I’ve done it two weeks in a row, so I’m going to consider that a trend. I’ve dropped a spotify widget in the column and I’ll update it on Wednesdays with the things I have on repeat through the week. I think the last one was 13 songs and about 30 minutes. This one is 9 songs, 20 minutes (as I write this).
A few songs made it from last week to this week. I’m still loving Tierra Whack and the Maxine Sullivan version of “Enjoy Yourself (It’s Later Than You Think).” And I’m not sure why Big Freedia wasn’t on last week’s mix, but that’s been set right tonight.
Neither of us is particularly spiritual or religious, but we were itching to get out and about after more than a year of lockdowns and isolation, so we chose Cassadaga as a more-or-less arbitrary stupid goal. It’s a kitschy tourist destination (as well as a for-real spiritualist center) and it’s close enough we could do a weekend visit.
We arrived Friday night and stayed in the Cassadaga Hotel. Saturday morning we went to a presentation about the origins of Cassadaga, the hotel, and the rise of spiritualism in the 19th century, which ended with a tour of the camp. We had our auras read and visited a nearby ‘haunted history museum’.
After all of that it was only mid-afternoon so we wandered aimlessly around the camp, visiting several tiny parks. The map showed the Horseshoe Park and Fairy Trail, but it wasn’t clear to me exactly what that was. And, considering the postage-stamp size of the other parks, I wasn’t expecting much. But, since we had time and not much to do, we trekked over.
It was magnificent.
There’s clearly a design, and elements that have been put into place by people tending the park, but there’s also a strong vibe of emergent vernacular art. While there’s a “frame” in place (pillars, signs, a maze, some furniture, designated areas (like a section for lots of garden gnomes)), many of the elements are contributed by visitors (beads, stickers, ‘in memoriam’ grafitti, random objects).
While we visited the camp as a kitschy tourist destination, spiritualism is a real faith and many of the visitors are interested in connecting with the spirit of someone they lost. Throughout the park are mementoes to those who have died, which gives the fairy park a sweet, sentimental aura.
Additionally, the park is large. We wandered around for at least 30 or 40 minutes, finding different nooks and crannies of weird outdoor art installations. Not many people were there when we visited, so it also had the air of a quiet contemplative space.
We found it so charming that on the way home we decided to put a fairy garden next to our house. There’s an unused spot between the driveway and the fence, underneath a giant oak, we decided would be perfect for random bits of colorful junk arranged to be aesthetically pleasing.
At some point in the last 75 years the oak grew around a steel pole that had been stuck in the ground near it. Now there’s what looks like a steel spike sticking out of the oak tree.
“The fairies aren’t going to like that,” I thought. “They don’t like cold iron. What can I do to lessen the impact of this spike? It’s embedded too deep to pull out.” Knowing that fairies didn’t like ‘cold iron’ exhausted my knowledge of fairies. As I was idly wondering if I should look it up to see if there’s an answer for my steel-in-the-fairy-garden conundrum, I laughed at how my brain is research bent, and decided that by-gum I would research fairies, and I’d write a really long essay about what I learned.
The essay is coming along. There’s a rich history to research. But it all started with an arbitrary stupid goal, an idle moment, and a little bit of boredom.
Baby go head, Baby go head Baby go head, Baby go head Baby go head, Baby go head
It’s the first of the month I said enough is enough (Say what) I committed to you (yeah) You should of paid me in love (come on) Instead boy you tried it (umm) I see through your lying (uh uh forreal though) This time my family done Keep your apologizes hun We could have had a good run (uh huh) But you done fucked up son Cause ooo boy you tried it (say what say what) Can’t stand all your lying (all your lying) With all that
You don’t pay no rent (no no) You don’t pay no rent (no no) All this time ive spent (uh huh uh huh) Still don’t pay no rent (nope) You don’t pay no rent (no no) You don’t pay no rent (no no) All this time ive spent (uh huh uh huh) Still don’t pay no rent (nope)
You taking up space You in my head every day But baby this aint your place (nope) And this the shit that I hate (come on) Ooo boy you tried it (say what say what) I cant stand all your lying (nope nah nope nah) Get these boxes out my home (uh huh uh huh) I be better on my own (on my on my what) Stop calling my phone (ring) Bitch leave me alone With all that
You don’t pay no rent (no no) You don’t pay no rent (no no) All this time ive spent (uh huh uh huh) Still don’t pay no rent (nope) You don’t pay no rent (no no) You don’t pay no rent (no no) All this time ive spent (uh huh uh huh) Still don’t pay no rent (nope)
Bitch im your landlord (uh huh uh huh) Don’t got no remorse (nope nah not at all) Pack your bags boy (pack em up pack em up) You don’t live here no more (no more no more) Bitch im your landlord (uh huh uh huh) Don’t got no remorse (nope nah nope nah) Pack your bags boy (pack em up pack em up) You don’t live here no more (no more no more)
You don’t pay no rent (no no) You don’t pay no rent (no no) All this time ive spent (uh huh uh huh) Still don’t pay no rent (nope) You don’t pay no rent (no no) You don’t pay no rent (no no) All this time ive spent (uh huh uh huh) Still don’t pay no rent (nope)
Last year was supposed to be the year of submission. And it was in that I submitted some stories, as opposed to previous years when I submitted none. I submitted 5 stories and received 4 rejections. I’m still waiting for a flash piece that’s out.
