Work Hard, and we'll buy you a nice coffin with your own money when the time comes.

I believe that hard work can do good things for the person working hard. It can do good things for the hard worker's family, community, and other things in the person's environment. I feel pretty safe in saying that the actions represented by the term "hard work" can work towards good results. But hard work does not automatically imply good things, good defined as beneficial to the person, community, and environment.

After all, I bet the nazis worked pretty damn hard on their project.

Last September the entire student body of my high school was called into the gym for an assembly on this year's new "P.O.W.E.R" program, an acronym-based motivational plan put together by the school administrators or somebody. I really don't think the posters, t-shirts, teams, and assemblies reminding us of this program have done much. I mean, I was never entirely clear on what the administration hoped to achieve in the first place.
Anyway, it bugged me when I noticed that all of the depictions of "Success" involved men... in suits. Wtf?

On that note, I have homework to do. Har har har. I'll blawg more later, possibly about school.

The Hermit Crab Ditches Another Shell

I felt pretty damn depressed today. I really did. I have never felt that depressed I don't think, ever. I think really I've felt down since January, when I went to the beach with some friends and clambered over the hills of sand and down to the water and back up cliffs. After that trip, I got depressed, and since then I've read some and thought some and it's just gotten worse and worse. Why? Because I live in a house. I live in a house in a neighborhood in a town. I have no way of entirely avoiding horrible carcinogenic materials. I feel compelled to check my email a lot. Other people essentially force me to attend mass-education factories. I eat food out of boxes.

And it depresses me.

And it depresses everyone else, too. If not their souls, then their bodies. Yeah, bodies get depressed.

I told my speech & debate coach that I'm not going to the state tournament this weekend. I'm giving up my spot in the event. She didn't fight me, but I feel pretty guilty and bad about it. I hate to let people down, and I know I did that by saying I just can't go.

But, I do not think I will regret it. At least not the part about not competing; I will probably regret the letting-my-coach-down part for at least a while. But this Saturday, I turn 18. I hope to attend my old school's Haru Matsuri festival in the morning for a while, then go to a concert put on by another town's environmental club.

When I got home after breaking the news to my coach, I checked my email (yeah... yeah, I know) and was happy to find an email from my uncle. He sent me an essay by Dmitry Orlov, someone I had never heard of before. Here is the essay.

I believe that I will get through this. Belief can be an unreliable thing, but what isn't, really?

Another interesting thingy I ran across today: James Cameron (creator of the movie Avatar) goes to the Amazon.

Yeah, I run barefoot. I'm cool.

In fact, I'm amazing! Or at least my body is.... But, in truth, I have discovered another important thing for myself to share: I was born to run barefoot. And then, more broadly, we were all born to run barefoot.

Now, hey, I ran track. I own fancy schmancy shoes. Professionals have to wear shoes, or they'd hurt themselves!

Right?

I think not!

If humans are animals (which they are) and other animals do not wear shoes (or, really, any clothes at all, although other-than-humans are better at sticking to their own natural habitat where whatever fur they have is perfect) and other animals run (I've seen it happen!), we humans don't need shoes! Whoa! Locura!

I've done a little research, and found that there are many communities, gathering online and off, of people who run sans shoesies. A lot of them are into barefoot racing and barefoot marathons, which I'm not ready for or even particularly interested in these days, but their words are clear: barefoot is the way to go.

I've been running with my buddy for the last month or so, never even thinking of leaving the house without my running shoes up until this last week, when I took them off before we hit the trail at the local park. I've been pretty happy with running at the park for starters, since the uneven ground and general forested atmosphere make me feel more like I'm running for fun and adventure and less like a rodent in a hamster wheel (although I'm sure hamster wheels have their merits... when you are a caged rodent).

When I run barefoot, I strike the ground with the ball of my foot. I can feel the ground: more specifically, I feel what the ground is composed of. This is important. Yes. And as I move forward the shock of impact goes unfelt in my legs and I ease my foot down, my heel barely brushing the ground. Then I spring back up, and KAPOW! I like that word.

I have learned that I am, in fact, contrary to popular belief, running correctly. My body is put together in such a way that sensitive nerves on the bottom of my feet, the bit between the ball and the heel, make ground-slapping gaits painful for a reason: I am not meant to run that way. The balls of my feet, however, are perfectly adapted to hit the ground and spring me forward. And sure, I have to look at where I'm running so I don't step on anything sharp, but guess what? Callouses aren't ugly in my book, and eye/foot coordination ain't a bad thing to develop.

Running barefoot I do not tire as I do running shod. Barefoot, I feel a connection with my running space. Without shoes, I am a runner. I truly run. I feel like a deer.

I recommend ditching your shoes next time you feel like running. You may find that you feel more like running once you try it barefoot! I don't know! But it's fantastic. Don't step on broken glass. Befriend the ground you're galloping across.

Welcome to the Future

Here again I blog. I've had a blog for many years. I've blogged a lot of bullspit. I haven't been very interesting. I do not intend to become any more interesting.

But my thoughts help me only so much, caught up inside my head: I like to at least pretend that other people will read these things.

An hour or so ago I finished reading a book: Rewild or Die, by Urban Scout. I know about the book since my brother knows the author, and I have always idolized my brother, so I caught on.

Various things have become clear(er) to me in the past few days...

1. civilization owns me.

2. my parents unwittingly raised me to be attracted by the idea of rewilding.

3. i could do anything.

I remember that when I was a little kid (as opposed to the big kid I am currently, of course) on a few occasions I would be running around the playground at my dandy Montessori School and pick up a piece of bark dust off the ground and ponder it briefly. I do not remember my specific thought process, but I then chased around my friends and asked them if they wondered what the tree had looked like, the tree that this piece came from. I thought of it sort of as being like the Shard from the Dark Crystal.

No one else seemed to care. Dramatic!

So I gave up. For a long time. I was weird on my own time, alone, and only slightly less weird in public. I pretended I was a tiger when I was uncomfortable with other people and burst into tears when I realized I would never actually be a not-human.

I wrote some very depressing, mildly creepy poetry.

I talked about myself a lot... oh, wait, I still do!

Anyway, you know what? People exist out there who think like me. I think like other people. And that makes all the difference.

I could go to college for three or four years, become a graphic designer, work hard and make money and do things with money.

Or I could go live in centroamerica for a while, live somewhere that is not here, come back, find some work, and find a community. Find a place to share. Find things to learn, find things to create, find good things.

I will not wait to gather the funds to flee from what there is. I would rather live a penniless life of grief and joy than a life of working to purchase illusions.