Nightmares
Lately I really haven't been sleeping well. I find it hard to actually go to sleep, I need to distract myself from my own thoughts to trick my mind into not thinking. When I get stuck thinking all I do is toss and turn awake. I sleep best on Monday mornings usually because on Sunday nights they've been playing the Planet Earth series on the Discover Channel. Something about the narrator's voice is very soothing to me. Combine that with the imagery and I can get lost in it all and just sort of drift off to sleep before I know it. Last night I almost slept well, the trick worked like a charm but, something woke me up around 5am and for another 2 hours I tried to just drift back to sleep but instead I had nightmares. I think I cried out at one point, I know tears came, more I'd rather not mention. I'm not looking forward to this week if my Monday morning went so badly. I'm feeling really drained today, haunted almost, I feel like a ghost. Wait, no I don't. That's just silly.
The rest of the week I only have a book to get me to sleep, I typically have to read til my eyes start to blur, I often fall asleep book in hand still and find myself clutching it in the morning, or else its been thrown around my bed. Despite these tricks I still don't really sleep all that well more often than not. There isn't enough time or there just isn't enough peace in me yet. That sounds better, maybe.
Despite my drained mind I got myself motivated and hiked about 5 miles today. I found another new trail. I got this sensation hiking this unknown trail today I can't liken it to too many things. Maybe really good sex and pushing a fast car to its absolute limits. As the forest closes in around you until there is almost no link to the real world you came from, it comes with these unique sounds, smells, sights, sensations, your senses are all on high alert. Everything you sense seems amplified in a way, your mind races processing it all. The smells, sights, sounds and sensations are all unique for each of those activities but I feel that there is an element of danger in each that is where my mind has made the connection. With each you never quite know if you're chasing the danger or if its you who's being chased by it. Its there either way and there's something exhilarating about the whole thing.
The dangers in this urban forest are probably not as great as I can imagine them when my senses are filled with nothing but that forest. There are some skunks, I've encountered 4 so far in the past few weeks, or at least their smell, never quite spotted the actual animal, the scent was always coming with the wind. There may be a very small number of mountain lions but I would lay the odds of coming across one lower than being hit by lightning. The most dangerous thing you can run across besides slipping and falling somewhere would probably be another person and I would say 99.(a bunch more 9's)% of the people you come across have no intent to harm you. Still you have to be on your toes and paying attention to where you make turns, where you've been, how to get back.
I came across someones attempt to mark a trail every once and a while with what looked like flour or some sort of other fine white/beige powder. I thought of Hansel and Gretel and laughed at how easily their trail could disappear. I chose not to mark my trail as I went on and off the actual trails other than the normal things you do by moving through dense woods, breaking fallen branches and twigs as you walk, footprints etc. I came across a fallen tree that went across a little valley maybe 15 feet below. It feel between a bend in the mountainside. On my way up I made note of it and hiked on on the trail. I chose to push my danger by walking back across it on my way down. I could have been in some bad shape if I'd slipped off it, I was hiking alone, it wasn't a huge fall but I could have easily twisted or sprained something in the fall, there would also have been poison oak to get out of and some thorny looking bushes (some offshoot of manzanita I'd guess). I thought of all these possibilities before I decided to cross the log and I think I made my choice in spite of them.
Lately I've been feeling like the force that moves fate, whatever it may be has been throwing whatever it can at me, almost like I was being punished. I've been feeling sorry for myself, I've been upset, angry even, at circumstance and the world I'm in, at the people in my life, about the people no longer in my life. I've felt unable to affect any of these things I see and can't stand. I fully believe that as individuals we have the ability to affect our circumstance more often than not but I would say in most of the past year I've felt like I've lost a lot of my control over the course I've been on. My choices have been few and all keep coming up wrong when I make them, the failure has been eating away at my consciousness til I can hardly stand to even think about making a new choice. Its been maddening. I say I pushed my luck on that log because as I made that choice I feel like I was standing up to circumstance, I knew it was dumb and somewhat dangerous. I'm not the most agile or graceful person but I believed in my abilities none the less to cross that log, maintaining my balance and grip without falling. I feel like I was staring fate down with my decision, daring it to try and throw something more at me. I was a little triumphant upon reaching the other side that I had made it and stood my ground without backing down.
