Feb 29 2008

If We Weren’t All Crazy, We Would Go Insane

Throughout my whole life since I ran away from home for the first time when I was 12 years old with my bicycle, three dollars, the clothes I was wearing, and my transistor radio, through the second time when I was 14 years old and with my friend and one dollar between us we managed to make it nearly two thousand miles towards the west coast hitchhiking, to the final departure at seventeen, I’ve always traveled light with as few attachments to “stuff” and the material world as I could.

Today, at 55, I’m moving once again. I woke up at 6 AM to start packing. It’s now 8 AM. I’m nearly done packing, but the surprising thing is that once again I’ve thrown into the garbage can as much as I’ve packed, with it has gone some of the cobwebs in my mind that I find once again have collected and I don’t need, and still what’s left will barely fit into my friends SUV about an hour from now.

The strange, mysterious, and what I think shouldn’t be but always is surprising thing is that an old familiar friend who hides right in front of my nose has just suddenly re-appeared that I sometimes forget about for long periods while living in any one particular place, and looking around the living room at the stack of boxes I again feel wonderfully light on my feet with anticipation of the umpteenth new start in my life!

I’m going to shut down this computer in the next hour, but I should be back up online within a day or so, and I might even drop in via a friends computer this afternoon.

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    • Edger on February 29, 2008 at 17:22
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    that people like George Bush can never take away, no matter how fascist they manage to get.

    Something that we all have… we just sometimes forget we have it…

    • Edger on February 29, 2008 at 17:55
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    “Of Old Sat Freedom”

    Of old sat Freedom on the heights,

    The thunders breaking at her feet:

    Above her shook the starry lights:

    She heard the torrents meet.

    There in her place she did rejoice,

    Self-gather’d in her prophet-mind,

    But fragments of her mighty voice

    Came rolling on the wind.

    Then stept she down thro’ town and field

    To mingle with the human race,

    And part by part to men reveal’d

    The fullness of her face —

    Grave mother of majestic works,

    From her isle-alter gazing down,

    Who, God-like, grasps the triple forks,

    And, King-like, wears the crown:

    Her open eyes desire the truth.

    The wisdom of a thousand years

    Is in them. May perpetual youth

    Keep dry their light from tears;

    That her fair form may stand and shine

    Make bright our days and light our dreams,

    Turning to scorn with lips divine

    The falsehood of extremes!

  3. I’ve always said that insanity is the leverage to sanity! LOL.  

    Agree with

    . . . . that an old familiar friend who hides right in front of my nose has just suddenly re-appeared that I sometimes forget about for long periods while living in any one particular place, . . . .

    Thanks for sharing!

    • Alma on February 29, 2008 at 18:44
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    We’ll see you when you get settled, or are able to pop in.  ðŸ™‚

    • Edger on February 29, 2008 at 19:01
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    I’ll be back. You can’t get rid of me that easy!

    😉

  6. I’ve got a big one coming up the end of the month as well.

    Only when you move do you truly realize just how much your possessions weigh you down.

    Good luck with yours Edger.

    • pfiore8 on February 29, 2008 at 19:57
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    why are you moving? i want more of the story.

    more. more. more please.

    or did you already tell it and i’ve missed it in one of your essays?

    take care of yourself…

    • nocatz on February 29, 2008 at 20:19
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    is there room for George and Janis too?

  9. Hey the last time I moved I had to rent a construction bin that was the legnth of 3 cars!

    Best of luck and wish I was there to help

  10. I am of a similar age, i too ran, who wouldn’t, at twelve I camped in the hills of southern California. I ran until I knew that the run was okay a normal response to the insanity. We are not insane but the ones who know sanity has been twisted to mean excepting the unacceptable on all levels. I hope this move brings you some peace as that’s, I’m learning is a good place to operate from. Your always a voice I trust and what pray tell is sanity in this wicked world. I await your next and always stimulating posts where ever they come from.  

  11. and all our other dharmafriends who are traveling to new places these days.

    The Journey

    by David Whyte

    Above the mountains

    the geese turn into

    the light again

    Painting their

    black silhouettes

    on an open sky.

    Sometimes everything

    has to be

    inscribed across

    the heavens

    so you can find

    the one line

    already written

    inside you.

    Sometimes it takes

    a great sky

    to find that

    small, bright

    and indescribable

    wedge of freedom

    in your own heart.

