Throwback Thursday: 3:15 experiments

A bit of writing from the old 3:15 experiments, this from April 9, 2011:

Pushing forward and upwards
Bit foggy
Bermuda Triangle?

Sometimes it feels like
I'm lost,
Sea-tossed
And wind beaten

Fuzz inside my head
Words escaping me
overwhelmed

Need a glimpse of the light
The beacon, that moment of
Clarity, to bring me back,
Grounding me

homeward:
 back to what was never lost.

I remember how I was feeling when I wrote that.  I was stuck in a job that wasn't right for me, too stubborn or afraid to leave.  I felt constantly drained, anxious, and overwhelmed.  It felt Iike I was living a life of shell-shock, frantically rushing from day to day, and actually experiencing as little of it as possible.
While I don't miss living that nightmare, I am grateful for the lessons learned during that tricky time in my life.  It took me a long time to learn them, and a severance package, but eventually, I got the idea.  Life is now.  This is it.  It's not happening in the future, and it sure as hell isn't happening in the past.
Despite all the delusions of grandeur...  This is it.
So take a good look around you, and see the good.  And if you feel too bogged down, held under and suffocated to see the good (as I once did) then know that change is possible.  It may not happen quickly, but you have an evolution to get on with.  So don't let yourself get stuck in the
proverbial (primordial?) mud.
Sometimes it's the mud that we need to experience before we learn to soar.

Snug in my pack

It was a quiet walk today, I was by myself on the trails with Shelby and Paloma.
I love these girls, I love watching their boundless enthusiasm and energy as they leap across the fields and traverse up and down slopes, chasing each other and exploring together.
I'm reminded of Ender and Abby, and on days like today, I still feel them walking with me.  I can hear their unique footfalls:   Ender steady and surefooted, trotting right at my side;  Abby a little bouncy, a lot gangly and prone to wild, careening, spontaneous runs.

Having a dog is a wonderful experience.  Creating a pack, a family with dogs is a chaotic, adventurous, exhausting, exciting, beautiful and at times, heartbreaking experience.  Once a pack, always a pack.  I wonder if Shelby can feel them too.  And can Poe?  She's our newest pack member, and I wonder if Ender and Abby have reached out to her in some way.
I love days like today to remind me that I'm surrounded by my pack, present and past, at all times.

I find myself singing Abby's song, Rae Spoon's "I'll be a Ghost for You,"  and it's fitting.

A beautiful memory of my Lucy

So, I'm tidying up.
Which means basically moving things from place to place.
In the process I found an old journal I used for my 3:15 writing experiments.
If you've never heard of the 3:15 writing experiment it goes like this:
Set your alarm, so that you wake every morning at 3:15 am.  Yes, 3:15 AM.
You keep a notebook by your bed, and a pen, pencil, crayon...  a writing utensil of your choosing.
When you awake at this ridiculous hour, you groggily put to paper whatever groggy thoughts are in your head.
This is one I found from April5, 2011:

Awoken by my alarm
but raised from bed by the tapdancing of dogs,
this 3:15 is no longer my own.
My guardian Lucy comes
to restore my faith in sleep
putting her foot down
exactly where I'm writing, saying
Stop.

New and Improved Reading Culture?

So, I have always been a bit of a bookworm.  Wayback, before everyone carried technology with them, I would usually have a book with me.  This meant that any time spent waiting for buses, appointments and grocery store lineups could be spent reading.
Mostly, I just got used to the odd looks I'd get from people while I read in various scenarios...
As I drove into Kelowna today, I was amazed by the number of people I saw, in various stages of waiting, avidly reading from the small screens in their hands.

Interesting that compulsive reading has become the norm. 

Take a look at how many people around you are busily "reading" from their handheld tech.   And just imagine what it would be like if in their hands were books instead of gadgets.

Neat, huh?