Farmer MacEgan's Scrawl 2
August 20, 2001
Its been a really great day today. I went out to lunch with my good friend Sophia. We talked about life and people and how happiness is dependent on following your own path and accepting yourself. Loving others unconditionally and not judging yourself or others is also very important. Life is simple, beautiful, and wild! On this Friday Rob and I got together and made salsa. You can see new pictures of it in the photo albums. This last weekend I also met lots of new people and attended the famed drum circle at Liberty Park in SLC. I went with my friends Jennifer, Liz, Susan, and Holly (pictured in the photos). I bought a book there called "Common Sense and the Ageless Wisdom" by Don Bradley. I am very excited to start reading it. It is very simple and straightforward on life. The drum circle is full of all kinds of fascinating people jumping around and dancing to the rhythm. It is a really interesting community event. I also broke down and got a cell phone over the weekend. I am going to turn of my home phone since I am never there. It is really neat to be so connected to people where ever I go. I like being available and reachable. I do feel that cell phones are some kind of adult security blanket, but they are really exciting and a lot of good fun. So far this has been a good idea. I want to share a poem I wrote about the drum circle:
Pitter, Patter, Soul Splatter
Pop, crash, pitter, patter,
Taken up in the moment of
The hypnotic music of the soul.
The exchange of people,
The intercourse of ideas,
The melting, fusing, breathing down rhythm,
That takes your feet and taps you on the shoulder.
Grasp for a lost sense of community,
Longing to share the love,
The touching, feeling, breathing spirit,
That binds in a hypnotic trance,
Which sweeps on the mind,
Mimics the dance of life,
The closeness of the tribe,
The sense of the beating heart
We all share inside of us.
That heart that takes us out across the sea of sorrow,
And bridges the gaps,
To the hope of the splattering mind.
Hope you like this one. I am very happy about the diversity of lifeways in SLC. It's nice to share in this celebration of life.
August 27, 2001
I had a very interesting and fun weekend. It all started with me spending the whole day finishing the editing on my movie "The Soul of Salt Lake." Everything went quite well and I am very pleased with the movie. It will be showing at the Gangrene Film Festival in about a month. I am really excited about it. Friday night Matt and I went to the Buddhist temple in Layton. This weekend is a special weekend for them because they were housing some of the sacred relics of the Buddha. We had about an hour long meditation which I found very pleasant. The collective energy in the room created a beatiful feeling of love and peace. Afterwards we talked about the vows of the Monastics. It was very interesting, for instance, they must not sleep in a high, luxurious bed, also they must not kill any living thing and cannot ask for anything from the people, and several other vows. There dhamma talk was very interesting and I learned a lot. The great lesson seems to be to live focused on the present and what you can do and feel in the moment. Not dwelling on things we cannot change and having no fear for the future. Saturday morning Matt and I again went to the temple and participated in the alms giving to the monks. It was really a beautiful experience. The monks have such a quiet power and compassion for everything is seems. After the temple I went home and decided to check my e-mail, which was a good thing because Sara, a girl I met over the internet, wrote me back and said we could meet on Sunday. She lives in Spring City, just blocks from my best friend Adam. Before I went down I had to run up to Logan for my sisters homecoming party. She just got back from taiwan. I really enjoyed spending some time with the family. Saturday night I spent down at Adams around the fire talking spiritual babble. It was really a lot of fun and very enlightening. We discussed order vs. chaos and how spontaneity as well as structure effects our lives. On Sunday morning I met Sara for the first time. She is a very beautiful girl and had a lot of interesting and fun things to say. We spent four hours talking and enjoying the day together. I was able to meet her family. Her parents are great down to earth people. They are fixing up the house Sara is living in. I am planning on going back down next weekend and hopefully go hiking and do other fun things. I am hoping to spend more time and get to know her better. It was hard to come back to work today, even though I love my job. It has been a very productive day and a busy one. Computers are a bit to logical for humans some times. Here is a poem I wrote on the weekend, Hope you like it:
Spin me around on the countless wagon wheel,
Which end we know not.
