Like many women I've got a peculiar relationship with My hair, specifically its color. All of us have a friend who changes hair color on a whim. If you're like Me you don't totally understand that friend, but you envy her more than a little bit.
I'm in a comfort zone with My own nearly black locks. Over time one's hair becomes one's personality, one's self, really, in a non-superficial way that men will never understand. So I like who I am and I'm OK with My hair.
But I think about those who play with their hair color -- and how I often wish I could just change on a whim like that. If My hair now "is" Me, then, changing it significantly makes Me . . . Someone else?
What if I were to (gasp) go blonde? Who would I become then? Would I "have more fun?" [Studies show that women with blonde hair do get more attention, socially/sexually. I'm still young enough to think that's not a terrible thing.] I know My IQ wouldn't suddenly drop 20 points; that's just an unfortunate cliche . . . ummm . . . what was I saying?
Who am I kidding? I'm simply not Suddenly Go Blonde For The Hell Of It Girl.
But I know her, very well. And I know she stole my boyfriend in the 10th grade.
"Look into my eyes, what do you see? Cult of personality I know your anger, I know your dreams Ive been everything you want to be I'm the cult of personality Like Mussolini and Kennedy I'm the cult of personality"
--Living Colour, "Cult of Personality"
A visitor to the channel the other night said something along the lines that he was "glad I was paying attention to the blog again." Well, hold yer horses there, Pilgrim . . . a few posts does not "attention" make, but thank you . . . and I do hope to keep this up.
But paying attention to the blog isn't all fun and games. When I was ignoring this blog, I was able to also ignore the fact that I have like, nine readers, three of whom are collared to Me and kinda have to read it. Paying attention means being reminded that some girl posts a photo of her cellulite for Half Naked Thursday Afternoon or whatever it's called and it gets 24 comments. Or a post about random promiscuity will garner readership and comments like crazy (extra points for bareback).
OK, I get it. I really do. This might not be a sex blog, but it's "competing" in that marketplace. And a sex blog has got to have some sex in it. Or embarrassing personal details and revelations. My dry little insights are clearly not cutting it in this hyper-exposedhyper-sexualized circus that blogging has become. If you want to be a blog star you have to give the people what they want!
I just have to find My voice . . . perhaps something like . . .
"I was trying for the eleventh time to fix My panty wedgie, and getting wet thinking about the grocerybagger at SavMart, when I realized something very important about the nature of Dominance and submission . .. "
"Now I don't know but I been told it's hard to run with the weight of gold Other hand I heard it said it's just as hard with the weight of lead"
from "New Speedway Boogie," The Grateful Dead
I'm always saying that lessons come at the oddest times from the most mundane things. I say it and think it so often that sometimes I wonder if it's really true or I've just convinced Myself of it and can no longer differentiate lessons from well, random stuff.
Then something happens like what happened tonight. I was driving home and the voices on the radio were hurting My ears in that odd, hard to put words to way that sometimes happens. So I switched to the CD.
Song lyrics stick in Me, or wash over Me, or take Me back to somewhere, or shove Me forward, or, like tonight, just give Me a perfect little jewel of a lesson. I just have to be in the right place at the right time.
And tonight was apparently that right place right time . . . traffic came to a stop at just the right time, and those lyrics above could really seep inside Me.
So what's the wonderful perfect lesson?
More of a reminder than a lesson, really: Burdens are burdens. They all entrap and enervate us, despite how beautiful they might seem on the surface. It's folly to carry them around with us. Likewise, the ugly packages are no more worth lugging around, either. The beautiful ones make us feel important and proud when we carry them; the ugly ones make us feel noble and strong. Both are illusions. Let go.
I actually heard a good chunk of President Obama's speech today.
He's a good speaker . . . he has just enough of the gospel preacher thing without going over the top (and that's not easy to do), he's thorough without being long-winded, inspiring without sounding hokey.
I think he said all the right things . . . and it's kind of hard not to, really, in January 2009. America's current problems make an Inaugural Address kind of a slam dunk for anyone with any intelligence and soul at all. But still, to mix My sports metaphors, fastballs right down the middle get fouled off all the time -- if Obama didn't knock his out of the park today, at the very least he hit a one-hop liner off the wall in a clutch situation.
I do wonder if any of this historic change in American politics portends any real change in America, though. I don't mean on any of the "big" issues . . . the economy will get fixed, partially, and fix itself, partially, We will figure out a way to gracefully exit Iraq and Afghanistan. Etc.
