I've been harping on how much online writing feels so. o.n.l.i.n.e. – in its own bubble of hyper-connectivity but deeply lost in thought, overwhelmingly lost in the brains and eyeballs and mindfucks of what it's like to stare at a screen, big or little, for hours and hours, days and weeks on end.
In these early morning hours, I hear the rooster down the street and I realize that this on.li.ne writing is a lot of heaping piles of loneliness and anxiety. These heaps of lonely and anxious yearn to seep into my pores from my eyeballs as they scan the published words glowing on this screen, or on the littler one that is often in the palm of my hand.
Lately, I've been doing far less reading from a screen. and the things I do read from a screen are text messages or intentionally-just-digitally-shared-with-me revelations and meanderings – poems, I've been reading so many poems, some of them called "poem" and many others not. or just not yet.
some of this writing too is lonely and anxious, yes. we're human and so, loneliness and anxiety can walk hand-in-hand with being human.
but wait. writing these words about o.n.l.i.n.e. writing is having me feel like i'm trying to eat my own butt. and not in good way. writing online about writing online. that's the thing. it often feels insular, isolating, stifling. sometimes dizzying, nauseating.
so i'll stop.
and breathe.
and remember i'm here to experiment with belonging. to belong. i'm here to belong.
and i'll write about being offline. inbody. intouch. maybe that's it. there's online and there's intouch. and there's likely actually truly really no separation, ((it's all about belonging, all about experimenting...)) the boxes//separations, they can just help the mind/brain/ego? believe there's a separation between the two so the mind/brain/ego? can feel like it can conceptualize and manage and control its own messy beautiful existence. phew. what a trip this all is.
some intouch noticings of mine over the past who knows how long:
- having coworkers who are self-aware is a delight
- i hold my own basket, you hold your own basket
- sedimentary is the new "perfect"
- dance is so much more than dancing (for me) - it's self-healing and co-healing and attempting and going for those places that feel just out of reach and then being available for another to reach that place for, with, alongside me. and then that other might actually reach that spot and then I too reach a spot within that other's sphere of existence and you, or I might not know that it's happened and no brain words are being asked for and so we can be in this reaching and receiving and meeting, we can just be in it, we can just be with it.
- is your want for this thing because you want this thing or you have deprived yourself for so long of wanting this other adjacent thing that you really think you want this thing but you actually deeply yearn for that other adjacent thing?
- if I don't feel a sense of agency then the experience is not based in reality.
- maybe some of moments of indecisiveness stem from both choices being solid good viable paths
- maybe some moments of indecision stem from the decision being a not-yet-known and living more life is what's needed
- maybe we don't know what happens next and thinking we know what happens next makes for a dull existence – and remembering we don't know what happens next can make for abundant surprising delights
some intouch experiences of mine since i last wrote to you:
- off ramping from eating a bunch of foods in the name of healing my feet
- continuing to meet with my job search council as each of us shift into new work or similar work with different eyes
- continuing my new, very full-time job that is not so new anymore but I just moved through my first year work-iversary during a very full summer season while my supervisor has been on parental leave and I would not have predicted I would've done many of the things I've actually done over this past year
- falling in surprising love with certain people
- and with certain places
- hosted a messy and fun and funny winter solstice bash at my home with my two big, loving housemates
- moving with trusting and healing conversations, questions, relationships - sometimes very shakingly and sometimes with shocking ease
- got sugared, and then went back for more
- swimming in salt and lake so much, so much with so much delight - more, please
- hosted two full-yes women's circles with Christiane
- sailing for the second time – sunset sailing for the first time and v. likely not the last
- hosted SumMoons dance ~ summer moons = summons ~ in the home-shop and some ebb'd and flowed onto the home-floors
- laying and lounging with the big dog on the dried out grass out in the backyard that i've yearned for for so long - thank you, thank you for and to this expansive weed valley land
- shifting sleeping arrangements and bathroom arrangements and working arrangements and relational arrangements and finding myself and others anew
- visited and made-home for a long weekend on an island cliff and an island beach with four women and the dog – and one woman and one man heart-tending the land – as they chose themselves and I chose myself.
arriving at this moment, the last day of August
Sitting outside Friday Afternoon on the last Saturday afternoon of August (aka yesterday hah), I wrote out some questions. These questions I might answer but maybe they will enjoy simply existing as questions on a page, opening into spaces presently unknown.
question if you feel called, answer if you can:
- what will September bring?
- what do I want to bring to September?
- what do I want to leave behind in August?
- what do I want to release into September?
- what do I want to love at this end of August?
- how do I want to move from August into September?
- ....
- what might I love when I arrive at the end of September?
your responses are so welcome
In this moment of life, I am as-lovingly-as-I-can admitting to be quite horrible at responding to emails of a more personal nature (work emails = I. am. on. it.) but even so, hit me up if you feel the desire to do so!
I will, without a doubt, excitedly read your words and who knows if or when I'll respond! Sometimes I find it challenging to respond to things that feel oh.so.big (like do you ever not know how to respond to the question "how are you?" Recently I just gave someone a small thumbs up in response and it seemed to work).
see you ((intouch)) sometime, somewhere – or maybe o.n.l.i.n.e?
Cassandra
P.S. If you're curious about my work as a creative partner (project and marketing manager and so much more for creative entrepreneurs), it's still alive and becoming. Let me know if you're interested in creating together.