Tue 02 Apr 2002 19:49
Had a great time walking in central park with Asia and Kasia--but perhaps called Asia on too much, or told her what I was thinking too often (she does ask, which is fun![challenging--maybe I should ask her more--but I guess I'm not as other-focused as she is? and am content to have her tell me what she wants to tell me. I did ask carmen monday AM whether she was thinking anything during a silent time. She said no, she was tired, but then that she was thinking of the granola she had in her bag. Remember that rebecca said she was always thinking something?--that reminds me, it is quite something to be talking with Joanna, who has read parts of this web site--nothing has been updated since 02-24, note--but she does already know many of the things I have to say about myself, or the questions I have--she caught me once today, and in a way it was as if she could read my mind or as if she had been with me when I was thinking them here, perhaps for the first time... I did ask rebecca what she was thinking, and did perhaps wish she would focus on me more as I did on her, so I think I will ask Joanna more--if she doesn't want to tell me, no problem. There are times when she's saying a lot with her face, her eyes, or her hugs, I could ask her what she's thinking then--it is almost as if she wishes to say something but does not--but so often I like to just be with her feelings, and if she wishes to say something with more than her face, her eyes, or her hugs, to let her, but not ask her. I should keep in mind a thing I think I noticed about myself--that often I ask others what I wish they'd ask me, perhaps others do this also, that is easy to check. I will ask her sometimes about means of physically expressing affection she's ok with, because more is feeling more appropriate, but the basics and variations on them (hugs, embraces, handholding), are so powerful, it is more that the power of those is growing for us(?) without needing or perhaps wanting more, which could be more problematic?]). She seemed a bit stressed or discontent--not that that's a problem but I hope she comes to a more joyful time again soon. Really wonderful, relationship with a capital "r" to some extent. But I'm always holding my breath a bit wondering how long this can continue, always excited when I see she's left a message for me--easier for me to respond to messages well than phone calls- I have time to change frame of mind, and consider her proposal--("it's like waking someone up" I said once about a phone call received while absorbed in some internet reading--that infamous phone call, actually--so I have been keeping my phone off much of the time except when I know I could receive a call well....). FYI it's hardly lovey-dovey at all, more like how I felt Patrick (who is gay, but I didn't know then) loved me in Austin, Texas--a hug she gave me today felt so much like one he gave me there... And how I love her? For the most part, for me, the perfect kind of love--little problems, uncertainties, of course, but happy to see her and be with her--and yet I'm not to the point of missing her when I don't hear from her--though since that one weekend, it's never been far apart--though if it were I think because of the resolution from that one weekend, I still would not actively miss her--

All that is to say, because I have so many other great things to do, and nice people to see, I'm not sad to not hear from her, and yet I'm still very happy to see her when I do get to see her. And I wish she feels the same, but she still has a lot of hard challenges, and quite possibly as she is considering, NYC is not the place for her...there is another better place she has in mind.

So, I'm happy about the piles of books I have around, unread (here and at the research library), because I'm very interested in all of them, I'm happy because GIMP is free and ported to windows [I put some serious effort to getting BSD/linux on this laptop to dual boot, without success--I could do it, but my first priority is to work on my web site, and read books, not mess with OSs--and thanks to cygwin, gvim, vim, python, zope, etc, I basically have access to a lot of what *nix box could get me--screen (a program), primarily, cadaver (webdav, for zope).], and because of GIMP and what I've read on Phil Greenspun's photo.net pages, I should be able to put some decent, maybe even very pretty images on my site. I should get to see carmen tomorrow morning. Daylight savings time starts on the 4th[7th], I believe (so it might be dark again when I go to the pool!). I may see sarah. At work, I have a fun book to read related to procedural textures, and thanks to the program I finished friday and monday, most tedious computer operating tasks exist no longer!--I can sit back and read the book or improve the program, while the program does the work I used to do. And hal is probably quite satisfied because we can do things he might not ever have been able to do so easily before.

I need to tell mom I won't be going to my aunt's wedding in yosemite. I need to take care of my taxes. And progress on these books, the website, and maybe get to know Ilene. And there's always consciousness and meditation to explore...

and sleep
and see joanna again.

.