The change I wonder about and keep waiting for (foolishly, perhaps), is the fundamental shift wherein we reverse the places of sex and violence in our society. Corny, perhaps, to point this out for the 1,393,884th time, but a movie can show the most sickening acts of violence and cruelty and be rated PG-13, while a slang word for the procreative act or a bared breast is an automatic "R." The unsuccessful Culture War the Right waged for years didn't just acknowledge the ass-backwards places of sex and violence in this country, it embraced that perversion (and cynically relied on it). That they failed was less because the great mass of people rejected it but more because people didn't care all that much to embrace change of any kind.
Apathy -- America's single greatest weapon!
So I'm hopeful today, on many levels . . . but not particularly sanguine about the prospect that our twisted and tragic view of sex and violence will get straightened out any time soon.
When I decided to pay attention to the blog again, I wasn't thinking about one unpleasant chore.
I refer to the link list over there to your right. It's been close to a year since I've really looked at it. I must have loads of dozens of dead or stale links.
I see that saratoga is going strong. The thoughtful and considerate swan commented on yesterday's post, so she's around, obviously . . . I look forward to going over there and catching up. What's become of nina? Geisha, if you're out there, send Me a message on yahoo.
I am going to go through the link list . . . doing so is not only good blog management and good manners, but going through it after a long hiatus isn't unlike dumping out a shoebox full of snapshots on the floor and touching on the memories and emotions, recalling what inspired Me in the first place to add that link.
Time to start the cleanup . . . I'm dressed for it!
I. Wow, June 22 was the last time I posted . . . by My own standard that makes this a "dead blog." Obviously standards aren't what they used to be here in #EPB land.
The goal . . . is to post on a regular basis, honest. As with all goals, though, the striving is actually the important thing.
II. It's hard to be "Dominant" when you're apologizing. Sometimes.
In the normal course of life, there are the "trivial" type apologies -- "sorry I ran over your foot" . . . "sorry I washed your red shirt in the bleach load" . . . "sorry I ate the last Dorito." Sometimes we mean them, sometimes we don't, but on some level we understand that the social fabric relies on observance of various well-understood norms. All of us, Dominant, submissive, or neither, follow these norms to a greater or lesser degree, and the degree to which we follow them more or less assigns us our place on the continuum that stretches from "nice guy/girl" to "bastard/bitch." And presumably we're more or less happy with, or unaware of, our particular place.
Then there's the more involved apologies. Those that involve emotions, but not emotions of people we're romantically/sexually involved with. Apologizing to friends can be a sticky affair, but it depends more on the wronged party, really. If the person we're apologizing to wants to be difficult, and we're more on the "nice" side of the continuum, the apology can get fairly long, drawn out, and start to feel semi-humiliating after a while. If the person we're apologizing to is healthy and gracious, well, then, apologizing is a relative snap, because both parties realize that it's not about undoing the wrong -- it's about making the gesture that acknowledges what both parities already know about who was wrong and why.
Sex and love of course complicate the matter exponentially. It's often impossible to keep the current wrong straight from the laundry list of wrongs the wronged party is keeping, consciously or otherwise, in his or her head. And vice versa -- some people don't know what they're apologizing for at any given moment, or much care, in extreme cases.
Bring Dominance and submission into it and there's a very different cast to things. Does a Master/Mistress ever apologize to a slave? Said that way, the entire concept sounds ludicrous.
But this isn't Gor or the Planet of the Blondes . . . real people interacting in real ways can and do, despite their best efforts, give offense.
And I do at times find it difficult to apologize to My girls, even when I really feel as though I should.
Knowing it's difficult, though, helps Me a lot to actually go ahead and do it. I could be kidding Myself, but I don't think so. I think that having the ability to embrace sufficient humility to be able to apologize when it's called for . . . makes Me better, as a Domme and as a person.
I haven't dropped off the face of the earth. But I have obviously neglected the blog for a little while.
I've dropped YouTube Tuesday as an every-week thing . . . it began to feel like real work, it was beginning to distort what I felt this blog should be about, and judging from the response it won't be missed anyway.
It's one of those phases of life when all creative energy seems to simply vanish, and that more than anything is the reason thata there's been so little posted here lately.
"Stuff Happens" is the operating principle of the universe. Stuff is happening. But along with that principle comes the related one, "It will pass."
