A Blanket Of Thoughts

My own mind amazes me sometimes. Some days I think about getting on and writing a blog...but have nothing to say because nothing has happened and I haven't been up to much. But not today...nothing has happened...and yet I have a TON of things to talk about. Too many things actually.

My mind chattered away a lot today. I guess I don't realize just how much I talk to myself. Today I did, though. I thought about writing a blog and what I would say today. Which of the many things that I had thought about I would actually write about. There's just so much...and none of it relates outside of the fact that I've just been thinking about it. So it's hard to tie it all up into one big meaningful summary like I can sometimes pull off.

But then I figured out what to do. "Tell them that you've just been thinking a lot about a lot of different things and talk about everything!" Simple. And I have. I've been thinking about myself and my life...studding my reactions to everything that I see and feel and taste and smell and hear and want and say and think. I've been thinking about life in general...people in general. I've been missing friends and family. I've been feeling inspired and uninspired. Bored and natural. Happy and disappointed. Distracted and entertained. And it doesn't have to relate beyond the fact...that it's me...and it's who I am...and it's what I'm doing. So here goes a splurge of a ton of random thoughts...I suppose I'll be less eloquent than usual today...but you'll just have to get along anyways.

Yesterday Robbie and I visited a pet store. I've been needing an animal fix like crazy. I'm used to living in a place where there's constantly a furry animal to love and be loved and have fun with without any string attached or any judgment placed. It's amazing how much I took that for granted...not in the way that I didn't appreciate it...but in the way that I didn't realize what it would be like to live withOUT a pet. At home....there were dogs all the time...the poor silly kitty...little pets here and there....horses, cows, pigs, goats, wildlife. (I'm sure I've forgotten some but you get the picture.) I miss Riley and her little waggy self. And Cynthia's pooches. And Coffee of course. I look at pictures of them and can imagine how they feel...how soft their coat is or was...or bulky or coarse. I've been missing them. So we went to the store so I could pet and hold some fuzzy things. I fell in love with a chinchilla who cuddled up right next to me (and then proceeded to poop down my shirt which I only realized much later standing in line to get a library card). We're thinking when we have the income...we'll get something fuzzy for me to play with (and we're studing up on chinchillas so if you have any personal experience with the creatures, we'd love to hear your input). But there's always this part of me that feels evil...owning and caging a helpless animal who should be free and wild and in it's own natural environment. How do I justify owning an animal like a chinchilla? Is it okay if I just make sure to spend time with it? Or is there no justification? Is it just...wrong and unnatural and I shouldn't buy into it? Part of me thinks "well...if I don't buy it...it will either stay in this crappy store in it's small cage and rarely get any attention and die miserably...or someone else who wouldn't treat it as wonderfully will buy it and it will die miserably...so it might as well be me...who would love it and care for it fully. But the other part of me knows that that's exactly why there's a business in the first place...and that buying it...only makes the store buy another one. Where is peace when I need it? Maybe I feel guilty because in the long run...I'm only doing it for my own selfish reasons anyways...so maybe what I should do is just ask the chinchilla...the same way I used to ask flowers if I could pick them like my dad suggested when I was little.

Today Robbie and I woke up late...he had to go to work early...and he's pokey as hell about getting ready to go...so after an hour of getting up, eating, getting ready, and getting him all set up to go to work...we finally got out the door with only an hour to do the thrift shopping and volunteer hunting that we wanted to do. We ended up only doing the volunteer hunting. We found a place called MPP inc. which stands for Macon Program for Progress. I'm sure they do other things but the main thing they do is work with children...they have classes and daycare and what not. We met with a nice older lady named Joann and she told us both all about what they do and how to get involved. We both walked away very excited about it. But I'm not sure how to balance that with a job. Robbie said I should just get a part time job and do part time volunteer work...but I'm not sure if that will work out income vs expense-wise. I suppose we'll find out!