    Sometimes with

    the bones of the black

    sticks left when the fire

    has gone out

    someone has written

    something new

    in the ashes of your life.

    You are not leaving

    you are arriving.

    • OPOL on February 29, 2008 at 23:53
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    but never realized we had a shared history of running away.

    I was 13 the first time but had quite an adventure and ended up making a habit of it.  Hitchhiked from Huntsville, Alabama to Cocoa Beach, Florida several times – had friends there.  To Texas and California on other occasions.  It was quite an education.  It’s amazing the experiences you have on the road like that.  But I don’t have to tell you, you’re one of the few other Roads Scholars that I know.  ðŸ™‚

    Best of luck with the new move brother.  Keep us posted.

    • Edger on March 1, 2008 at 00:04
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    for the good wishes and poetry and nice comments today… and the great music too! Sorry for the quick hit and have to run again comment here – lots to do today and have to still go back and rescue Magic who is going to have some serious meowing at me to do for locking her up in a house she’s never been in before while moving. I know she can hear dogs barking at her through a locked door and she’s probably a little freaked… so I may be in deep shit for a few days, but she’s tough. She’ll make it, but I’ll probably bleed a bit… 😉

    More music and poetry would be nice… nudge, nudge, hint, hint! 🙂

    • Robyn on March 1, 2008 at 00:49
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    • nocatz on March 1, 2008 at 01:36
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    sorry I missed your blues last week, Edger, here’s one that blew my mind.

    • kj on March 1, 2008 at 01:52
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    an oldie, but a goodie

    • kj on March 1, 2008 at 02:01
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    another sorta oldie and goodie…

    • Edger on March 1, 2008 at 02:46
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    A song for all of you, and for Magic!

    By Saturday evening I should have my own computer back up and running full speed again… 🙂

  20. told me this one might be appropriate.

    • kj on March 1, 2008 at 04:43
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    on Budhy’s essay, and it’s mad and won’t let me post there again, so trying here to see if i can alert anyone!  i apparently didn’t close the tag after using a smaller point size, and all the posts below mine are in the small type… SORRY!  

  22. Here it is leap day, and you’ve moved. I can’t find you. Just got my nerve up and you’re gone.

    Guess I’ll just have to wait another 4 years.

    Blessings till then.

    • kj on March 2, 2008 at 03:08
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    adjusting?  Has she found a favorite new nap spot(s) yet? or still “trying out” places?

    • RiaD on March 2, 2008 at 03:56
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    found a new favorite nap spot?

    first couple days are wierd(O!) then it gets fine…

    scritch Magic under the chin for me!

    • Edger on March 2, 2008 at 09:18
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    and got the wireless internet connection up and running, sort of. It’s a little slower than the cable connection was in the old place so we’ll need to get a dedicated line run in here. One of the frustrating parts of it is that videos are slower to download so music videos are choppy the first play through which takes awhile. And my human does like his music, in case no one has noticed, so that has to be fixed.

    BUT! I do have a bedroom window that actually opens unlike the old apartment, so I now have this wonderful fresh air to sleep in, and I even have a window to go in and out of without having to roam the rest of the house in the middle of the night freaking out the other cat Polly, who is cowering in her owners bedroom since we arrived and wondering why she is no longer the queen of the house.

    I even finally took the harness and leash off my human because he kept squirming out of it anyway, and let him go in and out all day yesterday and explore, but I kept a close eye on him and followed him up and down the street and around the neighborhood until I was satisfied that he wouldn’t try to go back to the old place and actually knew where he lived and could find his way back without getting run over by a car or eaten by a neighborhood dog or beat up by other animals, and now I’ll even let him go out all by himself! I keep telling him the other people who live in the house are friends and won’t attack him so he shouldn’t be scared of them.

    It took awhile, but he’s relaxed and less freaked out now, and I think we’ll be ok here. He’s sawing logs over in the corner now. I guess he’s tired because I made him carry in and unpack and put away all the junk that humans accumulate for some weird reason.  Humans get freaked out so easily. I think they run around in circles like chickens with their heads cut off too much and seem to have such a hard time relaxing and just living in the moment. But I’ll keep working on him and maybe in the morning after he wakes up I’ll let him try out the new wireless connection, but for now I think it’s best just to let him sleep and get used to the new house.

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