#uncoffeed...

Kalamazoo now has traffic circles. why does pain so familiar feel so good?  I play the same song over & over opening the same vein over & over recounting the crossroads where the path could have been different mighta been coulda been shoulda been woulda been never matters anyway It's not regret I'm feeling, no I'm playing Physical Graffiti to remember a particular permutation of me. The me who helped break a puppy out of dog jail. ...the one who once took a bunch of the blinky traffic signs and put them in someone's yard like their front door was blocked off...and then another day did the same thing but blocking off Douglas, one of the main streets in Kalamazoo. THERE WASN'T ANYTHING ELSE TO DO. We were kids who didn't want to go home. I was "raised" by old hippies. I'd given up on traditional life entirely, skipped school, and went downtown to hang in basements on the North Side with musicians who had weed and philosophy. They talked to m...

Boundaries as a term is bordering on being the new catchprase, clickbait even.  You read it here first, kids.  However, the concept is crucial for healthy living. Let's get ahead of the curve and set some now, before hipsterdom catches the wave. Realise that you have them.  You always have had them; your first set was probably handed to you by adults you trusted as a child.  This may or may not be problematic: the boundaries you were given may be inappropriate for you or you may have outgrown them. I'll give a personal example: I was taught that I should sit down, and if somebody wants me to have something they will give it to me. At some point, somebody who'd been handed different boundaries laughed at me and said, "If you want something, you have to ask for it," and was amazed that I didn't know this.  Now we arrive at the next rule.  Do not weigh or judge the boundaries of others . It may be best to start thinking of boundaries as an invisib...

The more ideas I have, and the more I work out the math in my own mind to find them feasible, the more I realize how much I've shut myself down in the years prior to 2018.  It's a little galling, but I know I didn't do all of it to myself. Also I realize how much I have always been exactly what I am. This is not a post about casting blame. We're going to talk about discovery. In 1975, I was ten years old. For the second time, my school had me evaluated (to see if something was wrong with me.) I met with a guidance counselor weekly and she gave me various tasks that didn't make sense, but I performed them well. She typed my parents a letter that begins: "The most apt phrase to describe our most delightful Debbie is that she 'bites off more than she can chew.' Although this really isn't the case." I love this line. But then she follows with "Deb could do the work if she'd like to but perhaps she gets more attention if she...