Connected and Committed

#LOA #Abraham and something more

Amazingness.

I still come back to this and read it, every day.

This is why we're here.

To remind each other. With our words, actions and thoughts, of who we really are.

Consider yourself reminded.

requirements

~Requirements~

Fun. Awareness. Appreciation. Ups and downs. Knowing. Not knowing. Exercise of the soul, the mind and the body. Work. Play. Connection with others. Solitude. Change. Routine. Good food. Flowing abundance through me and back out into the general stream of the universe. Laughter. Love. Faith. Good coffee. Hot showers. Leisurely baths. Paper. Color. Texture. Dreams. Inspiration. Friends. Enemies. Ecstasy. Pain. Source. Fire. Water. Air. Earth. Ether. Children. Organic dark chocolate. Black licorice. Basil. Cilantro. Cumin. Books. Film. Sleep. Expression.

~Appreciation~

Fun. Awareness. Appreciation. Ups and downs. Knowing. Not knowing. Exercise of the soul, the mind and the body. Work. Play. Connection with others. Solitude. Change. Routine. Good food. Flowing abundance through me and back out into the general stream of the universe. Laughter. Love. Faith. Good coffee. Hot showers. Leisurely baths. Paper. Color. Texture. Dreams. Inspiration. Friends. Enemies. Ecstasy. Pain. Source. Fire. Water. Air. Earth. Ether. Children. Organic dark chocolate. Black licorice. Basil. Cilantro. Cumin. Books. Film. Sleep. Expression.

making the world a better place, one electromagnetic field at a time

"It feels good when our efforts are gratefully acknowledged and hurtful when our efforts are met with indifference, grudgingly offered thanks, or ingratitude. The effect of receiving gratitude goes beyond an emotional or cognitive satisfaction in knowing that we have contributed something useful, however. Modern research in the emerging field of neurocardiology suggests an intriguing physiological basis for why receiving heartfelt gratefulness is itself physiologically beneficial for the receiver.

Recall that researchers have shown that gratitude and the related positive emotions of love and appreciation are associated with a smooth, ordered, coherent pattern in the heart's rhythmic activity (see Figure 3.1). What was left unsaid earlier was that the heart itself generates an electromagnetic field. In fact, the heart is the most powerful generator of electromagnetic energy in the human body, producing the largest rhythmic electromagnetic field of any of the body's organs. The heart's electrical field is about sixty times greater in amplitude than the electrical activity generated by the brain. Furthermore, the magnetic field produced by the heart is more than five thousand times greater in strength than the field generated by the brain and can be detected a number of feet away from the body, in all directions, using a device known as a magnetometer. Prompted by findings that a person's cardiac field is modulated by his or her different emotional states, several studies have now documented that the electromagnetic field generated by the heart may actually transmit information that can be received by others.

"For example, when two people are at a conversational distance, the electromagnetic signal generated by one person's heart can influence the other person's brain rhythms. When an individual is generating a coherent heart rhythm, synchronization between that individual's brainwaves and another person's heartbeat is more likely to occur. In other words, one person's brain waves harmonize with the other person's heart waves, an effect that has been measured between individuals up to five feet apart. This deep form of communication establishes a heartfelt connection between people, resulting in perceptions of, among other things, really being understood and appreciated by the other. So when a person expresses heartfelt gratitude toward us, there is the potential for us to experience all sorts of benefits, driven by this exchange of electromagnetic energy. What kicks this energy exchange system into gear is the coherent heart rhythm produced by grateful feelings. The flip side is that a force this strong may also repel, possibly explaining why we feel an immediate dislike for someone whom we barely know, as well as providing a physiological explanation for why perceptions of ingratitude are so profoundly aversive. "

excerpt from THANKS!: How the New Science of Gratitude Can Make You Happier, by Robert A. Emmons, Ph.D.

~*~

"What kicks this energy exchange system into gear is the coherent heart rhythm produced by grateful feelings."

Another scientist stepping up to provide evidence for the skeptics among us of how blissmongering changes the world.

Focusing on what's intended and wanted and appreciated before it gets here, rather than continually taking score of what's wrong along the way, has documented, physiological benefit for those who practice this seemingly radical world view, and for those around them.

We really do help make the planet a better place, one electromagnetic field at a time.

bliss bling for the holidays

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Swooning will occur when she opens the box. Click here to purchase.

 

I do commission designs for the special people in your life. Click here to initiate the talks for a special design. She will love it.