I'm not sure any of this makes much sense. These are some of the thoughts that occupy my mind currently though and I'm tired of keeping them inside.
The rest of the week I only have a book to get me to sleep, I typically have to read til my eyes start to blur, I often fall asleep book in hand still and find myself clutching it in the morning, or else its been thrown around my bed. Despite these tricks I still don't really sleep all that well more often than not. There isn't enough time or there just isn't enough peace in me yet. That sounds better, maybe.
Despite my drained mind I got myself motivated and hiked about 5 miles today. I found another new trail. I got this sensation hiking this unknown trail today I can't liken it to too many things. Maybe really good sex and pushing a fast car to its absolute limits. As the forest closes in around you until there is almost no link to the real world you came from, it comes with these unique sounds, smells, sights, sensations, your senses are all on high alert. Everything you sense seems amplified in a way, your mind races processing it all. The smells, sights, sounds and sensations are all unique for each of those activities but I feel that there is an element of danger in each that is where my mind has made the connection. With each you never quite know if you're chasing the danger or if its you who's being chased by it. Its there either way and there's something exhilarating about the whole thing.
The dangers in this urban forest are probably not as great as I can imagine them when my senses are filled with nothing but that forest. There are some skunks, I've encountered 4 so far in the past few weeks, or at least their smell, never quite spotted the actual animal, the scent was always coming with the wind. There may be a very small number of mountain lions but I would lay the odds of coming across one lower than being hit by lightning. The most dangerous thing you can run across besides slipping and falling somewhere would probably be another person and I would say 99.(a bunch more 9's)% of the people you come across have no intent to harm you. Still you have to be on your toes and paying attention to where you make turns, where you've been, how to get back.
I came across someones attempt to mark a trail every once and a while with what looked like flour or some sort of other fine white/beige powder. I thought of Hansel and Gretel and laughed at how easily their trail could disappear. I chose not to mark my trail as I went on and off the actual trails other than the normal things you do by moving through dense woods, breaking fallen branches and twigs as you walk, footprints etc. I came across a fallen tree that went across a little valley maybe 15 feet below. It feel between a bend in the mountainside. On my way up I made note of it and hiked on on the trail. I chose to push my danger by walking back across it on my way down. I could have been in some bad shape if I'd slipped off it, I was hiking alone, it wasn't a huge fall but I could have easily twisted or sprained something in the fall, there would also have been poison oak to get out of and some thorny looking bushes (some offshoot of manzanita I'd guess). I thought of all these possibilities before I decided to cross the log and I think I made my choice in spite of them.
Lately I've been feeling like the force that moves fate, whatever it may be has been throwing whatever it can at me, almost like I was being punished. I've been feeling sorry for myself, I've been upset, angry even, at circumstance and the world I'm in, at the people in my life, about the people no longer in my life. I've felt unable to affect any of these things I see and can't stand. I fully believe that as individuals we have the ability to affect our circumstance more often than not but I would say in most of the past year I've felt like I've lost a lot of my control over the course I've been on. My choices have been few and all keep coming up wrong when I make them, the failure has been eating away at my consciousness til I can hardly stand to even think about making a new choice. Its been maddening. I say I pushed my luck on that log because as I made that choice I feel like I was standing up to circumstance, I knew it was dumb and somewhat dangerous. I'm not the most agile or graceful person but I believed in my abilities none the less to cross that log, maintaining my balance and grip without falling. I feel like I was staring fate down with my decision, daring it to try and throw something more at me. I was a little triumphant upon reaching the other side that I had made it and stood my ground without backing down.
I'm not sure any of this makes much sense. These are some of the thoughts that occupy my mind currently though and I'm tired of keeping them inside.