The attitude I wanted to adopt last year was to shoot for rejections instead of acceptances. Which, I think, is an attempt to trick myself into not tying my self-esteem to a story’s acceptance or rejection. Maybe I’m getting better at that?
I continually believe I can level up, but feel like I need to do a few years of steady attentive work before I get there. And those couple of years are necessarily stretched out even longer since I have a non-writing job that pays the bills and takes up my time. I’m also pretty indolent which doesn’t help my productivity. There’s certainly some excuse-making packed into the sentences above, so I’m working on uprooting the weird fears I have about my creative expression.
This year it might be a little bit before I crank out any short stories or flash fiction. I’m currently working on two longer pieces — a long non-fiction essay on fairies, and a long historical romance set in my fictional world of Abdera, Fl. I’ll do a post about each of those projects during this 100 days of blogging stint. (Oh! I’m also working on a group project for a commercial interest that I’m not sure if I can write about or not. I didn’t sign a NDA, but it seems a little gauche to discuss it without everyone’s permission, and it’s in an unfinished state, so I’ll keep quiet about it until they start publicizing it.)
Associated with this topic I’ll also do posts on writing podcasts, self-improvement books, making and breaking habits, and other places I’ve been looking for insight and solutions.
Influencing (changing, re-directing) my self talk has absorbed my attention for the last 8 months.
I don’t think self-talk really became an behavioral health issue for me until late 2018, early 2019. And then, because of general work misery, my self-talk started having a disproportionate impact on my emotional well-being. I found myself constantly arguing with imaginary versions of real people. The inability to shut it off and think about other things led me to use the employee assistance program (EAP) at my work. The EAP offered a limited number of free counseling sessions. It was a scary step, but my internal dialog and general unhappiness was negatively affecting my life so I sought help. During the summer of 2019 I picked up some tips and tricks on re-directing my self-talk to less stressful topics.
2020-2021 covid. The tips and tricks I had been utilizing seemed to work. It helped that I worked from home that year.
But in the summer of 2021 I realized I’d been negilgent in redirecting my self-talk, and my miserable chatter returned. So in July I found another therapist, this one I pay regularly (though I’m fortunate enough to have insurance that covers most of the cost), and started a regular practice of mindfulness meditation.
In retrospect I wish I’d started something like meditation much earlier in life because I’m really appreciating the effect it has on my attitude and general emotional well-being.
There are all sorts of other things I’ve been doing to increase happiness and decrease unhappiness for the past 8 months. Those will come up in future entries. What started it all though was arguing with people in my head all the time and not being able to figure out how to ‘change my mind.’
One of the best decisions I made last year was to start therapy. Ostensibly it was to help with job burnout, but I’ve found it extremely useful to have someone listen to my worries about all the weirdness in the world and my own reflections about personal happiness, relationship stuff, chronic low-grade anxieties, and portents of mortality.
For most of my life I’ve resisted any sort of emotional/mental health counseling because I believed that a) whatever was wrong didn’t rise to the level of needing professional help, and b) that a therapist would identify that something truly was wrong with me, and I didn’t want that.
What I got instead is someone who is an advocate, an ally, and a sounding board.
I think it helps that I went in with an open mind and a desire to weed out bad habits, and old frames of reference, and a willingness to sincerely try new strategies for improving my emotional health.
At around the same time I also did a 40 day mindfulness meditation ‘class’ (Mindfulness Daily at Work with Tara Brach & Jack Kornfield). A non-trivial part of what I want to change is my self-talk, and the mindfulness meditation has helped me with that.
And so, as I contemplate what brings me joy and how to turn toward that, I’ve decided to shoot for one hundred days straight of blogging in an attempt to re-establish that habit.
I’m somewhere beyond mid-life. Currently the average life expectancy of a US male is just under 80 years, and I’m a few years under 60. (Long list of caveats including accident, unforeseen health issues, and benefits of privilege.)
This closer-than-I-like-but-still-kind-of-far-away destiny carries more weight when I reflect on the general job/career dissatisfaction that’s been plaguing me for the last four or five years. Am I really going to spend half the time I have left grousing about my day-to-day existence? That sounds miserable.
So, what am I going to do? Well, I’m not sure. I’m in the process of figuring that out.
And that’s one reason to do 100 Days of Blogging. I blogged regularly from 2000 until 2010, and then sporadically from 2010 until now. I like it. It’s fun. I want to do more frequently. We’ll see if a 100 day commitment can bring the habit back.
For no particular reason, or for reasons I can unpack over the course of the next few months, today I’m starting 100 days of blogging. Let the blogging begin!
“The photograph of William James was taken in 1865 in Brazil, where James had traveled to explore the Amazon with the biologist Louis Agassiz.” [source]
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