Spend another hour while the turning lists,
The strains of eternity;
The fire burns a thousand sunsets down,
But the moment the trickle of sunlight,
Plays in your hair and feeds into my heart,
Is the moment in the present,
We all try to capture forever,
And spend time flying on broken wings,
As I delicately stroke the edge of your skin,
A speech to the dream of your love,
That grows only when you are not afraid to show it.
What a wild, wonderful, crazy, world, but would we really have it any other way?
August 29, 2001
Wow, this has been a busy week, but lots of fun. Yesterday I took off from work a little early to get some things taken care of. I decided to go get a haircut. It was sort of inspired by this Doc Martins book that Matt gave me. I had it cut really short for a change and it seems a bit strange. I know I am the same person, but somehow I feel a bit different. I think the measure of a person should be based more on the inside anyway. Matt and I got together for poetry and a vinyl, but we listened to a CD instead because the new Bjork album was just released, it is called Verpertine. It is really mellow, but a very nice listen. After the album we wrote some poetry. Matt's mom wrote a great poem about me, I will post it later on. My poem is as follows:
Once I was Seeking You
Leave an empty page for me in your diary.
Run with a thought of my love,
Dripping down through mind and heart.
Feel the time we spent reading each other's dreams,
And making those subtle wishes become true,
In the passion of a moments embrace.
The spinning emotion that sometimes
Brings me to seeking something,
Deep inside of you,
That I was never able to share,
Last time we touched.
Left to you and some art splashed canvas
We used to admire,
But as things fade in fancy,
I seek something in you that I forgot was everlasting.
It seems that I am teetering towards this romantic stain in my poetry these past months, perhaps because I have thought about the whole love thing quite a bit since my divorce. It is human nature to hang on sometimes to emotions, even though the pain would be less if we let them slip away. Sharing love is really so powerful and fullfiling.
Later last night I finished a pitcher I threw on the wheel, I will post pictures when I can.
Today has been very long at work. I did get the album cover design done for the re-release of my first bands album (the Skinless Chaps) I am excited to get the CD out so people can hear my early musical efforts. My class went really well tonight. I was able to help my students get a lot done on a group project they are finishing up and everything just seemed to flow well. Life really is like running a river, sometimes you fight to avoid the rocks and strong rapids, but there are the quiet smooth parts that give balance and peace of mind. Sometimes fighting to much against the river causes problems in the progress, there are times when we just have to go with the flow and see where the current takes us.
September 6, 2001
What a busy week it has been. I am finally able to get to my journal. I had a crazy weekend. Thursday I went down to see Sara again and when I stopped by her house to see her she was sitting there with a guy. This guy turned out to be her boyfriend. So that pretty well ends the saga of Sara. I was a bit sad she wasn't totally honest with me. People should not be afraid to be perfectly honest with thier intentions. I stayed in Spring City and visited with Adam (see albums) and had fun with his kids, they are a handful. On Saturday I got a hold of some of my good friends Christian and Mandi and we went sailing up at Bear Lake. I am now totally addicted to sailing. I didn't realize how exciting and active sailing is. My sister, Stefainie came up on Monday and we went out in my canoe and also went sailing again. What a great end to a weekend that started with much disappointment. I am looking for a Hobie Catamaran. They have a model you can put on top of a van, thats the one I am looking for. Messing about in boats, messing about in boats....I found out yesterday that my new film, The Soul of Salt Lake, did not make it into the Gangrene film fest. They said it was too serious. It is too bad they only take comedies, a bit limiting I think. I was a bit sad about it, but I am planning on submitting it to a few other fests. Here is another poem installment I wrote in Spring City:
Hot, summer filled orchard days,
Slipping into early autumn,
I find myself wondering,
At the abandonement of all the joys I once knew,
And contemplating on the rebirth
Of a thousand blades of grass and one thistle.
Shall I uproot this vile spot of vegitation,
Or look into its center to find a beauty
That most people can never find.
Ring around a ring of thorny roses,
And prick the skin,
Letting the essence of life drain;
But even the day stops the flow,
Stops the pain,
And the year brings new oppertunities,
For those with the courage to take them.
I am glad for the short work week. I am excited to start on some new pottery projects this weekend. I hope to also start writing songs for an upcoming electronic album I have in the works.
