Archive for Existensis
August is a difficult month
this comes from Existensis.com, a blog of spirituality and existence
I don’t know why this is, but it does seem that August is always a difficult time for me physically, mentally, and existentially. Knowing this is more than half the battle. I also know that things invariably improve dramatically for me as the year winds down. So, there it is.
At the moment, I am (obviously) figuring some things out. Getting some catharsis and looking at a generalized direction to go with career, life, and more. I’m in a good place to do that. The small ranch I am on is quiet and gives me the space to think, explore, and write. Not to mention, I like waking up and doing the chores.
I usually wake up around dawn, make coffee, then go feed the horses, feed the chickens, water the gardens, and maybe ride around the place on one of the quad wheelers. Not bad for a homeless guy, right? It’s one of those situations that just came up and I happened to be able to say yes to. That’s one of the reasons prefer to keep my options open, because when something like this comes up, I can say yes to it.
Don’t get me wrong, this is very temporary, probably two weeks at the longest and more likely a week or so. I’m just thankful to have it. Especially in August. It’s so funny, most of the truly traumatic experiences of my life have taken place during the 8th month. The universe sometimes seems to stack things up like that.
And so it goes. I’ve got several challenges ahead of me. Personal, professional, and spiritual. On the personal level, I’ve put on some weight since getting to the U.S., I want to shed those pounds. On the professional level, I really want this job in Indonesia and I need to figure out how to make my blogging more than just a hobby, and on the spiritual level, Ramadan starts very soon and I will be taking the Feeding the Spirit journey. The nice part is that I can see how these three goals line up and work together.
So yes, August is a difficult month, but in truth, the only times we ever actually learn anything are when we are suffering. I’m grateful to suffer so that I can learn not to suffer.
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Long days online
I’m spending way too much time online. I’m really trying to figure out how folks make money on the internet and what I’m finding is that everything is for sale. It all revolves around pagerank, a ranking system that google came up with. The higher the pagerank, the better your chances of making any money. There are people selling everything online:
Want traffic to your site? You can buy 10K unique U.S. visitors for $10
Want links on pageranked sites? You can buy them.
Want comments on your blog? You can pay for them.
Want content? That’s for sale too.
Want site reviews? For sale.
Essentially it all comes down to me asking, what is real on the internet? The answer? Nothing. It’s just like everything else. A big illusion hidden behind a mask that pretends to be real but isn’t. Crazy stuff. Wow.
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Burning Bridges
Okay. So moving on. Sometimes one has to burn the bridges to actually get across the rough water. I feel that I’ve done that now and am ready to get going again.
Ramadan is coming very soon and I’m going to be following the advice that I put together in “Feeding the Spirit” on my blog over at existensis.com. If you want to go along on this trip with me, I would love the company. One thing that makes the 30 day fast easier is having company along for the ride.
Why not pick up an e-copy of Feeding the Spirit and join me. We can share all of our insights and revelations and maybe we will actually make some discoveries and in the process take concrete steps towards making the world a better place.
Certainly in recent days I’ve been reminded that I am a fundamentally flawed human being just like everyone else. I think that is the important part. One has to make that realization if one is to progress in any sort of way.
So grab a copy of Feeding the Spirit, read the introduction and get ready to discover things about life, God,yourself, and the universe.
Ramadan will begin in North America on Saturday, August 22nd. It will continue until September 20.
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Oh, by the way Dad…
I never wanted your god damn money. You’ve told me so many times that I wouldn’t get an inheritance that I truly believed you. All I wanted was a Dad. And incidentally, those two years you like to say you were looking for us and didn’t know where we were, we were living with the alcoholic and the child molestor and we got your child support checks right on time every month…delivered to our door. Thanks for the birthday presents too…
Just in case you didn’t get my letters…my dog got killed, I had to stick a gun in the assholes mouth when he broke mom’s back, we had big bins of pot on the coffee table while we watched wheel of fortune on the tv in the trailer, and the math teacher at Coffenberry Junior High beat me nearly every day with a big wooden paddle.
I think that’s about it. Have a nice time on your next cruise. I understand why you weren’t able to help me stay in college when i got out of the marines because you had just got back from Hawaii, and why since you got married for a week we couldn’t afford to take the motorcycle/golf trip to Australia you promised me if I got straight A’s, and that your crank habit, corvette, and boat made it impossible to build a birch bark canoe like we talked about.
Oh yeah, you’re dead to me. I forgot.
But since I’m talking to you anyway, I remember doing crank with you and your girlfriend and when i ran away from home cause you hit me, I lived with her but despite the rumours you spread, I wasn’t having sex with her, and even though you deny it, you really did beat up my grandma and my mom.
You’re one hell of a guy.
And Grandpa told me you robbed your mom. He also showed me the will that said each grandkid got $10K and I wasn’t really surprised that you patched things up before he died and that none of us grandkids got anything. He understood you even less than me.
