McPie is a Bargainin'

So I am talking to Booty this morning on video chat and she explained to me that I am in a bargaining phase.  How so one might ask (or maybe one might not...who knows), well Booty explained to me that all these questions that are all of a sudden popping up in my head (by the way, all of a sudden there are so many questions popping up in my head) about random things that have occurred in the past year  combined with the insane dreams I have been having (ya having lots of insane dreams again, for example, ones where I am meeting friends late at night and I have until Midnight to convince them all the decisions they are making are berserk) are me trying to change the actuality of situations that are mostly in the past.  I am essentially trying to bargain for change which as we all know can't happen, the past is the past, whats done is done, move on right?  oh how it sounds so simple.

How do you put the past in the past and focus on the future when the past is in your face all the flippin' time (yes, getting out of Dodge is very helpful but eventually you have to go back to Dodge).  We are so fantastic at recording our lives these days with photos and videos and email and I think we all believe that these mementos we are taking with us are so wonderful but the fact is, they aren't always.  We used to just put photos in albums on shelves, or boxes in closets and take them out when we wanted, look at the ones we wanted to, smile, laugh, scream at bad haircuts and it was fantastic, but it isn't that simple anymore.  They are on our computers, our social networks, our phones AND everyone else's computers, networks and phones and no matter where you store them, they are always there and you see them all the time whether you want to or not and something special is lost in that because maybe you don't want to see them all the time and no there is no reason to get excited about digging through photos in a box because that box no longer exists.  The other thing, is that it changes history by omitting anything unpleasant.  Digital is cheap so we record absolutely everything, to the point where we could all probably do flip books of our lives and it would play in real time (k, I know that is a little bit of an exaggeration). The thing is though, we don't photograph and video experiences that don't make us happy so in digital hindsight, everything can often seem better than it was and convince our small little brains that our not-so-great memories aren't real.  This I believe is bargaining, using anything we/I can to convince ourselves/myself that things may have been different than what I thought a minute ago and different than what I will think in the next minute or so when I am inundated with some cyber reminder of something.  What am I going to do, cut myself off completely from the world and go live with pandas? I really do love a nice panda....it's a thought.

p.s.  I was video chatting (my new obsession in case anyone was wondering, I'm late to this game) with a dear friend Captain Hook(er), and he was showing me all these photos from years ago and it was wonderful because I would never have seen them anywhere as they were taken on a camera that uses film (FILM: a cellulose nitrate or cellulose acetate composition made in thin sheets or strips and coated with a sensitive emulsion for taking photographs.)  Thanks for making me smile so much Captain Hook(er)!!!

p.p.s.  What I forgot to mention, and part of my point, wass that I didn't bring a camera with me on this journey.  I have questioned if that was the right thing to do or not, but the fact is, a picture cannot capture the journey I am on right now and I don't want to remember it if it isn't worth remembering.  My feeling is that I will one day look back on this experience and remember what a profound time in my life it is, not how I was living in the middle of the strangest city I have ever been in or the the painfully beautiful mountains around me.  If I don't remember it, that will be ok too, but I have to trust my mind on this one, I want to experience this, go through it, as uncomfortable as it can be at times, and hopefully I will remember how amazingly I survived and came out on top and I won't want to change a thing about it or wish it was different in any way.

p.p.p.s.  I have a camera on my phone and I'm not afraid to use it!

I McPie is HERE

689 miles, almost 10 hours of straight driving (never going more than 10 miles above speed limit) I MCPIE IS HERE!  I stopped to pee 3 times, 2 of those times filled the car up with gas, munched on nuts and Barbara's shredded oat squares (favorite cereal) and am now sitting in The future Mrs. Junior's hotel suite waiting for her to return, filled with excitement, freaked out of my mind and playing the day's thoughts back in my head, and no, I still haven't had a cup of coffee (I did have an earl grey latte from Starbucks 2 hours in...holy cow).

The drive really went very quickly, Booty told me long distance driving alone can be amazing and it really was.  The state I am in now is the most beautiful state I have ever driven through, and it is in this state that I had some sort of road trip breakthrough (I won't lie, what I am about to tell you could very well have been caused by lack of blood circulation from being stationery too long, or malnutrition). I must start by saying that I am afraid of really large things (mind out of the gutter please people, and if it wasn't in the gutter, sorry I put it there).  I have a hard time processing the enormity of things, an obvious one that freaks many people out would be the universe.  So scale that down a bit to things like say, cliffs or worse...giant windmills and really I get the chills and start jerking around like I'm having a seizure.  I used to think I was just afraid of heights, but then once in Manhattan when driving across town from the Westside Highway towards Court Street, I looked up at the old buildings in front of me and around me and I thought my heart was going to jump out of my chest, everything felt so huge and out of place...strange thought to have while in Manhattan.  Anyhow, to the story, as I was driving today, I was staring in the distance all around me (safely of course) and everywhere I looked were these GIANT mountains covered in snow, but right next to the road it was just flat and level to the freeway making the mountains look so much more ginormous, so I started to panic a bit, but instead of turning away or closing my eyes (which of course I really couldn't as they were everywhere and you know, I was driving) I just kept looking and slowly but surely, my heart rate became more normal and the mountains started to look almost unbearably beautiful, they were really really beautiful.  And then the weirdest thing happened in the middle of nowhere, there was traffic, and everyone slowed, so I opened my windows and it was freezing outside, but i just drove along at maybe 20 miles an hour and let the wind absolutely freeze my skin, it felt sharp.  I know this sounds corny and cheesy but something happened and I was just fine for a minute, I wasn't thinking about anything that has been swirling around in my mind lately.  I have been freezing all week, and shaking and absolutely flipping out in relatively warm weather, being completely tortured inside out by this emotional blizzard inside me, but today I got outside in cold, super flippin' cold and it felt amazing.  I wasn't scared of the mountains, I didn't even twitch, and I wasn't cold inside, even though my skin felt like ice, and I am pretty damn sure that I am exactly where I am supposed to be right now.

This whole experience was just a moment.  But knowing I had that moment is knowing I am capable of having moments like this again....and again...and again and again.  This is now part of my plan, to stay focused in the moment.

p.s. I forgot to mention I had just listed to 5 hours of Wayne Dyer telling me to connect with the world instead of my own form....what a Tool.....for real.