What?

Happiness?
Do i find myself without a reason to lament?
Where are my mountainous mole-hills?
Whose life is this?
Ah! I claim it as my own!!
Hallelujah blue skies! For once I see not hope in the future, but blessing in the now!
When the next dark day comes, I can rejoice knowing I am blessed. I will store up every happy moment in the dungeons of my soul, where nothing can access them. And when I need them, I will delve deep and coax them out to caress every so often.
thank you God, for giving me a break.

a few things that matter a bit

neil is coming to ohio. are you jealous? of course you get to see him all the time :) but i am freaking out. very happy about this.
have you ever been at a point when you felt like you were on the edge of nothing? there's a whole lot of life ahead, but it doesn't mean anything. as always, we just keep walking. i'm waiting for the day someone tells me 'this is what you are supposed to be doing.' thinking that day will come makes all the days in between a little easier. heck, maybe it will come. no i take it back, it's not that it doesn't mean anything. it's just that so little of it means something.
i sat down next a friend of mine at lunch a few days ago. we talked for maybe two minutes, then i had to work on a script so he started talking to one of our other friends. then he turned back for a second and simply said "i love you."
those are the moments that matter. you touched someone else's life and they reach into yours. and moments with God, of which there are far too few for me. but they're there. i could write about this forever...
two nights ago: the first rehearsal for Swamp Baby (featuring the hallucinating green-skinned nymphomaniac, as Lenny darling so sensitively put it :) Lenny when are you coming out here?) i am blown away. It was like this huge event in my life, and this play feels like it’s growing into a canopy over my head (there’s no symbolism behind that, it just sounds like how I feel) –I’m learning a ton and experiencing so much already through this. and there’ve only been two read-throughs! I wish I could tell you all my little thoughts during rehearsal. Amazing. After we read through the play both nights, we had a long discussion about what we had discovered about our characters, what confused us about the play, what we wanted to work on, etc. It’s like this group of people collaborating on the show actually cares about the play. They want to get everything they can out of it, and there’s an ever-present awareness that it’s all a process. We can’t understand everything right now, so we slowly work our way through technicalities, character motivations, everything as it comes to us. I remember when I used to pick up a script and think, “ok, I have to get this perfect the first rehearsal or everyone will think I suck.” I’m really learning to be patient with myself. This is good.

It would really bless me if I knew you guys were out there.

Wait, let me think

From a paper written by Jackie Spinks, 40 years old, homeless since age 20:
"Next to a high IQ, freedom is the most over-rated quality any sociologist ever extolled."

Anyone have any thoughts? Emotions, even?

The capacity for thinking and honest reactions is far under-used - perhaps stifled - in far too many of us. When was the last time you honestly felt intrigued by something you read or heard spoken, by a teacher or otherwise? And when was the last time you didn't let that feeling sink into your gut and dissolve, whether it was because of the work involved in pursuing it, fear of your gut reaction being wrong or, more commonly, misjudged if you expressed it, or simple laziness? Some of us think and examine our own opinions more than others. I'm the queen of doing what needs to be done to please the authorities; trying to make everyone happy; feeling a rise in my center but pushing it down to get 'more important' things done, but where's the fun in that? Why not question values and assumptions? Find out more about the billions of people in this crazy world whose lives are as important to them as mine is to me? Even if it means getting an hour less of sleep!
This is why I have always admired Kiry, (among many others, but she's the first one who comes to mind.) She does not subscribe to some group that automatically makes her feel the way she feels and do the things she does... and think the way she thinks... "She's a hippie, of course she says that." While I'm sure some people glom onto the hippie/liberal you-name-it culture just to be part of a group, I am convinced that her convictions and political intelligence comes from her heart and her willingness to explore what intrigues her.
I am NOT saying that I feel everyone should be involved in politics. I'm simply saying we should chase after being alive! When something affects us, interests us, outside of our daily lives, it's a reminder that we are very much an integrated part of this world that is pulsing with life at every moment. Pursue it! (she cried to herself) In writing or in thoughts, others' or your own, for as long as it continues to interest.

If this quote evokes anything in you, say something. If it doesn't do anything for you, wait, and allow yourself to react when something does.