Robbie and I haven't been sleeping in the bedroom lately. Instead we've found ourselves camping out on the futon in the living room...or on an air mattress on the floor. There's something about the room that bugs me. The main thing is the lack of light...there's only one window...and it looks out into a dark covered concrete slab of ugliness that really doesn't serve an purpose except to block the sunlight from coming in the room...and it does it well. When we sleep in the living room...we can leave the curtains open and let the sun wake us up in the morning like I feel it should. But even that isn't the main reason...because I wake up just fine in the bedroom. But the way it looks...when I look into the room and I see the dark yellowish wood paneled empty walls...it isn't a bad little space but...it isn't inviting either. We figure it doesn't hurt to not sleep there...except for the fact that if we weren't going to use a bedroom we could be paying $100 less for a different apartment right down the porch that's an efficiency and a fairly nice one at that. I suppose it is more spacious here...but still. It's weird to have a room that you can't find a use for. I walked down and looked at the other one (if I really wanted to...we probably could move to that one)...but it is much smaller and there are of course the downsides to it. But the kitchen is nice and big and open...the bathroom is roomier...and there is light comming in through the front and the back of the place. The one I'm in now almost feels like there's TOO much room sometimes...it's a big room and everything is right up on the walls and there's a good deal of space in the middle. But in the other one...the room is much smaller...less wall space for things so it would have to all fit oddly...and forget having both a couch AND a bed. (Not that we use both of them now). It would be awesome if another apartment became available that was just as big but brighter too. I'm not quite sure if we'd be allowed to move though...and I'm not sure if it's even worth it. *shrug*

This morning we checked the mail...and there was a load of someone else's mail in our box. I told Robbie to go back and check the mailboxes to see if he could find the guy's name anywhere else...and he look for a bit but then ended up just putting it in what we thought was our landlord's mailbox and headed off. Later a guy came around to the door holding the mail and said "do you know a Mr. So-and-so?" and I thought for a second that the name sounded familiar and said "no, I'm sorry, I don't" and he said "Well they put all of his mail in our mailbox and I'm not sure what to do with it." and I looked down and recognized it and as I was trying to figure out why HE had gotten the mail, said "well I'm sorry, I don't know him" and closed the door and went back to washing lettuce. But it happened in such a way that...I didn't really have time to recognize that it was US who put the mail there and that it really should be our job to figure out what to do with it. So as I went back to work...I realized that I felt really guilty about it. I ducked my head out the door to see if he was still around and I didn't see him...but I couldn't help but beat myself up about it afterwards. Why hadn't I fessed up? And really...why was I making it such a big deal? On one hand I was thinking "well it was just as much our responsibility as it was his...neither of us deserved to have to deal with it." But then I thought "but it was my responsibility...because it was in my box." And then I thought that maybe it wasn't either of our responsibility at all and then thought that maybe it was all just happening exactly the way it needed to...by making me think about it and maybe learn or grow in some way. I'm not sure if there's blame or not...and I'm guessing the guy made it through okay and is still breathing healthy and didn't suffer too much from the experience. But I couldn't help thinking that it should have been me...and that I should have said something...and that in some weird way...karma would come back and bite me in the ass in some strange little way that would slightly put me out for a few minutes in the same way this did to him. But then I wondered if karma applied to people who genuinely felt badly and cared and thought about it and tried to learn something from it...and if so...what a bitch that would be. I warned you that my mind is a crazy place...

Sinnead O' Connor was on the Oprah show today talking about bipolar disorder. I couldn't help but get all philosophical about that, of course. That's my kinda bait if I've ever seen it! But really...I don't get it. I get it in the way that...someone went through something hard...and didn't heal...and the effect was depression. I don't get it in that...people just have a weird chemical imbalance and are born sad. I suppose my thoughts on this are rather obvious. But I find myself wanting to fix it...wanting to help people...wanting to understand it and figure out the cure. If it's just people being sad...my heart thinks that there are ways of working it out. Talking, feeling, healing. But if it's beyond that...then it boggles my mind. Why does someone need to be on medicine to be healthy? Isn't that unnatural? Is the depression just the effect of this world? Or is it really...just like...a sickness? It's weird to me.

And my last spurt of random thought is...I'm not sure how to feel about what I do everyday. Basically...I do exactly this. I hang around and do nothing...and let life approach me...and think a LOT about it and learn from it and try to figure things out. But I'm not DOING anything or CREATING anything or making any MONEY or anything like that...so I feel lazy and unproductive. Where is the balance? Is what I'm doing okay? Am I allowed to not do anything and still be a productive person? Or should I be...making myself useful...for lack of a better way to put it? That's a very usual question I have.

To anything I've said...if you have a response...an answer...a bit of wisdom or insight or just a silly comment or joke or random spurt of your own wonderments....do post it. I love getting responses because I love knowing that people are reading...and it's my only way of knowing that I'm not getting ignored. So post all you want, whoever you are....even if it's just a "jsyk...read this and am reading often". You may think I don't want to get posts from "you old fogies" or keep getting responses from the same people...but I do. I want anything and everything you've got to say. So reach out...I won't bite (unless you tempt me with corn dogs or ice cream or something)

Love you all dearly and miss you all too.

Lovely, (as always)

Kate