A word on comments

If you read this, think about commenting once and awhile. Here's why:

• I'm interested in what YOU think about the stuff that I think about.
• I want you to correct me if I make stupid grammatical errors. It may embarrass me but learning is more important.
• I want to create a sense of community in this weird and freaky Internet world.
• I like you.

I do understand that commenting sometimes feels annoying or strange to do and I don't need anyone else to read what you have to say if you don't want them to so if you don't want to post a comment here, at least maybe shoot me an e-mail sometime! shaktihoweth@gmail.com

Cool.

Honey pie, you are makin' me crazy.

*Disclaimer:

You will soon be entering the “after hours” portion of my brain.

If at any point you should start to experience dizziness or hunger, please,

step away from the computer and bake a pie immediately.

People are like the live active ingredients of some strange relationship food item. Depending on how many components you mix and the different properties of each, countless recipes can be created.

Salty and sweet could be a nice balance but too much sugar could end up tasting rotten. Salt on salt would be impossible to eat and bitter on bitter would probably be pretty unpleasant to bite. Bland with anything is going to be one-dimensional but too much spice will burn. Obviously, we can’t cook with poison and must be careful when using anything labeled “eat me”.

If the creation is left unattended then bites can be stolen but wrapped up too tight and it can’t be enjoyed. Years on the shelf and anything can become stale, so what is the perfect recipe and who the hell knows that secret ingredient?

*Obviously days of skimping on food is making me a little crazy (but when am I not?) I’m also much to wired to sleep so this is whatcha get! Let us review: First, people=ingredients; two could be a couple, more a party and so on. Personality traits=flavors; certain combinations are better than others. “The creation”=the relationship. Then we become both the food and the “eater” and the eating is the experience of it… I think... The secret ingredient=

Well, it’s secret, and no one will tell me.

Let’s get back to it. I’m confusing myself. Carelessly throwing around these food metaphors while coping with this insomnia, I’m just gonna keep on rolling and move towards digestion.

Some questions:

• Why can’t we have our cake and eat it too?
• Why do some people pluck a fruit before it’s ripe and try to eat it anyway?
• And why does gorging on all the good stuff leave us feeling so, so bad?

(This all makes sense in my head, are you with me?)

I think until I figure it out I will have to remain a “frequent snacker” and continue developing my pallet. If that doesn’t work, then a fast.

The bottom line is, I’m hungry! I don’t know what I want and I wouldn’t know how to make it if I did! The only thing I do know is that everything has its own individual date-of-expiration and it ain’t written anywhere!

Change is constant and people are not food. Ah wait! I’m wrong. I’m totally disrespecting cannibals! OK. I’m thinking now might be a good time for me eat or sleep... Ugh, I give up!

Just one last thing: Does “honey pie” exist and has anyone ever tried it?

Take Heart. Give Love.

The temperature gets better every day. I’ve found a job. I’ve been upgraded from weeks of sleeping on the floor to a borrowed air mattress (as of yesterday)! Henry has a full tank of gas and got a much-needed bath and when I got in him to drive to the library today, Fleetwood Mac came on the radio! Things are really looking up! Soon I’ll have a real mattress on the floor, and who knows, maybe one day a bed frame too!

I’ve been working on some paintings that I don’t hate (yet) and I’ve never posted my artwork on here, I don’t think, but I’m going to today. Why not, I guess. I woke up thinking about how nice it was to sleep a few inches off the ground and then about this memory of a horse I made. I don’t want to spend every blog talking about me, myself and I, in fact, now that things are less dramatic around here I’ll probably be writing about the world around me more. But since I’m mostly still alone, I can’t help but hear the voice in my head and for some reason it wants to tell you this story:

I don’t really know how old I was, maybe around 9? 10? Not sure, but I had discovered horses and I was in love. We lived in the country so it wasn’t out of the realm of possibility physically, however, financially it was a crazy dream to dream. I helped out at a stable in exchange for riding lessons and I fell in love with a horse named Roam. He was a beautiful rust red with a white blaze on his forehead and we understood each other. Out of my obsession grew the desire to possess him but since I couldn’t buy him I decided to make my own version. I just wanted to be with him! I dug around in my dad’s tool shed and found supplies and scraps and started building.