I watch a lot of TV. So I watch a lot of commercials. Many of them are funny, many are easily dismissible, some are silly, and a very few rise to the level where one's left wondering what's being sold to whom, and why.
Such is the case with the following Cadillac commercial, featuring Kate Walsh of Grey's Anatomy.
There are two spots with the actress. One is the pseudo-clever "when you turn your car on, does it return the favor?" spot -- kind of stupid of basically harmless.
The other one is the "favorite things" commercial. Ms. Walsh is tooling along in her Caddy CTS, and she begins listing off some of her supposedly favorite things.
"Gossip magazines . . . dark chocolate . . . "
All righty then. Establishing Ms. Walsh's "girly" credentials. I had no idea they were in doubt, but OK, for anyone watching the ad who might not somehow know, Kate Walsh is female, and what's more, she's a "regular" type girl -- she reads Us in the checkout line just like you (if she ever actually did her own grocery shopping of course, but you get the idea).
The litany of favorite things continues . . .
"Italian shoes . . . "
Oh, hold on now. She might be a "regular girl" but let's not get crazy here -- you can only covet those Manolos -- Kate Walsh can actually buy them, and does so without calling for a 22% payday advance loan. So, fuck off, regular girls.
Kate! Get back on message! Quick!
"Definitely a Kansas City ribeye . . . "
Whoa . . . a left turn there and aimed squarely at the guys. Fellers, this ain't no shrinkin' violet do your laundry type girl . . . this here's a fire-breathin' CTS-drivin' WOMMIN! Woman enough to fuck you and your best friend, make you look bad in the board meeting the next morning, and . . .
"pulling up to the boys' club . . . in one of these."
Kate looks over at the two chumps in the next car, smiles, then a high-heel-shod foot (Italian shoes, bitch!) stomps the accelerator. The music swells and in no time Kate is doing 117 in a 35 mph zone in her CTS.
While very well-made, and certainly expensively produced, not even counting Ms. Walsh's fee for swearing undying allegiance to a car she doesn't drive in real life, it's a horrendous commercial.
The target market clearly isn't 31-old female stars of hit TV shows . . . that's a bit too small a segment. In fact, like almost all car ads, it's not targeted at females at all. I know a fair number of successful women -- none of them drive high-performance sports sedans (or coupes . . . I'm not bothering to look up how many doors a CTS has). Or, and this is important, if they do they don't identify that way. Meaning, some might drive BMWs or Mercedes, but not because they are "performance" cars per se.
So let's give GM credit and assume they are not selling to a non-existent market. (I realize that I could be assuming facts not in evidence, but let's go with it.)
If this ad is aimed primarily at men, then what exactly is being sold, and how? What does this ad say to men?
1. You're a loser. Look at you sitting there with a boner over a car ad, for Christ's sake. 2. And while you are never getting any action from a TV show hottie like Kate Walsh, drive this car, and who knows? 3. There really are women who like sex. Just not sex with you. 4. But you can dream. Buy a Cadillac CTS.
Most advertising is based on two concepts: Come hither. Drop dead. Mixing the two can make for great ads, but more often makes for a mess. And like most big-dollar advertisers, GM makes the mistake of thinking that production values, name talent, and some oblique form of sex is what weds the two concepts best.
Billy Joel is a shining example. He can give you the chills with "Captain Jack" . . . then make you shake your head with tired hackwork like "Still Rock 'N' Roll To Me." Brilliant satire ("The Entertainer," "Angry Young Man") stands elbow to elbow in the catalog with "She's Always A Woman To Me," perhaps the single worst song by an otherwise good artist in modern musical history. That the same person created "Scenes From An Italian Restaurant" and "Uptown Girl" is baffling, and somehow sad.
That's My Bill Joel Problem. But the good outweighs the bad, certainly. Tonight's clip is Joel's brilliant "Ballad Of Billy The Kid." The clips from classic Westerns are a little bonus.
"Well, he never traveled heavy Yes, he always rode alone And he soon put many older guns to shame And he never had a sweetheart But he finally found a home Underneath the boothill grave that bears his name"
No compilation of 80s videos would be complete without a contribution from Prince. Tonight's selection is "1999."
It's easy to get caught up in the persona, the outfits, the girls, and the total over-the-topness of Prince and lose sight of the fact that he is an extremely talented and influential musician and songwriter. In a way he was too good for the 80s, but in another of course he was absolutely perfect for them.