Earrings and bracelets can accompany these necklaces. Click here for details.

random Rumi

The grief you cry out from

draws you toward union.

~*~

Cry out! Don't be stolid and silent

with your pain. Lament! And let the milk

of loving flow into you.

The hard rain and wind

are ways the cloud has

to take care of us.

Be patient.

Respond to every call

that excites your spirit.

Ignore those that make you fearful

and sad, that degrade you

back toward disease and death.

~*~

Having nothing produces provisions.

Ask a difficult question,

and the marvelous answer appears.

~*~

Muhammed says, "I come before dawn

to chain you and drag you off."

It's amazing, and funny, that you have to be pulled away

from being tortured, pulled out

into this Spring garden,

but that's the way it is.

Almost everyone must be bound and dragged here.

Only a few come on their own...

Those that make you return, for whatever reason,

to God's solitude, be grateful to them.

Worry about the others, who give you

delicious comforts that keep you from prayer.

Friends are enemies sometimes,

and enemies friends...

If you can't do this work yourself, don't worry.

You don't even have to make a decision,

one way or another. The Friend, who knows

a lot more than you do, will bring difficulties,

and grief, and sickness, as medicine, as happiness,

as the essence of the moment when you're beaten,

when you hear Checkmate...

~*~

You could be moving in a circuit without wing,

nourished without eating, soverign without a throne.

No longer subject to fortune, you could be luck itself,

if you would rise from sleep, leave

the market arguing, and learn that

you own essence is your wealth.

from The Vigil

Every holy person seems to have a different doctrine
and practice, but there's really only one work.

Someone listening to a millstone falls asleep.
No matter. The stone keeps turning.

Water from the mountain
far above the mill keeps flowing down.
The sleepers will get their bread.

Underground it moves, without sound, and without
repetition. Show us where that source of speech is
that has no alphabet. That spaciousness.

Where we are now is a narrow fantasy
that comes from there, and the actual, outside world
is even narrower. Narrowness is pain,
and the cause of narrowness is manyness.

Creation was spoken with one sound, BE.
The two letters, B and E,
to record it,
came after.
The meaning and its resonance are one.

~Rumi

train tracks in Holly

from Send the Chaperones Away

Inside me a hundred beings
are putting their fingers to their lips and saying,
"That's enough for now. Shhhh." Silence
is an ocean. Speech is a river.

When the ocean is searching for you, don't walk
to the language-river. Listen to the ocean,
and bring your talky business
to an end.

Traditional words are just babbling
in that presence, and babbling is a substitute
for sight. When you sit down beside your beloved,
send the chaperones away, the old women
who brought you together.

When you are mature and with your love,
the love letters and matchmakers
seem irritating.
         You might read those letters,

but only to teach beginners about love. One who sees
grows silent. When you're with one of those,
be still and quiet, unless he asks you
to talk...

~Rumi

the pickaxe

Some commentary on I was a hidden treasure,
and I desired to be known: tear down

this house. A hundred thousand new houses
can be built fro the transparent yellow carnelian

buried beneath it, and the only way to get to that
is to do the work of demolishing and then

digging under the foundations. With that value
in hand all the new construction will be done

without effort. And anyway, sooner or later this house
will fall down on its own. The jewel treasure will be

uncovered, but it won't be yours then. The buried
wealth is you pay for doing the demolition,

the pick and shovel work. If you wait and just
let it happen, you'd bite your hand and say,

"I didn't do as I knew  should have." This
is a rented house. You don't own the deed.

You have a lease, and you've set up a little shop,
where you barely make a living sewing patches

on torn clothing. Yet only a few feet underneath
are two veins, pure red and bright gold carnelian.

Quick! Take the pickaxe and pry the foundation.
You've got to quit this seamstress work.


What does the patch-sewing mean,, you ask. Eating
and drinking. The heavy cloak of the body

is always getting torn. You patch it with food,
and other restless ego-satisfaction. Rip up

one board from the shop floor and look into
the basement. You'll see two glints in the dirt.

~Rumi

Humankind is being led along an evolving course

Humankind is being led along an evolving course,
through this migration of intelligences,
and though we seem to be sleeping,
there is an inner wakefulness
that directs the dream,

and that will eventually startle us back
to the truth of who we are.

~Rumi

I wish I knew what you wanted

The Blocked Road

I wish I knew what you wanted.
You block the road and won't give me rest.
You pull my lead-rope one way, the the other.
You act cold, my darling!
Do you hear what I say?