The most important thing to me was that I could actually sit on this model horse so it needed to be sturdy and structurally sound. The torso was fashioned from a big plastic bucket that I stuffed to prevent from bending and cracking. I nailed it onto four pieces of wood and added another one for the neck and head. Once this skeleton was constructed I covered the body in chicken wire and then molded paper mache over it. I wanted to cover him in fuzzy fabric from the fabric store, but it was too expensive so my mom helped me pick out the perfect shade of house paint, brownish yarn made the mane and tail.

The horse was a success! He looked a little stumpy, like some kind of reddish elephant-horse, but to me, he was magnificent! He was strong enough to put a saddle on and ride and to have seen my vision come to life was a satisfying triumph! Later we ended up adopting two horses that were near the end of their lives, it was a great experience having them and taking care of them and I can’t help but wonder if my innocent (and slightly crazy) child’s imagination helped manifest them into reality. The detail I remembered today however, the thing that I woke up thinking about was the littlest part of my red horse.

When we were young, my sisters and I would sometimes cut tiny holes in our stuffed animals and implant little jewels or trinkets to give them “hearts”. Roam got a heart too. In the center of all the stuffing in the bucket, before the layers of wire and mache I planted a tiny, pink, heart-shaped chewable vitamin. This little heart didn’t pump blood and it was no bigger than my thumbnail but somehow, it worked. He had a heart and he loved me. When I think of that little heart I can see it. I can smell it. I can taste it. When I think of that little heart I think, “so this is love...” A child’s heart is less discriminating than that of a world-weary heart and it's easier for a child to love. But we all have something in us, not the chewable vitamin variety, but something much more powerful and amazing and every heart, every heart, every heart is capable of infinite love. Give it freely.

And of course, take your vitamins!

Employed, for now.

I got a job.

I'm really, 

really 

really

glad! 

Now I just have to work my butt off, pay a bunch of bills and save enough to sign up for an acting workshop!  I can't wait!  I'm going to be working hard to finance the life and opportunities I want to create for myself.  What could feel better than that?  Now all I have to do is scrape together the rest of my money to buy the right outfits for work.  This is when my creativity, resourcefulness and poorness combine!  They expect me to wear heels every day so I'm going to have to suffer for my choices but I think I can handle a little physical pain for awhile. 

Lessons learned:

• Looking for a job is like looking for a role.
  
• Interviews are like auditions.
  
• Go for what you have experience in.
  
• Be extremely competitive, dress sharp and show up early.
  
• In LA, telling them you're an actor is like saying, "don't hire me, I'm flaky and a liar".
  
• Be persistent!
  

And finally, I must remember impermanence.  I have a job today, who knows about tomorrow.  I feel grateful now and I'm going to try to keep working towards staying present.

I Just Don't Know!

So much is unknown.

So much is out of my control.

I'm getting the chance to face myself more than I've ever had to before.

Out of this aloneness comes frustration and anxiety.

Out of the frustration come the many attempts at affecting change.

There are colorful dreams.

Sleepless nights.

Pages of writing.

Beginning's of songs.

I'm devouring books.

Making lists.

Baking pies.

Cleaning.

Painting.

Hoping.

Somehow, within all this movement there is a kind of peace.

Under the fear of the unknown, the fear of not getting work soon enough, the fear of having to lose all I've worked so hard to create, this hope of a new life, there is a peace.  Through muscle and sweat and tears and hours on the road and hours of planning, selling things, giving things away, all the time spent on craigslist, all the time spent on the phone, all the work, all the goodbyes, all the miles...  Well.  I'm just here.  This is all.

Somehow, I think it's OK.  I have to let go and I hate to admit it but, 

I have no idea what's coming next.

First Night Out

Last night was the end of another long day of job hunting and interviews. Feeling discouraged and exhausted I walked out to my car to head home and found a papery little treat under the wiper.  My first parking ticket.  Too drained to cry and too poor to even begin to think about paying it, I stuffed it in my purse and drove home in a daze.