Some readers may remember when 1999 seemed like a long time in the future.
"I was dreamin' when I wrote this So sue me if I go too fast But life is just a party And parties weren't meant to last War is all around us My mind says prepare to fight So if I gotta die I'm gonna listen to my body tonight Yeah, they say two thousand zero zero party over Oops out of time So tonight I'm gonna party like it's 1999"
I've been out of touch a couple of days, having been with a good friend for her father's wake and funeral.
Our rituals surrounding death, morbid and unnecessary though they often seem, do have the (positive?) side effect of bringing various emotions to the surface in the observer(s).
These emotions are often surprising.
I watched My friend over the past couple of days and at times I found Myself actually envious of her uncomplicated grief, the crushing sadness of losing her father untempered, unmitigated by any laundry list of confusing, conflicting feelings getting in the way.
I was envious too of her ability to let others be there for her, to accept the sincere concern we offered, to simply and completely sink down into our love and empathy the way one gives one's self up to a soothing bath. Envious of her grace in just allowing herself to be comforted.
I felt vaguely wrong in feeling envious of those things, until the lesson behind it all was made clearer.
During the funeral Mass, I found Myself crying for no apparent reason. I usually tune out during those times when circumstances mandate My presence in a church, but the relative darkness and the solemnity of the ritual are at least soothing.
The Gospel was one commonly used in funeral Masses, Luke 24:1-8. This passage recounts what happened on the Sunday after the Crucifixion, when women came to Jesus' tomb:
But on the first day of the week, at early dawn, the women came to the tomb, bringing the spices which they had prepared. And they found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. And it happened that while they were perplexed about this, behold, two men suddenly stood near them in dazzling apparel; and as the women were terrified and bowed their faces to the ground, the men said to them, "Why do you seek the living One among the dead? He is not here, but He has risen. Remember how He spoke to you while He was still in Galilee, saying that the Son of Man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, and be crucified, and the third day rise again." And they remembered His words.
The words washed over Me but that one insistent question lodged itself in My mind: Why do you seek the living One among the dead?
And I realized that that is something that we do in our lives, again and again: Constantly put ourselves through futile exercises, nonsensical efforts with as much as chance of succeeding as looking for the living among the dead. Death, being and feeling so final, drives the simple lessons home with great force at moments like that.
I cried, and couldn't stop for some time. Normally, even at a funeral Mass, I would've made more effort to stop. This time, though, I didn't feel the need to . . . the more I cried the deeper I could feel the lesson penetrating Me, penetrating to that place where words can't reach.
My friend, in the midst of her crushing grief, understood this lesson much better than I. She sought the comfort the living could provide in the face of the awesomeness and finality of death; her sadness and her response to the efforts of those who love her was complete, rational, and totally of its time and place. It was that rare thing-in-itself that lies outside the boundaries of our reflexive system of reason.
The thought that maybe this time I had truly learned that lesson caused Me to stop crying.
It's a cliche to say "no one writes songs like _____ any more," but no one's writing songs like Joni Mitchell any more, or executing them like her, either.
Tonight's clip is a live version of "Coyote," one of the last great Joni songs before she lost her way in the jazz morass, never to return.
"Coyote," for Me, encapsulates a longing, a sweet pain so intense it defies words, even defies thought at times.
Alleged trivia fact: The "coyote" in question is actor/playwright Sam Shepard.
"I tried to run away myself To run away and wrestle with my ego And with this flame You put here in this Eskimo In this hitcher In this prisoner Of the fine white lines Of the white lines on the free, free way"
Summer's coming. And summer means that Jimmy Buffet, by forces of nature unknown to Me, racks up his customary $100 million or so in concert grosses.
I don't get it and never will. But OK, grab your blanket and your Mike's Hard Lemonade or similar portable intoxicant, pony up your $118 or whatever a Buffet ticket will go for this summer and have at it.
Not to say that Herr Buffet is totally without redeeming social value. I've always liked "Cheeseburger In Paradise." Buffet is as clever as he is shrewd.
"Tried to amend my carnivorous habits. Made it nearly seventy days, Losin' weight without speed, eatin' sunflower seeds, Drinkin' lots of carrot juice and soakin' up rays. But at night I'd have these wonderful dreams Some kind of sensuous treat. Not zucchini, fettuccini, or bulgur wheat, But a big warm bun and a huge hunk of meat. Cheeseburger in paradise. Heaven on earth with an onion slice. Not too particular, not too precise. I'm just a cheeseburger in paradise."