Will this night of talking ever end?
Why am I still embarrassed and timid about you?
You are thousands. You are one.
Quiet, but articulate.

Your name is Spring.
Your name is wine.
Your name is nausea
that comes from wine!

You are my doubting
and the lightpoints
in my eyes.

You are every image, and yet
I'm homesick for you.

Can I get there?
Where the deer pounces on the lion,
where the one I'm after's
after me?

This drum and these words keep pounding!
Let them both smash through their coverings
into silence.

~Rumi

are you jealous of the ocean's generosity?

Are you jealous of the ocean's generosity?
Why would you refuse to give
this joy to anyone?

Fish don't hold the sacred liquid in cups!
They swim the huge fluid freedom.

~Rumi

be the change

retire the reactivity and acquire some creativity

You cannot ask for improvement until you stand in a place that causes the improvement to occur to you. ~ Abraham-Hicks

~*~

Outrage is helpful when you're in a place of despair. Outrage becomes misplaced glue in the problem mode. Pointing fingers and reactivity only cement the problem ever more in place. Unplug the energy from the problem. Stoke the fires of creativity. Leave the power mongers ignored and eventually powerless because you un-selfrighteously took your power back.

It belongs to you in the first place.

I require

I require that I pass by the cave of “I don't deserve/I'm not worthy/I'm a fraud” when on my morning saunter through the synapses of my mind. There are other more hospitable land formations that serve me that are just as accessible, if not more so, with even a fraction of the practice I’ve dedicated to the cave over the decades. I require that I see that giving in to entering that cave is a result of believing a lie, a lie that is certainly laughable at best, debilitating at worst, but still, a lie.

a mouse and a frog

A mouse and a frog meet every morning on the riverbank.

They sit  in a nook of the ground and talk.

Each morning, the second they see each other,

they open easily, telling stories and dreams and secrets,

empty of any fear or suspicious holding back.

To watch and listen to these two

is to understand how, as it's written,

sometimes when two beings come together,

Christ becomes visible.

The mouse starts laughing out a story he hasn't thought of

in five years, and the telling might take five years!

There's no blocking the speechflow-river-running-

all-carrying momentum that true intimacy is.

Bitterness doesn't have a chance

between those two.

The-God-messenger, Khidr, touches a roasted fish.

It leaps off the grill back into the water.

Friend sits by Friend, and the tablets appear.

They read the mysteries

off each other's foreheads.

But one day the mouse complains, "There are times

when I want sohbet [mystical conversation on mystical subjects], and you're out in the water,

jumping around where you can't hear me.

We meet at this appointed time,

but the text says, Lovers pray constantly.

Once a day, once a week, five times an hour,

is not enough. Fish like we are

need the ocean around us!"

Do camel bells say, Let's meet back here Thursday night?

Ridiculous. They jingle

together continuously,

talking while the camel walks.

Do you pay regular visits to yourself?

Don't argue or answer rationally.

Let us die,

                and dying, reply.

~*~

The mystery does not get clearer by repeating the question,

nor is it bought with going to amazing places.

Until you've kept your eyes

and your wanting still for fifty years,

you don't begin to cross over from confusion.

~Rumi

he sputtered, stopped and disappeared

I appreciate the dream I was in the middle of downloading when I woke up this morning. I was on a train to see my brother in Seattle, but the car I was riding in was more like the front room of an elderly woman’s house, full of bureaus and other pieces of furniture that could hold a plethora of collectibles–-my collectibles.

There were other people riding in this car with me, and as I started disgorging this old stuff from the drawers they were entombed in, I would just set them out to see who would be interested in them and take them for their own. One drawer had disposable cameras. One had little boxes of various kinds. One had statues. Another had flat rocks with designs on them. Occasionally I would decide to keep something that I really liked, and then continue purging.

I kept listening for the announcement of arriving in Seattle soon, and asked those around me a few times how much longer it would be, if I had enough time to finish what I was doing. A stranger came up to me and touched me and started talking to me like he knew me, and I started telling him what my requirements were around that.

He sputtered, stopped and disappeared.

found

There is a way between voice and presence

where information flows.

In disciplined silence it opens.

With wandering talk it closes.

~Rumi

~*~

These things I thought were just not there, they have begun to make their presence known to me. My acculturated vision needed to be ditched first. They were right there, all the time; I just couldn't see them. One after another, a bizarre procession of awakening. Makes me want to get rid of as many belongings as possible so that more can be revealed. Who knew that such mundane objects could contain such amazing information?

