1.4 – Keep Good Company

March 30, 2015

Dear Darkened Rose,

This month has felt overwhelmingly busy, yet again. I spent some time adventuring with a few of my most valued friends. I managed to participate in SXSW events with various groups of people, and soak up some free time with Jane, the babies, and Daddy. I did FEMA trainings, purchased expensive camping equipment and work boots, and finished up a schedule (that was a bit longer than I anticipated) with my last day working for the oil company.

Yes, I said FEMA. As promised–my latest news is: I’m joining an AmeriCorps service. Save the world status, some might say (pssh–who the hell am I kidding). At times, I will be able to make money while out camping, and could possibly be deployed in a 24-48 hour notice to assist in emergency relief–so that’s pretty badass. I’m full of a collaboration of trepidation. I feel unprepared, fast-paced, penny-less, excited, frail, and straight-up exhausted.

I just did chainsaw classroom training. I feel so masculine. I may be carrying in your footsteps there—you’re so awkwardly masculine, but awesome nonetheless! It’s whatever. I’m putting it in my tool belt (not literally) and hoping that it can give me the training and knowledge to devote my future to more feminine things. I’m aspiring to one day do something where my days are filled with only the fanciest and most lovely flowers. It’ll happen–eventually.

I’ve been thinking (oh no!). I think one of greatest liberties of being a human is not having a clear establishment of whether or not we should be a pack animal. We’re developed to have minds that are able to embrace freedom through realization; minds that can create, engage, self-sustain, and simply adore things, all autonomously. We do all of this based on our own perceptions and knowledge. It’s beautiful because people can be a nuisance at times, right? That includes you (but today—I love you, and I miss you).

One thing I’ve grown a lot from lately is learning through embracing whatever emotion (love is so vastly included) in whatever form it comes to me. Admiring whatever I want to admire. Neglecting what social norms have requested I do or not do, and just adoring whatever I can intrinsically adore. I love when I take the time to be sad. I love when I notice I’m rich in joy. I love stories of addicts. I love lolly-gagging. I love reasonable goals (those last two tend to go hand-in-hand; haha). I love dogs and babies. I love families. I love my family. I love plants. I love people who talk about overcoming struggles, and their motivation behind it. I don’t like talking about (nor much less knowing the names of) celebrities. I do like talking about blatant sociopaths/psychopaths (‘paths are interesting—that shit’s interesting).

I recently started listening to a podcast over different people’s ideas of how to be Simply Happy. I really enjoyed it. One thing it mentioned was an app called Track Your Happiness. This app has collected research and discovering that happiness could potentially be directly correlated to not engaging in the act of mind-wandering. I love that.

I realize that there is a lot I can do to get rid of mind wandering, through eventually letting go of some tension. I, unfortunately, hold on to some anger from the past, and I feel I will eventually start talking to you about these past incidents. You helped me work through a lot of this (sometimes when these episodes happened), but I still have this persistent need to still talk about them and work through them. I need to breathe out the dirty parts and let it go. It’ll happen…eventually.

I just reread that second to the last sentence, and thought I wrote: “breathe out the dirty pants.” I might do that, too.

I have decided to make stages to my letters to you. As you’ll see, I named this letter for you with a number (weird, I know). This is now 1.4, when I finish 1.9, I will be onto stages 2.0-5.9. I’m nervous about it. I’m preparing for things to get ugly in stage 2. Albeit, we’ll breathe through, and stay present there. We’re still here at stage 1.4. I’ll go more into detail later. Eventually, I won’t talk about my current life statuses or my awkward thoughts. I will have substance.

I’ll leave you on this note:

“If you think romance is dead and gone, find an old jukebox full of 45’s, pop a nickel in it and it all comes back”

I love you. I miss you.

-Oie

Enclosed are cool things.

The Song: Old 45’s

The Pictures:

While I caught up with my dearest friend Nancy and her pup (Candy) at Pedernales Falls State Park, Caleb decided to fish.

Attended the Rachael Ray event at SXSW again this year, and we figured we’d be super early this year. Ashley (Caleb’s cousin’s girlfriend) was determined to get the sliders this year.

Early bird gets the [“Blue Moon Beer-Brined Smoked BBQ Chicken Hard Shell Tacos with The Work”].

Jane, Daddy, Bae, and I visited Ian for lunch one Friday when he got to dress up as a cowboy. His Crawfish (Caleb) bought him that hat to go with his Indiana Jone’s bull whip. He sports it well.

Bae shared her Cheerios and toys.

Daddy and I visited one of my favorite little small parks in Austin (Mayfield Preserve). This guy (peacock), his many friends, and many other factors–make this place so peaceful.