(Margarataville(tm) Frozen Dinners are available in your local supermarket. Ask for them by name!)
Often, I'll say something to someone and their response is "I know."
"I know" is a common deflector. We all use it in response to something that we don't want to hear, something we are embarrassed about, something we actually are going to get around to, something that we have no intention of ever doing, or, most perversely (and perhaps most commonly) of all, something we really don't know at all. It can mean "OK," "I really do agree with you," "screw off," "sorry," "I feel your pain," and a whole host of other things.
But what it almost never means is "I know." Because there is knowing, the way we've come to treat that phrase, and there is knowing.
The distinction is readily apparent in the D/s context. The nature of the Dominant/submissive relationship is often that the Dominant ends up saying a lot of stuff, and the submissive ends up saying "i know" in response. A lot.
And when the submissive says that, more often than not s/he means it. Aside from intentional bratting or in a relationship that is well down the slippery slope to dissolution, the submissive's "i know" is sincere, i.e., s/he really thinks s/he knows.
And s/he might. But most likely not. Not because s/he is incompetent or lazy, but because knowing is available to us all, but knowing is rare.
Knowing, as embodied in the phrase "i know," is a simple cognizance of a fact, generally-accepted principle, or piece of common or uncommon wisdom we've come to internalize.
This brick is red. Beggars can't be choosers. Hitler shouldn't have waged war on two fronts. One might say "I know" in response to any of those, with varying degrees of interest or irritation.
The simple knowing also can encompass desired states. The Mom and apple pie sort of things that we understand and more or less acquiesce to without really changing anything inside us.
You shouldn't care too much about what other people think. Working out will give you more energy. a submissive should serve with passion, always.
And thus "I know" becomes that deflector -- it expresses nothing, least of all any true knowledge. It's offered as proof of our depth and concern and sensitivity, but there is nothing behind it, because "I know" closes the case in our minds. What is usually left unsaid after "I know" is "let's move on to something I can feel better about."
The other "knowing," what I've referred to as knowing, above, is an almost bodily sense of conviction. The common way to refer to this might be knowing in one's head as opposed to knowing in one's heart, but that's a glib definition that's ultimately meaningless.
Knowing is being convinced to the extent that behavior/actions actually change. The cart needs to go before the horse. Change first, "know" second. The result is that one ends up knowing without actually "knowing" how or why. Because knowing is the inescapable result of the correct approach, not the result of any specific actions or procedures.
The first step is being aware that there is knowing and there is knowing. Once one comprehends that, then "I know" can begin to take on a different, much more important, meaning.
Tonight's offering: "White and Nerdy," Weird Al's re-take on Chamillionaire's "Ridin' Dirty."
Weird Al has the perfect eye and ear for what he does. One doesn't have to be familiar with the original video to enjoy what Weird Al does here. And the lyrics . . . it's worth watching the video again if you don't get them all the first time through.
"There's no killer app I haven't run At Pascal, well, I'm number 1 Do vector calculus just for fun I ain't got a gat but I gotta soldering gun Happy days is my favorite theme song I can sure kick your butt in a game of ping pong I'll ace any trivia quiz you bring on I'm fluent in Java Script as well as Klingon Here's the part I sing on"
This week's entry: The Stones' classic "Satisfaction." Unlike last week's "I Am The Walrus," "Satisfaction" practically invites "coverage" somehow.
And there's plenty to give it a go.
First, a pretty faithful rendering of the Stones themselves performing the song on The Ed Sullivan Show in 1996. This video is worth it just to see how young Mick looks and Keith and the boys in mod suits. a la The Fab Four. I give this a B for overall cuteness.
Next up, the most satisfying version for Me: Devo's syncopated reconstruction. "Satisfaction's" lyrics might've seemed fairly subversive in the early 60s -- by the mid 70s they were beyond tame. Devo's version, intentionally or otherwise, makes the song subversive again, not by changing the lyrics but by twisting the rhythm.
And those smart yellow decontamination suits never go out of style. A+.
On we go to the Residents, a (purposely) obscure band based in San Francisco. Their cover of "Satisfaction" goes beyond subversive . . . like much of their music it's deliberately distancing to the typical listener. This live version is actually morelistenable than their original cover.