Trying to keep my chin up I decided a little distraction would do me good, so I took my roommate up on the offer to go out with him.  His friend Lily was playing a final show with her band at The Echo, so I tagged along for what turned out to be the perfect medicine.

We started the evening at The Gold Room where I sipped soda water (due to my weak stomach) and surprisingly ran into a couple of friends of mine! Seeing someone from San Francisco right here in my neighborhood bar totally brightened my mood and gave me the sense of being at home.  After the bar we headed to the venue where we saw three bands. Lily, the lead singer of "Lily and the Ladies" was fantastic and "the Ladies" rocked out. I'm not one to critique music, not really my field of expertise but I will say the whole night was loud, fun, visual and highly entertaining.  The crowd was made up of what appeared to be the Hipster scene on steroids, the hottest and coolest looking chicks you've ever seen and the skinniest boys in the tightest pants.  The fashion, for the most part, was similar to the Mission sensibility but amped way up. 

All of my roommate's friends were totally welcoming and fun and they were all interesting and accomplished people who seemed to have a million different jobs and artistic endeavors.  Overall the night gave me a break from stress, it gave me a nice big dose of fun and it gave me the first taste of my local nightlife.  Once again I'm grateful to have landed in the neighborhood I did, I'm so stoked that I hit the jackpot with my roommies and I can't wait to continue to explore all LA has to offer.  So far so good, sippin' on a coconut Italian soda and gearing up for another job interview.  After that, the beach. Good, free fun and a little nap in the sun.  I think I can do this.

Butt on Cushion

We spend a lot of time looking for the answers to our problems.

OK, how about: I spend a lot of time looking for the answers to my problems.  I dunno what you do.

Sometimes this “time” is during the day, sometimes I’m looking late at night, sometimes, wait… I’m always searching!  I’m so frequently searching for answers, solutions, fixes, and ways to avoid pain and seek out pleasure that I often forget the simplest thing: The Now!

Freedom from suffering is in “the now”, peace is in “the now”.  It’s all here, now!  In this moment… and this moment… and this moment.

Last week was my first week in LA.  It was a roller coaster ride made up of the highest levels of excitement and the lowest and darkest fears.  I made some new friends and connected with old ones, I suffered through the hottest heat and breathed ash and smoke from the burning fires all around, I spent hours and hours each day applying for jobs and even more hours in the car driving, I went to the ER for the first time in my life due to some really bad acid reflux (and a few other little problems in my body which lead me to believe I might have been dying on Saturday night) then I went to Irvine and had some very rejuvenating “mommy time” (with Lissy’s mom, and dad, and dogs, and pool!) I made it back to my room in one piece, got a check in the mail from my own parents (allowing me to survive for the next week or so) and went to three different job interviews yesterday and one today!

Will all this drama happening I hadn’t meditated once!  But last night I finally got my butt on a cushion and found another home away from home.  (Wherever that second “home” may be…)  I made it to Dharma Punx!  The weekly sitting group I attended in San Francisco (with Vinny). Dharma Punx actually has its home base right here in LA with Noah Levine!  I thank my lucky stars (er, um, Stephen) that I know about it.

Meditating last night was harder than it used to be in SF.  It’s easy to bring your mind back to the present when it’s only wandering off to, “who did buy the last roll of toilet paper?” or, “I wonder if that guy’s gonna call?”  But when it wanders over to, “I wonder if I’ll ever get a job, what if I lose my apartment, what if I have to leave California or what if I just become a homeless person?”  Getting “present” becomes a little trickier.  That’s why meditation is called a practice though!  You practice it!  It’s not easy, it doesn’t work over night and it takes lots and lots and lots of practice.

There are plenty of “what ifs” and some are more convincing to the mind than others but the fact remains, this is the now, now this is happening.  Not what might happen, or what did happen, those are my stories.  All there is, is this!  I am here.  Here, is where I am.  For me, this is the key, this is the answer, this is the best thing I can possibly do for myself and this is why I gotta get my butt on that cushion.  Nothing else in my life has benefited me so greatly.  Go meditate!  Now.