What lingers

Lets start at the ending. 

I walked toward home, the air growing thicker and as I turned down the street to my apartment. A moment I wanted to capture panned out before me. As always I stopped in the T of the road and was aligning my view. It was at that moment standing there in the middle of an empty road I heard a train and felt an impact. It all happened in a split second as a thought passing through my mind.  Somewhere in space I had just been struck down while taking a picture. The shutter clicks and a breeze again swept my hair.

The ground neatly swept. A conversation beginning or ending, leaving what was said hanging in the air. A contemplative breeze brushed by as I stood eavesdropping on shadows, a conversation unfolding.

 The shadows were good today. I found myself on a path winding through burial grounds sounds of birds joyfully leading the way. Beckoning and cautioning at my progress on a trail like a serpent moving in and around obstacles. Communing with nature now and then a breeze touches my face. 

A bitter nostalgia

 

A bitter nostalgia 

An imagined past

A future contrived of past imaginings and bitter nostalgia for a childhood that  existed only in the scripts of sitcoms absorbed by the masses. 

Televisions lighting the windows as evening closes in on unsuspecting beings force fed a diet of regurgitated beliefs sent through a tube and thrust out of a box. Casting a sickly light on the faces of youth, false promises and  fake news. 

Scaring into complacency,
scarring them through the trauma of being an american through no fault of their own.  

Cast upon the world like a ragged net hoping to catch fish only capturing the trash of those who raised them.  

standing in a swamp of discarded hopes and dreams, with the rains of rhetoric pounding down like a stormy night sky heavy with the weight of ozone. 

The smell of grief for a life never lived and a past only imagined.  Bitter nostalgia.

I am not made for winter

 I always felt like winter looked nice on postcards and in books. But in real life winter has been horrible to me my entire life. I seem to always feel bad, get injured, get sick, or experience huge disasters in winter. 

Which is strange I am born of winter.

Another winter is upon me and the dry cold dusty air has already sent me to the doctors once. I just finished a round of treating a sinus infection to have it come raging back as soon as the pills were out of my system. 

Hot summers seemed bad but this past summer was hot and humid and my sinuses flourished, no stuffy nose, no constant pain, no stuffy ears. In fact I don't think I used more than a quarter thing of tissues from June until November. I have gone through 2 boxes in 10 days. 

I just want to feel good enough to walk to work, or go for a walk. I am not asking for perfect health just relief from feeling like I can never catch my breath.

I don't want more diagnoses so being told my septum is a deviant and could be fixed with surgery wasn't great news. I had surgery on my wrist and that has lead to I probably need surgery on both shoulders now. One hip is very painful my hyper mobile side of my body. Turns out all these years I thought I was inflexible but I actually had hypermobile joints in my left hip and both shoulders. I have an unknown autoimmune disorder, I have adhd which may be the link to many of my health complaints, I probably have POTS but I have been fainting my entire life and just am used to it at this point.

Learning in your 50's that you have a mess of conditions that all should have lead to having support and knowing many of my struggles were real and I was dismissed has been its own trauma. So I wont ever become a great content creator, or a famous artist, or any of that because my body and mind work against me and some months and seasons of my life are all about simply living to the next season and hoping for the better.

I went on a journey

I took a last minute trip to Taiwan. I had a great time. I found myself lost more than found, which is ok. sometimes the best time is had by being completely uncomfortable and reminding myself in past lives we would have used instincts and landmarks and since I do that naturally it takes time to settle in and navigate properly.

Three days is not enough time to really take in a city but I was able to see a few landmarks, meet some new people get invited to a gallery show opening, an incredibly special and important one. It was an invitation show that included many of the Asian countries, to compare and show the diversity among artists. I met a bunch of lovely women and a few men. It got too peopley for me pretty fast so much picture taking. 