Letters to a Young Poet

Most happenings are beyond expression; they exist where a word has never intruded.

~*~

If your everyday life appears to be unworthy subject matter, do not complain to life. Complain to yourself. Lament that you are not poet enough to call up its wealth. For the creative artist there is no poverty--nothing is insignificant or unimportant.

~*~

In this there is no measuring of time. A year doesn't matter; ten years are nothing. To be an artist means not to compute or count; it means to ripen as the tree, which does not force its sap, but stands unshaken in the storms of spring with no fear that summer might not follow. It will come regardless. But it comes only to those who live as though eternity stretches before them, carefree, silent, and endless. I learn it daily, learn it with many pains, for which I am grateful: Patience is all!

~*~

Why should anyone wish to exchange a child's wise incomprehension for resistance and disdain, since the incomprehension is aloneness, and resistance and disdain are an involvement in the things you seek to escape from.

~*~

If there are some who outwardly give the impression of granting more freedom, know that there really exists none that is related to the important things that make up real life.

~*~

What is keeping you...from living your life as though it were one painful beautiful day in the history of a great pregnancy? Don't you see that everything that happens becomes a beginning again and again?

~*~

That is basically the only case of courage required of us: to be courageous in the face of the strangest, the most whimsical and unexplainable thing that we could encounter...The fear of the unexplainable not only impoverished the existence of the individual, but also caused the relationship of one person to another to be limited. It is as though fear has caused something to be lifted out of the riverbed of limitless possibilities to a fallow stretch of shore where nothing happens.

For it is not inertia alone that causes the unspeakably monotonous and unrenewed human condition to repeat itself again and again. It is the aversion to anything new, any unpredictable experience, which is believed to be untenable.

~*~

We have no reason to mistrust our world, for it is not against us. If it has terrors, they are our own terrors. If it had precipices, they belong to us. If dangers are present, we must try to love them.

~*~

Why should you want to exclude any anxiety, any grief, any melancholy from your life, since you do not know what it is that these conditions are accomplishing in you? 

~*~

It is always my wish that you might find enough patience within yourself to endure, and enough innocence to have faith. It is my wish that you might gain more and more trust in whatever is difficult for you, in your aloneness, among other things. Allow life to happen to you. Believe me, life is right in all cases...Every advancement is good if it pervades your whole bloodstream, when it is not due to intoxication, not due to being conditioned to sadness, but to transparent joy. Do you understand what I mean?

Your doubt can become a good attribute if you discipline it. It must become a knowing, it must become the critic. Ask it, as often as it wishes to spoil something, why something is ugly. Demand proof of it, test it, and you will find it perhaps perplexed and confused, perhaps also in protest. But don't give in; demand arguments. Act with alertness and responsibility, each and every time, and the day will come when doubt will change from a destroyer to become one of your best fellow-workers, perhaps the wisest of all that have a part in building your life.

Rilke8

swooning will result when she opens the box

 

Blissmonger jewelry excels at unique design that augments your beloved's personality.

Tell me about her essence. Send me a photo of what she has in her present collection.

If she owns something in need of repair or tucked away because of lost elements, I specialize in reinvigorating left-for-unwearable treasures.

Either way, swooning will result when she opens the box.

When's the last time that happened?

Contact me for details.

flow

Flow.

The Csikszentmihalyi kind of flow.

That's what was dancing through my veins yesterday.

I was fully engaged in the pursuit in front of me, namely design, pulling in color and texture and hue, reveling in the inspirations that popped into my head.

No distractions, no drive-by negative thoughts, no interruptions of my reverie on a soulular level.

This is living, right here.

Flow.

reframe

Reframe

Slightly out of focus

Feeling into the shift in seasons, energy, life

There is delight to be had

in them all.

but if in your fear

but if in your fear you would seek only

love's peace and love's pleasure,

Then it is better for you that you cover

your nakedness and pass out of love's threshing-floor,

Into the seasonless world where you

shall laugh, but not all of your laughter,

and weep, but not all of your tears.

~Kahlil Gibran

corners on the curving sky

Our earth is round, and, among other things

That means that you and I can hold

completely different

Points of view and both be right.

The difference of our positions will show

Stars in your window. I cannot even imagine.

Your sky may burn with light,

While mine, at the same moment,

Spreads beautiful to darkness.

Still, we must choose how we separately corner

The circling universe of our experience.

