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Apr. 11th, 2003 11:53 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jawnbcThe perfect place
Laundry’s in the dryers (3 loads); this arvo my pal John and I are off to the Korean baths in Kings Cross for shhhpa treatments. It’s fantastic--for about $85 they massage, exfoliate and facial you, plus there are wonderful hot tubs and saunas. One of the tubs is a ginseng bath. I am *so* ready for some nurturing.
As of late I’m in one of those transitory phases. Or, as my Piscean soul refers to them, ick. Hate it. Poor focus, angst, crabby. I have learned through trial and error to “stay in my room until I can play nicely” at times like this. Though I’m probably much crankier in my mind than to others--I tend to seem quite distracted when I feel like this. Which some folks mistake for aloofness. More like overwhelmed, with a small o.
Truth be told, things are fine--I’m mostly homesick. Was chatting with a mate the other night about place. He’s lived in Melbourne and Sydney, as well as London, Amsterdam and Cologne (I think; somewhere in Germany). None of which quite “fit” him. I’ve lived in NYC, Oswego NY (actually Fruit Valley, but let’s not go there), Vancouver and now Sydney. And for me Vancouver is the perfect place.
I remember sitting on a bench near Sunset Beach in the Spring of 1990. I had moved to Vancouver 4 or 5 months earlier, hoping for a dramatic change in the way I lived my life by changing venue. As opposed to changing me. Much drama and several loud wake-up calls from the universe forced me to deal with me for the first time in my life. And after only a few weeks of that process I was transformed.
So I was sitting on this bench, and glanced to the right, towards Stanley Park (oh! Stanley Park!). And the range and textures of green poured over me. It’s the first time I remember in my life being both awestruck and grateful for the experience of being alive. How had I not seen the greens before? Many are the times I’ve drawn upon that moment to remind of what’s important in my life and what’s not. And what my priorities should be.
Vancouver is my perfect place, and I miss it. Somedays painfully, most days wistfully. And my time here in Sydney is making abundantly clear that I need to be there. Sydney’s great but it’ll never be home for me.
Laundry’s in the dryers (3 loads); this arvo my pal John and I are off to the Korean baths in Kings Cross for shhhpa treatments. It’s fantastic--for about $85 they massage, exfoliate and facial you, plus there are wonderful hot tubs and saunas. One of the tubs is a ginseng bath. I am *so* ready for some nurturing.
As of late I’m in one of those transitory phases. Or, as my Piscean soul refers to them, ick. Hate it. Poor focus, angst, crabby. I have learned through trial and error to “stay in my room until I can play nicely” at times like this. Though I’m probably much crankier in my mind than to others--I tend to seem quite distracted when I feel like this. Which some folks mistake for aloofness. More like overwhelmed, with a small o.
Truth be told, things are fine--I’m mostly homesick. Was chatting with a mate the other night about place. He’s lived in Melbourne and Sydney, as well as London, Amsterdam and Cologne (I think; somewhere in Germany). None of which quite “fit” him. I’ve lived in NYC, Oswego NY (actually Fruit Valley, but let’s not go there), Vancouver and now Sydney. And for me Vancouver is the perfect place.
I remember sitting on a bench near Sunset Beach in the Spring of 1990. I had moved to Vancouver 4 or 5 months earlier, hoping for a dramatic change in the way I lived my life by changing venue. As opposed to changing me. Much drama and several loud wake-up calls from the universe forced me to deal with me for the first time in my life. And after only a few weeks of that process I was transformed.
So I was sitting on this bench, and glanced to the right, towards Stanley Park (oh! Stanley Park!). And the range and textures of green poured over me. It’s the first time I remember in my life being both awestruck and grateful for the experience of being alive. How had I not seen the greens before? Many are the times I’ve drawn upon that moment to remind of what’s important in my life and what’s not. And what my priorities should be.
Vancouver is my perfect place, and I miss it. Somedays painfully, most days wistfully. And my time here in Sydney is making abundantly clear that I need to be there. Sydney’s great but it’ll never be home for me.
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Date: 2003-04-10 07:01 pm (UTC)Throw in a good meal and it sounds like Heaven.
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Date: 2003-04-10 07:24 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2003-04-10 07:07 pm (UTC)Funny you mention Fruit Valley. We were told when we were about to move here that Warkworth had this same nickname, because of the number of friends of Dorothy who lived here. And while the rumours were absolutely correct about the friends of Dorothy, I've never heard the nickname used since, until your post reminded me of it. Thanks!
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Date: 2003-04-10 07:27 pm (UTC)No, the site for the SUNY Oswego campus is actually outside the town limits of Oswego NY. In the town of Fruit Valley! But the power that were felt Fruit Valley U. didn't quite work. SUNY Binghamton is actually in Vestal...we won't even go there.
Oswego had it share of fruits, but nothing out of the ordinary.
Place...
Date: 2003-04-10 09:09 pm (UTC)Anyway, I moved to FL because I had elderly relatives here. There was a spiritual component that I rarely speak about to that move. There is "something" I must find here, in a sort of "vision quest," that is so rare as to be almost non-existant. Hence, my canoe trip. The canoing out into the intercoastal to visit some of the bird-filled islands and along the St. Lucie River might reveal an answer to my "questioning." I also know that what I need to find can be found on private lands up in central Florida but, again, it requires a quest of sorts. Cattle ranches cover much acreage and it's not easy to just go driving up and asking them to allow me to go backpacking in the back 40.
Much of the current art projects on my site are related to finding this "something" however, I cannot move away from FL until I find what I need. "Something" is a physical object, natural, animal, and very specific, unfortunately I cannot divulge it here. But, I still miss SF even though I moved to FL in 1976! [I will send you pics after my next trip.]
Re: Place...
Date: 2003-04-10 11:23 pm (UTC)Your quest sounds fascinating too--much more physical than I'd care to attempt--but that's an integral part of many North American indigenous vision quests--accessing the supernatural by testing the limits of the body. And transcending them.
I agree about SF; I always say its gay scene is analagous (sp?) to Disneyland for mice: they think it's the way all mice live. And how all mice should live. And that mice for whom it's ill-suited are, well, bad mice.
*squeak-squeak*
Re: Place...
Date: 2003-04-11 07:09 am (UTC)BTW, the image I'm using for this post is titled: "Spring Rite," after Stravinsky, taken in 1972 (I was my own model). "Mangroves" is the most recent self-modeling I've done. I had a photographer friend take the pics but for the web they've been "manipulated" so as to not show detail since I teach and don't want any problems arising because of nudity, even if it is art. I was covered in mud that I brought back from Minnesota. The rich red-oxide color of the soil there is an important color and the iron-rich mineral content has its spiritual significance.
Bit-by-bit I'll explain it all to you... actually, Wole Soyinka talks about it in his play, "A Dance of the Forests." (It's been out of print for years but I've had a copy since the 60's. Soyinka signed my copy of "Kongi's Harvest," just 3 yrs ago, another of his plays also out of print). "Kongi's Harvest," I could be wrong about which play, was supposed to debut at Nigeria's independence celebrations in 1960 but, the "official" gov't word was that his play was not appropriate because it *questioned* gov't corruption and cronyism. The play debuted at some unofficial in spite of non-support.