compulsion, compression, expansion, and explosion...

gone. again. charlie.
i'm starting to feel like i live with a traveling salesman. if you do, my sympathies. my solitude ends for the year with this trip. after this, i go with him. not because i put my foot down and insisted that i'm breaking up with him if he leaves me alone again, or because he missed me so much last time he said he's never going anywhere without me again (he did say that, which is sweet, but that's not why i get to go). and also not because i drank his diet gingerale. i get to go on the rest of the trips because i just do.

knowing that i get to go as a result of nothing starts me thinking about how often we twist circumstances to provide ourselves with explanations. you know, the way we always recognize "signs" of things to come after the thing has already come and gone. what matthew sanford calls "this longing for a connection deeper than random [that] defines the human condition". the truth is that we live in a random universe, where our human compulsion to connect the dots backwards can't affect the reality that exists in a moment. 

energy attracts like energy...laugh and the world laughs with you, weep, and you weep...hmmm...alone. at first that may sound like i'm contradicting myself, but i'm not really. positive energy is expansive, negative energy compressive. explosive vs. implosive. these are the forces at work in this random universe. the reality of some moments can be difficult to accept. add resistance, and let the compression begin. allow it to be what it is, for no reason other than it is, and watch the expansive energy of this beautifully random existence engulf and absorb it. it's a new moment.

craving is king...

charlie's gone again. this time for a week, to the new river gorge in west virginia for a climbing event. i didn't get to tag along, even though this particular event takes place at the location of and on the day of our one-year anniversary. so i'm eating...

...canned spaghetti, toast (apple fritter bread with sugar you can actually see on the top), sourdough pretzels, chips with salsa and hummous, and tomato basil focaccia...not necessarily in that order. and i'm drinking charlie's entire bottle of diet ginger ale to show him he should never leave me here by myself again.

i should probably be doing yoga instead. it occurs to me that maybe, just maybe, one day i'll be such a good yogi that i make that choice in this situation. right this moment, however, craving is king...and self-deprivation seems a little, well, egotistical. why am i a better person if i'm able to deny myself sourdough pretzels? i don't need all the sourdough pretzels in the world, and i'd share with you if you were here.

yesterday someone showed me an article about an old yogi somewhere in the world who claims he's lived for many years (40 years or something like that) without food or drink, not even water. the article told this man's story and then went on to provide testimonials from western doctors refuting the man's claims, citing information about dehydration timelines, etc. the really interesting thing about it to me wasn't whether or not the man was telling the truth, but that someone felt the need to publicly disprove him via scientific argument, as though anyone who believes the story would be the type of person to be influenced by science...

judgement reveals itself in so many forms...bad cravings, good science...and if i met that man i'd be dying to ask him if he ever gets thirsty, but instead i'd keep my mouth shut and breathe through my nose...