And finally, thanks for kicking me out with no notice after promising me a job for the summer. I’m sure I deserved it for being tired and working hard. No one ever treated me that way before, at least it was you, my Dad, so I could understand it.
You are and were and will be a miserable asshole and you get what you deserve. Enjoy it.
p.s. It’s a shame that you didn’t have the ‘patience’ to get to know the man I am. It seems that everyone I know respects and loves the man I am, except for you. I guess I have you to thank for that. I watched so much dysfunction in my childhood that I determined not to become the same. My parents gave me the greatest gift of all, the example of what I could become if I didn’t live with compassion, love, and a sense that my actions directly affect those around me. I count myself lucky in that I have people that love me, I just always wished that you were one of them.
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So what is happening?
Okay, things are a bit of a mess here, I recognize that. There are several layers to that question. First let’s take a look at the most obvious, this blog (and other blogs).
For some reason, I’ve been acquiring a number of websites lately and trying to develop them. I realized that I don’t have a job and I need to either figure out how to monetize my life on the internet or get off the pot. There are still now firm results, but I’ve been offering reviews, going to forums (online) and really boning up on what it takes to be a successful blogger. By the way, what I’ve been doing lately isn’t what you need to do to have a successful blog. So, one of the things I’ve been doing is sort of organizing my online properties, selling off some names, and trying to transfer this and other blogs I run over to new servers since I’ve decided GoDaddy isn’t really the best solution for me since I have about 40 websites to deal with. The problem comes with the fact that the database for this blog is absolutely massive and neither wordpress, godaddy, nor my new hosting company support database transfers that large, so I’ve had to learn about sql, php, and more. Same goes with a few of the other blogs I recently acquired, the transfer was anything but smooth. So, I’ve been trying to figure all this out and once in a while I need to transfer the domain name servers from here to there and it screws things up, so I haven’t wanted to put a lot of content up and confuse things…although no doubt you are thoroughly confused now.
Secondly, a different situation, the sperm donor that sired me really screwed up my life by being such an incredible jackass. He had offered me work, a place to stay, and the chance to earn enough money to take care of most of what I need and want to do. In addition, when I left Hawaii, he had told me that I could forward my mail to him and send those few possessions that I didn’t want to lose forever to him for safekeeping. So I did that. Old journals, family photos, a few heirlooms left to me from my grandparents, and my violin. So, when he booted me onto the street with no notice and basically fucked me up the ass, I was left in a position where he still had possession of the only possessions I really possess. And get this, at this point, I was reminded that when my brother had left his things with him, they had all ended up in the trash because they were taking up too much space. So, since I was so rudely kicked in the balls by him, I was expecting the same treatment. So I patiently worked to get my drivers license back so I could go there and get my things since he had already demonstrated numerous times that he is not a reasonable man, a control freak, and a serious dickhead. Well, on Monday, after some serious bureaucracy in North Carolina, Hawaii, and Utah, I finally got my license renewed (yes, just renewed, it wasn’t suspended, just expired).
My cousin agreed to drive down to the Mexican border with me to get my things from Big John Foreskin. So, license in hand, I called him for the first time since I had left and his wife answered. She told me just to let her know about when I would be there and her sister would help me get my things, since she and her penis head husband were still in Big Bear working on their laundromats and apartments. I called to let them know and got no answer and no response. The next day, my cousin and I took off and about 4 hours into the drive, the soulless old fart called and told me that we were out of luck and I wouldn’t be able to get my things for a month. We decided to drive the 18 hours to Nogales anyway and get my things since I really wanted to sever the connection with this super prick once and for all. He didn’t make it easy for me to get my things back, but it happened and then we drove back. Was it worth it? Well, even though just about everything that could be broken in the boxes was broken (including my violin), it was still nice to have taken the choice to get rid of my things from the fucking old fucker. Personally, I think it wasn’t the post office who smashed my things, I think that the arrogant old fart decided to smash my boxes, probably trying to throw them away and that his wife decided that she wouldn’t let him do that. Yes, he’s that much of a dick and more. I’m ashamed to carry the same name as him and would probably lose the name if I didn’t love and respect my uncle and my brother so much. So then it was a long drive back.
In the meantime, I’ve been looking for work as a teacher and going through a series of phone interviews that take place late at night due to the time difference, no word on how that is going.
And my student loans have come due and of course I don’t have any way to pay them back so I have been negotiating for a deferment.
It’s been a whole hell of a lot and then there is more too because of course being away from my sweetheart for months and months and thinking I was going to make enough to give us a start to life but then being shot down repeatedly just as I thought I was getting it together has added a lot of frustration to my general state of being.
So, that’s most of it. I’m sure each of you have your own stories of the past few months that are just as traumatic.
So, please excuse me if I don’t update with the same regularity that you may have become used to.
~Vago
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