Once chosen, our cornering will determine

The message of any star and darkness we

encounter.

~Anonymous

I Shall Paint My Nails Red

Because a bit of color is a public service.

Because I am proud of my hands.

Because it will remind me I'm a woman.

Because I will look like a survivor.

Because I can admire them in traffic jams.

Because my daughter will say "ugh!".

Because my lover will be surprised.

Because it is quicker than dyeing my hair.

Because it is a ten-minute moratorium.

Because it is reversible.

~Carole Satyamurti

all one can really ask for

That pain that comes and goes

it feels like life.

It feels like being awake and satisfied even though

you might not have slept much last night.

It feels real

and that is all one can really ask for.

hell, no

is all this god stuff real?

Girls, think twice before inviting God near.

His charms will turn you into a slave--are you ready for such

a wonderful bondage?

What if your human lover is just about ready to insert

a pulsating mass into your forest

and rain there;

what if just as he/she enters

--you hear His flute

calling,

could you run outside in a second, naked, and ready for

the world to make fun of you;

for who can really see Him.

Everyone may think you are worshiping a mirage.

And what if He asked you to give all your gold bangles

and fine clothes to the next

beggar you see?

Giving him your clay (our body) to shape is one thing.

for this can excite us,

but when our jewelry and silk are at risk

surely it is time to seriously ask

is all this God stuff--

real?

~Mira

in front of his wife

I tried controlling myself but it did no good.

My senses are

aflame.

I heard You singing.

That started all my blessed madness.

I openly made love with everything in sight last night

and this morning

the constable showed up and wrote out twenty citations.

I guess I should not have jumped naked

on him in front

of his

wife.

The hypocrite, he wouldn't have complained

at all

if we were

alone.

~Mira

stay with me awhile

I lived with her night and day--

the Nag.

I don't mean my wife or my mother-in-law,

they are both angels.

I am talking about that voice in me that would not

let me hold each moment

as I did my son when

he was born.

How to slay the Nag?

I am afraid I have become fond of you,

dear student,

if I spoke the answer,

you might

run.

~Kabir

I had to see the physician

I had to see the Physician

because of the pain this world

caused

me.

I could not believe what happened when I got there--

I found my

Teacher.

Before I left he said,

"Up for a little homework, yet?"

"Okay," I replied.

"Well then, try thanking all the people

who have caused

you pain.

They helped you

come to

me."

~Kabir

see if they wet their pants

The words Guru, Swami, Super Swami, Master, Teacher, Murshid,

Yogi, Priest,

most of those sporting such a title are

just peacocks.

The litmus test is:

hold them upside down over a cliff for a few hours.

If they don't wet their

pants

maybe you have found a real

one.

~Kabir

A Breast in the Sky

I hear talk about the famous.

I hear talk about different cities.

The most intimate events of families come to my ears.

I hear about temples and

mosques and

saints.

All that can be said I have heard.

All that can be wanted I

have seen.

My interest in this world has waned though,

not because I am

depressed.

A fish in a bowl I was,

a bottom feeder,

but now I nurse

upon the breast in the sky.

~Rabia

some fill with each good rain

There are different wells within your heart.

Some fill with each good rain,

Others are far too deep for that.

In one well

You have just a few precious cups of water,

That "love" is literally something of yourself,

It can grow as slow as a diamond

If it is lost.

Your love

Should never be offered to the mouth of a

Stranger,

Only to someone

Who has the valor and daring

To cut pieces of their soul off with a knife

Then weave them into a blanket

To protect you.

There are different wells within us.

Some fill with each good rain,

Others are far, far too deep

For that.

~Hafiz

damn thirsty

First

The fish needs to say,

"Something ain't right about this

Camel ride--

And I'm Feeling so damn

Thirsty."

~Hafiz

the woman I love

Because the Woman I love lives inside of you,

I lean as close to your body with my words as I can--

and I think of you all the time,

dear pilgrim.

Because the One I love goes with you wherever you go,

Hafiz will always be

near.

If you sat before me, wayfarer, with your aura bright from

your many charms,

my lips could resist rushing to you, but my eyes, my eyes

can no longer hide the wondrous fact of who

you really are.

The Beautiful One whom I adore

has pitched His royal tent inside of you,

so I will always lean my heart

as close to your soul

as I can.

-Hafiz

it's rigged

It's rigged--everything, in your favor.

So there is nothing to worry about.