I like being behind the camera not in front of it. When in front of it my desire to not be perceived gets triggered hard. I have no idea what to do, smile no my teeth are bad, am I standing right, omg I am towering over everyone, do I look fat and frumpy (of course I do that's my look these days) omg am I embarrassing these people, etc ... 

and it doesn't end until the pictures stop. Having my picture taken makes me want to crawl under a rock and not venture out.  Due to working in a Hagwon I have learned to just pose with my students and make finger hearts and know it will be over quick. The parents know their kids teacher is a fat, old, white person. So familiarity with my students makes it more tolerable although to be honest it still stresses me out immensely.

back to Taipei

I stumbled upon a temple that absolutely appealed to me in every way. I felt awed and welcomed, I was looked at due to being a tourist but also welcomed warmly. The temple itself was incredible and I went back over the course of 2 days 3 separate times, when I left I went and left an offering. I still did it all wrong I am sure but I hope they know I was truly in awe of it all. And have the utmost respect.

Oh and of course when I got lost the first morning my feet took me directly to a botanical park I had no idea existed. So yay instincts knowing where to go.

I definitely want to go back and spend more time there. If I live long enough to retire I would like to spend a couple months or so there, winter is lovely there.

and

I returned home to Changwon and promptly came down with the flu and have been sick as hell for the past 5 days.

Blink

 Blink

Pools of light and shadow play on the surface

Blink

Death lays before me in all its glorious splendor

Blink

A husk of wings no longer beating

Blink

Colors still vibrant even 

though life has gone dim

Blink

The shadows change the light shifts

Blink blink

The moment between death and life

Blink

Will it be there when my eyes open again

Blink

The sun shines so bright it voids my vision with bursts

Blink

The shadows grow long

Blink

What was bright grows dim

Blink

In the blink of an eye what was is no more

Blink

#poetry #writing #lyrics 

Another year has ticked by

 My goal this year is to try and share more of my creative moments. bits and bobs of writing, and drawing, sketches, photos. Everything that makes me the person I am. I have started a blog that will be 52 postings of comic like captures of my intrusive mind. I may post writings and photos in a second blog with links from the other. Why? Because I can and because that is much more how my mind works leaping through connections that no one would normally make.

Welcome to the mind of hummingbirdz

Wandering where tigers roamed

 

Another day off and another wandering in the local park. A wandering of my mind as always. Today I walked to the top and went slower and more thoughtfully. My goal was to not stress my breathing and cause the usual chest pains.  Something about me. My stupid ass was a smoker for about 20 years. That would be bad enough however I am allergic to smoke, highly reactive. So now I have allergy and exercise induced asthma. I also have very diminished lung capacity I operate on about 30% of what I should have.

I say this not for sympathy or suggestions but to paint an image of what its like to be someone who wants to climb just over the next hill, and whose legs get in shape quickly just by walking up steep hills. My lungs cannot keep up, so today I decided I would try walking at whatever pace kept me from breathing like I am about to die. It was hard to do really hard to do because I want to keep going, just keep moving. after I made it to the top I took a random trail and wandered all over the backside of the hill even crosses a little old log bridge over a ravine. saw some amazing rocks and trees.

My thoughts often get the best of me. I find myself sad, or tearing up over things that never were and never will be. Its a strange form of sentimental regrets about what might have been. It doesn't last long but it happens whenever I find myself among the trees and nature. often I will stop and jot my thoughts into my obsidian notes, and that is enough to clear my mind and focus on the present moment. i remind myself that the present moment is the only one that matters, the past is gone, the future isn't guaranteed. and when i do that i find myself with hilarious thoughts. looking around at some shrubby bamboo and trees of several varieties, red dirt/soil whatever you want to call it, i find it beautiful. i think of all the times i walked forests filled with cougars and bears and creatures. the forests here once had tigers and bears. that thought struck me, momentarily i thought what a way to go to be taken out by a tiger in a place it no longer exists. which then leads my mind down a trail of wondering how different forests were when tigers roamed there.

Some say touch grass but for me the only answer is to touch trees, rocks, earth and water.