Beans

For an unemployed person, I sure am neglecting this little journal. Ah well, c'est la vie.

Easter weekend was superb. My whole family went out to the cottage and it was so nice. I learned moer banjo, r learned more uke, there was didge-ing and eating (!) and lounging and activities. We helped clear out the well (read: atched my dad pour out some bleach into it), walked up 3km of the road and picked up garbage (thanks, hunters! you guys rock!) and hung out.

On the Friday we got there there was still ice on the lake, and it was extra cool because it was really porous and arranged as rafts of vertical tubes that were really sensitive to movement. If you touched them, they wuold break apart ant float up horizontally. They were about 3 inchs long, some more, some less, and the lake had huge patches of this stuff all over it. So we took out the rowboat and plowed through it all a bunch of time. It sounded like wid chimes sort of, and was *so* cool. I wish I had pictures, it was beautiful to see and very superman's-palace-of-solitude with all the ice tubes we could pick up and shift with the oars. The ice was totally gone by the next morning, which is incredible, and I was sorry to see it go.

But it was a lovely weekend overall and great to get back out to the cottage.

Oh man, you ever get all figured out and really it's all an illusion and you totally don't and then it takes you (and your family-as-counsellors) DAYS to get your brain on track? Like, you know somthing is a good thing, but since it wasn't what you had in mind, it takes a while to adjust? For someone who readily seeks out change, I really suck at actually handling it. One would think with all the practice I get, I'd be developing some skills, but I guess I just get attached to ideas.

Sometimes I wonder where I'd be if I wasn't here. If I felt less allegience to doing the right thing and planning for my retirement and spent all my time being a world traveller or a frigging clam digger in Polynsia or something. It's a romantic fantasy that has me worldly, healthy and loved still, but not totally screwed for my autumn years somehow, despite our society's very clear rules and regs about keeping in line and 'doing well'. But I make my choices and I like where I am, so everything better than okay, but does everybody feel the urge to abandon our society and see if it's possible ot make it somewhere else? Ina totally different way, sans hoops to jump through. No driver's licences, no RRSP's, no taxes, just you, your friends and your trusty jungle machete? Can I live without cars and my enormous selection of foods and spices from all over?

I mean, even if I wanted to be a noveau-hippie and live in a classy-yet-earthy chalet somewhere, it would cost the frigging earth to make a living at it to have all my nice things. It's just a different set of nice things. It all comes down to a standard of living concept. I can think of very few people who dream of living in a small house somewhere, or fantasize about living off beans and making less of an impact on the world based on habits and thoughts. Maybe it's that we consider these things as a drop in a standard of living, and maybe that perception is flawed. Shouldn't the lifestyle that is affordable, environmentally less destructive, more conscientious and more sustainable for future generations BE the most desireable one? Why do we like things that inevitable are breaking us down?

It weirds me out. Anyway, I guess I eat a lot of beans, and that's a start.