It's snowing; snowing like it rains, in tiny little pricking droves. Falling quickly and fading even more so on the ground still warm from the sun that seldom visits. Most likely it's only warm because of the footsteps; the friction of the masses that melts the uniqueness of the snowflake into grayness. But I digress. The day is silver, intensified mystically by the white falling from it. It falls down upon the brown of all that once lived, sprinkling its tedious dormancy with reassurance that they did not slow down their metabolisms and fold in their leaves without purpose. It's falling harder now, precipitation makes almost mathematical wave forms that, if calculable, would make such beautiful music; music you can not hear for all the traffic and the permeating buzz of the electric string draped all over this city like a spider's web. The snow is overcoming the ground now, beating the warmth out of it with the sheer numbers of its descent. It seems that light is falling, obliterating all shadows on its way. It seems to seek out the dark places, the places where it could not reach when it was a distant sphere. It illumines those places with a sort of heavenly everywhere-light that nothing can match.

Somewhere, I am much younger, hoping and praying for more, perhaps they'll cancel school, perhaps I could build a snowman, perhaps I'll be able to sled this year without getting my snowpants full of mud. It reminds me of home and the ice-like assurance of snow. Every year the snow would come, landing on the eager tongues of giddy children; the snowflakes landing in our mouths and only by our excitement could we feel it as it melted so instantly, becoming a part of us. The trick was to try to move around so as to catch the scarce larger ones in our mouths, the moving, of course, defeated the object but we tried nonetheless. It would snow all through the night, creating that special glow that comes with the snow, when the ground is so much closer to the sky. It was at that time that I would walk, in the silence of my loudly crunching boots I heard nothing. On other nights I would walk under the cold clear sky, the moon creating an impossible daylight, the stars and I counting the minutes. I could see farther into the sky on those nights, see beyond the cloudless atmosphere and the void. I could touch something with my mittened hand or freezing fingertips, something I have missed. To sleep in the warmth of the house, the snow welcome, but kept out. This was the most silent of times, waking up in awe and wonder at the light that was beyond white, a purity that comes when a little boy's snowman is tall enough to touch the sky.

Her emptiness was painted on her face in tinges of gray and ice; her desolation made her expression slack; the skin hung from her bones in lonely desparation. China blue eyes, which normally shine like richly hued gemstones, retreated into the gray hollows of her eye sockets.

("I give myself to it, to everything I thought was good;
oh, oh how can I get away from it all now?")

Reading through her inscrutability became easy; the carefree, arrogant girl leaves the repressed smalltown for the big life, discovering herself to be just as lost as she was in the middle of nowhere.

She discovers that her small life was not transformed into something grand, but rather seemed all the more insignificant under the onslaught of such enormous experiences and people. She notices the difference; it is subtle: she is now not only alone, but lonely: lost in a sea of people which neither understand nor see.

The artificial changes; the fundamental stays the same.

I see her. She does not know it; being herself one who does not see. I do; it pains that I do, because I know that the fate of those who observe so clearly the fate of the world is to be those chained by to watch the horror of it coming into fruition.

I don't see what is going wrong, but I feel that something is. I can't tell what, I just know it is something. He doesn't seem satisfied, just happy. That isn't a bad thing, but it's like I can't do anymore and I know that what I am doing isn't satisfying him, so what more can I do? I don't know what to say, or what to do, I just know that I'm not doing good enough, or that to me, I'm not good enough. He is my everything, someone that I just can't let go, that I believe no matter how hard I try, I just can't let him go, and I never will be able to, even if I really want to. We are together, but if he isn't satisfied than we may not be for a while longer. Since he is my everything, I don't know what I can do to make him satisfied, or happier, but I would try anything to do so. I would go to Afghanistan and try to make peace for him, I would do ANYTHING for him, to make him happy, satisfied, and to stay with me forever. He is the best guy that I have ever met, Sean is the best guy that I have ever met.

Today is my little sister's birthday so we're going to Chuck E. Cheese for dinner. I go there alot. Most of the employees know me. I'd apply for a job there but I'm afraid I'd get it. Why is that bad? Well 3 reasons: 1. I refuse to work with food. 2. I can't wear shorts (scars and I'm sensitive to the cold) 3. I'd screw up my SSI and I don't think I'm ready to keep a job.

My sister sent me an email that literally made me LOL. She's thirteen today. I call her short stuff playfully.