Is there some position you want,

some office, some acclaim, some award, some con, some lover,

maybe two, maybe three, maybe four--all at once,

maybe a relationship

with

God?

I know there is a gold mine in you, when you find it

the wonderment of the earth's gifts you will lay

aside as naturally as does

a child a

doll.

But, dear, how sweet you look to me kissing the unreal;

comfort, fulfill yourself in any way possible--do that until

you ache, until you ache,

then come home to me

again.

~Rumi

Rumi3

                                                                                       

pretty shiny things

 

Currently available at Sweetgrass in downtown Davisburg.

I want to go deep

Jane, I tried, I really did.

Fueled with enthusiasm for this endeavor, I eagerly started reading Sense and Sensibility. After experiencing several chapters of unrequited enthusiasm however I realized I had to put it down, for good, knowing that I would continue to enjoy your work from a 20th-century vantage point through the directors and the screenwriters and the actors and the films that have been inspired by them.

In another lifetime I rehabbed my reading students from this "should" of having to finish a book that they had started. 

Guess what? You don't have to.

It's no reflection on your character or your ability to discipline yourself or your tastes and refinement.

You simply are choosing to engage with text that engages you. 

No guilt, no cultural deprivation, no reproach from the inner censor, who BTW would not have a voice at all if it hadn't been implanted and internalized at some point in your childhood.

You are simply choosing to engage with what engages you.

Attempting the opposite provides the evidence of how inappropriate it is. Varying degrees of skin crawling let you know that there is something/somewhere/someone else you have a prior engagement with, and you need to go find out who/what/where it is.

There is something else going on here too. When I invest my time in a book, or a person, or a circumstance, I invest my soul in it as well. I want a connection that takes me to a place I couldn't go without that particular interaction.

I want to go deep.

I want to go deep, a layer or two or ten underneath the surface treatment of life and what's offered up in this culture as pinnacle experience. I've tunneled my way under the industries of education, spirituality, self-help, health care, food supply, media and marketing, to discover over time a common discrepancy between what is status quo and what is possible.

I've learned that reactivity around those discrepancies is an industry too, and only helps keep them firmly in place.

Beyond pointing fingers and beyond the self-recrimination for not measuring up, there's freedom to be found in that layer of deep.

Jane, you "got" it because that's what your life was all about--making choices that weren't popular but that allowed you to maintain your personal integrity. So I know you don't mind as I take this book back to the library only partially inhaled.

You didn't settle. You supported inhaling the whole enchilada.

I go there on a regular basis, and I know that there are others who are seeking the relief and the re-invigoration that only going deep can provide.

I call it blissmongering. 

I work with people who are craving the freedom of going deep, even though the thought of going there might trigger some occasional resistance, or disbelief, or uncertainty.

You probably have accomplished some amazing things in your life, measured by the usual yardsticks of the culture. But you've also asked yourself, "Is that all there is?" and you know the answer.

Hell no, there's more. Your previous successes just didn't teach you how to get there. I hold the space for what's beyond those barriers and help you get to what you're craving.

You.

I have openings for two deep exploration clients.

Contact me for details.

Your first assignment will be to watch Sense and Sensibility.

Popcorn's on me.

did I really throw out my ear plugs?

Did I really throw out my earplugs?

I must have.

They are nowhere to be seen, and there aren't that many nooks and crannies around here where they might be hiding.

Note to self: The next time you are about to do something you even get a twinge of possible fuzzy-on-the-details read on, write it down before you do it so your future self remembers what your former self did. Cuz she won't otherwise.

So of course tonight is the first night in awhile the need has arisen for the bloody things. I live near an exit ramp on an interstate, and some evenings I am able to hear the semis when they hit the rumble strips. Must be something about certain weather patterns carrying sound more than others, or something.

I've had those earplugs for at least four years, maybe more. They were connected by a length of cord, and I never lost them because of that cool feature. I believe I found them in the hunting aisle at Meijer. 

When my family was visiting, I remember picking the plugs up off the floor and thinking about what to do with them while the fam was here, vaguely considering whether I should invest in a new pair.

Guess where I'm going tomorrow.

So why can't I sleep? I've been on this binge of going to bed earlier than most adults in the Western Hemisphere, getting as much sleep as my body tells me it wants, and it feels amazing not to be sleep deprived. That hasn't been true for many decades, I'm sure. Too many thrilling ideas buzzing through my synapses tonight? Possibly. Too much anticipation charging up the cortisol levels? Maybe. 

Maybe that Jane Austen novel will do the trick.