people who think I was absolutely foolish to give up my apartment and my job and car to set out on a bike adventure. Basically homeless. But I was living a life of not living. I was existing. Existing from one bill to the next. Nothing ever changing. Nothing ever getting better. Now I have broken free of that dead-end cycle. I am in a place of God's complete grace and rest, and it's not the first time God has put me in a place of rest. The first time was in 1985. I was twenty-five years old, just out of university with no job prospects having had an extreme roller coaster ride of stress in the spring of 1985 (upcoming graduation with no job prospects, senior recital (voice), and the other lovely little thing of thinking I might be pregnant (I wasn't)). I had had a job in the town where I lived and went to university, but that was not a job to have (fast food) after graduation. No, no. I had student loans to pay.
I don't remember what day I graduated university with a triple major in music performance (voice), History and English, but it was in May 1985. I moved out of my little apartment in Pueblo, Colorado, and back in with my parents in Colorado Springs. Of course, it was meant to be temporary until I found a job and could save up enough to move out. But I couldn't find a job... a job that would pay enough for an apartment and all associated bills plus my student loans. It was quite a low point for me.
Then in late June I got a call from a life-long friend, Karen Magistrelli. I had known Karen since 1971 when she was a girls' camp counselor at a Christian youth camp and I was a little camper. I got an invite to her 1972 wedding, and despite our age difference, we have been best friends since then, and she saw me through many difficult, angst-filled teenage years. I have seen her raise her children and now have a quiver of grandchildren, and we are still best friends after 43 years. But she called me because that same camp where I had been a camper was needing a cook. I didn't have anything else happening, and all the R&B was covered, so I went up... and I didn't leave for 50 months. Yes, I became full-time, year-round staff at Eagle Lake Camp, located in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains above Colorado Springs. Elevation; 9,500 feet. In the summers the camp swelled with staff, counselors and kids, but in the rest of the year there was only a skeleton crew. No room and board costs. No utilities. No phone bill. And I still got paid. It wasn't much, but i could pay for the student loans. During the quiet months I felt my heart and life begin to heal... and I found the strength to forgive myself. I knew God had forgiven me, that I was cleansed by the blood of the cross, but I couldn't forgive myself. God had to speak very gently to my heart that His judgment was the only judgment, and for me to not be forgiving myself was to place my judgment above His, making my authority higher than His. I had to let go of my own unforgiveness of myself. God gave me just over four years of rest there. He healed my broken spirit and gave me new vision... a vision for screenwriting, and my efforts paid off with my acceptance into master's program at The American Film Institute in Los Angeles in 1989. I graduated in 1991 with a MFA in screenwriting.So right now I am in another place of rest, and I will be here until Feb 28, 2015 unless something else happens. I should also mention that I had brief places of rest in the summers of 1981 and 1982. In 1981 I got a job at a different kind of Christian youth camp in Manitou Springs, CO. I would say it was more of 2 weeks of intensive schooling for the kids. This was Summit Ministries. Room and board + pay. Then in 1982 I went up to Cripple Creek, CO, a former silver mining town (elevation 10,500 feet), and worked as a cocktail waitress in the old melodrama theater at The Imperial Hotel. R&B+ salary again provided.
Right now I feel a little disconnected with the bike. Mostly I feel it is unsafe to ride around here. Unsafe, that is, to ride in the main city streets. I'm not really used to riding in traffic like is required around here. I know people do it all the time, but I don't like it. The good thing is, my foot is pretty much healed up. I'm not limping anymore and that's good. It's nice to get out of bed in the morning without hobbling to the bathroom. When my landlady took me to the shoe store and bought me new shoes a few weeks ago, I was still in a lot of foot pain. It didn't matter what shoe I wore, I was hurting. Now I can once again be on my feet for a normal amount of time without limping off at the end. I think the old scar tissue from lots of ankle injuries just gets strained and pulled now and then, and scar tissue is not as forgiving as normal tissue. A few times I even soaked my foot in basically scalding water just to force as much heat into the area as possible. I think I will also temporarily lower the seat on my bike a little.
I have been making lots of English Toffee in the past couple of weeks. None of it has been for me. Now I need to make some for me (2 batches) and I still have 3 batches more to make for the landlady.
Life.
Thursday, December 4, 2014
Give it a Try. Whispered the Heart.
Today is one of those days which is not a great day. Woke up with a horrendous back ache. Sometimes it happens from sleeping on the lilo, which means I probably need to add more air to it because it's not hard enough. One does occasionally need to add air to keep it firm.Then there have been the tears. It's hormonal, but even so, on this day my dreams and hopes seem further from me than ever, and one dream in particular seems so far away. It is a dream I cannot ever discuss in public due to it's proprietary nature. And the tears come to my eyes when I think of it and how far away it seems, an impossible goal. And then the doubts and self-defeatist thoughts wash through my soul with their sharp, painful edges to injure and scar me and reopen old wounds that never seem to heal. This is one of those days when my soul feels the piercings and woundings.
And yet I sit in a place of complete basic provisions of living. But I want a life, and that is something that always seems just out of reach. Perhaps that's why becoming a touring cyclist means so much to me... because it's about finding life. A life unfettered. A life of exploration of new possibilities.
I had a hard time when I first arrived here because I was so anemic, so tired all the time and still perhaps recovering from the shock of dreams shattered. Today I feel that shock anew. I'm a bit put off by foreign travel now because I would be absolutely mortified if I ever had to go through customs detention like that again. I would just be permanently put off forever by foreign travel. Zing! Another self-defeatist shard just carved a chasm through my heart.
I have started a new Sherlock book, but it's not really taken off yet for me although I know approximately what I want to do with it. It will build on the foundation I have already established and is a sequel of sorts, but not of the mystery in the first one.
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