Subject: teenagerism........K

Wow!!!!!! Big Make believe word.
Thanks sissie.
I am a teenager.
WOOOHOYYYYYYYY
Loves ya
-Shortstuffs

I'm in a pretty good mood today. I spent all night doing stuff instead of laying in bed tossing and turning.
I put brand new sheets on my bed. I got them for Christmas but just never took them out of the package. They're flannel and really nice. When I finally went to bed at like half past six this morning They were nice and soft just like the pj's she gave me. I worked on rewriting my Raynaud's Disease node though it's not finished yet, I wrote out the assignment that had to be emailed to the teacher. I organized my CD's. I have 90! I made a list of all of them too. hehe. Ok well my mom just got home and now I don't remember what I was doing.

Warning: The following daylog is only for Magic: the Gathering geeks. You have been fairly warned ;)

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Today I went to a Wizards of the Coast shop and purchased an Invasion tournament pack. These were the first five cards granted to me:

1. Order of Chaos 1R Tribal Flames - damage equal to the number of basic lands I control, which is 30.
2. City of God: 3W Glimmering Angel - U to dodge all magic until end of turn, 2/2.
3. Light of Darkness: B Duskwalker - 3B kicker to transform from 1/1 to 3/3 and gain terrorwalk.
4. Game of Life: 3GG Kavu Climber - when summoned, gain card, 3/3.
5. Illusion of Control: U Faerie Squadron - 3U kicker to transform from 1/1 to 3/3 and learn flight.

The following are the flavor texts from my favorites among these cards:
6. "Fire is the universal language" - Jhoira, master artificer
7. "We turned to see where the blow came from and saw only a distant light." - Capashen lord
8. The appearance of the first kavu surprised Multani. As they continued to emerge, he no longer had any doubts about Yavimaya's ability to defend herself.
9. "Don't laugh. It works." - Yavimaya ranger
10. The faithful will walk through streams of fire and emerge unscathed. - Crimson acolyte creed
10.5 "Deceit is the heart of war."

Honorable mention for most humourous:
11. It's not eager to lose the other eye.
12. "Urborg's magic is strong. Did Urza send you to protect us or to protect against us?" - Urborg witch, to Barrin
13. The plagues robbed Dominaria of all but its dreams. Eladamri hoped dreams were enough.
14. Deep in the heart of Urborg lie massive volcanoes whose thick black smoke covers the land with perpetual darkness.

Most inspirational:
15. "I suggest you take a closer look." - Tidal visionary
 . The power of the wild, concentrated in a single charge.*

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Thanks to Candle for presenting me with so many enjoyable decisions.

Wish Fulfillment

Last Friday, January 18, 2002, my mother drove down from Santa Rosa to Santa Cruz to pick me up on her way to Southern California. It was going to be the first time she'd seen the room I'm living in now. Shortly before her arrival I made a quick inspection of the room in order to hide any contraband. I stowed my pipes and other paraphenalia away from prying eyes. For some reason I also covered up the book, Autobiography of a Yogi, which has been prominently displayed on my bookshelf for months. The cover shows a famous portrait of the author, Paramahansa Yogananda, and his piercing gaze is a presence I enjoy having in the room as a reminder of spiritual aspirations. Perhaps because I wanted to avoid a possible discussion, I chose to put another book in front it--thus occluding Yogananda's powerful stare.

Since returning home from the trip with my mother, I've forgotten to uncover Yogananda's portrait--though I've noticed it and reminded myself to uncover it at least five times over the week. Today I reminded myself twice to do it, and yet got distracted before ever completing the task. Tonight I was sitting at my desk when my phone rang. I answered it and it was my mother on the line. A few minutes into the conversation I heard a thump! to my right. Turning there I beheld with amazement the depthless gaze of Paramahansa Yogananda--the book that had been covering it, Robert Anton Wilson's Cosmic Trigger, was now lying on the floor.

I grinned and stared back at Yogananda as that warm glow of the numinous descended on me.

Funny, I'd just been reading a passage about wish fulfillment in Terence McKenna's True Hallucinations:

I have come to believe that under certain conditions the manipulative power of consciousness moves beyond the body and into the world. The world then obeys the will of consciousness to the degree that the inertia of pre-existing physical laws can be overcome. This inertia is overcome by consciousness determining the outcome of normally random, micro-physical events. Over time the deflection of micro-events from randomness is cumulative so that eventually the effects of such deflections is to shift the course of events in larger physical systems as well. Apparently, when wanting wishes to come true, patience is everything....It is easy for consciousness to direct the electrical flow in the central nervous system (though we have no idea how this is done); it is less easy for it to move, not electrons, but the whole atomic system spread far and wide in time and space. This may explain why it is easy to form a thought, but having one's wishes come true takes longer.