I am simply one of those hopeless idiots where the Residents are concerned -- I confess to not getting it. I give it a C.
I have no idea about these next guys, The Roadside BitchBand. Never heard of them, I don't know if they have a recording contract, if they are even really a "band," or what. Their version of "Satisfaction" is adorably sucky . . . it has a garage-band energy that can't be faked. B+ . . . an extra-half-grade for having the unmitigated chutzpah to post this on YouTube.
Then from out of left field . . . Britney Spears performing "Satisfaction" at the 2000 MTV Awards. It quickly morphs into "Oops I Did It Again" and the arrangement is a lot more Vegas than suits Me, but it does show that when Britney has her head on straight, she is an affecting performer. I give it a B.
The last one is a real gem of sorts. This cover is by The Acid Drinkers, described by the person who posted the video as "one of the best Polish bands." All right . . . I'll take your word for it.
Their "Satisfaction" is fast and punky. It's actually pretty good -- the singer's accent alone is worth the price of admission. I was giving this a B+ until I heard some weird semi-yodeling noises at the very end. B.
nina recently wrote about the recent surge in Blogger blogs that have been recently "flagged,' resulting in one seeing a "content warning"page before one sees the actual blog in question.
Of course, these newly-flagged blogs all deal with some aspect or other of sex, to no one's surprise. In My comment on nina's entry I (jokingly, I think) suggested that some form of guerrilla action was called for -- I had the idea that we should organize an army of people to visit all sorts of "normal" Blogger blogs and flag them until they receive warning labels. Quilting? Badminton? Brazilian pop music? Flag 'em all. The theory being that the backlash would result in the end of the warning label system as Blogger got inundated with hundreds of thousands of complaints.
Well, up the revolution and all that, but it's not practical.
What I see more and more (and what nina advocates in her post) is leaving Blogger for other alternatives.
Just today I went over to Stiletto Diaries and found that the lovely shastahad moved to her own domain. As I was updating My link list to take this change into account, I realized that Blogger wants all the sex bloggers to go elsewhere.
Blogger wants blogs that are going to connect to AdSense and generate revenues. And since "adult" products even in this enlightened age reside mainly on the margins, the AdSense opportunities in that arena are much more limited than they are for more mainstream blogs. Plus, not having any sex blogs would free Blogger (now a unit of deep-pocketed Google) from any fingers pointing in their direction along the lines of "your sex blogs made my son a rapist" and the like. However remote that might be, corporations always seek the path of least resistance, especially in the perception-is-reality-and-then-some area of children and anything remotely sexual.
So My advice to Blogger sex bloggers is: Stay. If people want to read you, a content warning screen isn't going to stop them. Stay. Because they want you to go.
There is no revolution. There is just a long series of tiny "no's."
Tonight's delicacy: "Sex As A Weapon" by Pat Benatar, from 1985. No idea what brought this song to mind today, but I'm glad I thought of it.
Pat Benatar exhorts the guys to "stop using sex as a weapon." The video also points up how sex to used to sell products. That Pat Benatar, whose entire career and professional persona were based precisely on using sex as a weapon/marketing tool, made this song/video, is either unintentional irony or chutzpah of the highest order.
Ah, the 80s. Not only was no message too ridiculous to deliver . . . it stood a good chance of being swallowed whole without complaint.
The quality of this clip isn't great but I was impressed by how sophisticated the video editing is for 1985.
saratoga tagged Me to participate in the six-word memoir meme, after he was tagged by nina.
The rules are as follows:
-Write your own six word memoir
-Post it on your blog and include a visual illustration if you’d like
-Link to the person that tagged you in your post
-Tag five more blogs with links
-And don’t forget to leave a comment on the tagged blogs with an invitation to play
What I consider My life to is a struggle to know and embrace reality, both the real but not all-encompassing "real world" we are presented with every day, and the other nature of the world, those parts of the world that are withheld from us by almost insurmountable perceptual barriers.
To be in a position to someday break those barriers requires a lifelong commitment to reclaiming one's true self from the myriad of foreign energies that have been layered upon us over the years, the process so subtle and continuous as to go unnoticed.
Getting free of all that is an equally long and slow process.
So My six-word memoir, My commitment, My life is:
Freeing Myself in continuous tiny increments.
Five is a lot of commenting I have to do . . . I'll keep it to three:
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