i enjoy sneezing

Everett Daniel Mintz

2010-04-15T21:13:00.000-07:00

Born at 5:52pm PDT on April 15th, 2010, a happy and healthy Everett Daniel Mintz was born to Dan & Catie Mintz in Los Angeles, California. Everett is named after Pam's father, Everett Cope.
I'm tired. It's been a long, amazing birthday. I awoke with the tiredness of vivid dreams that come with big birthdays, but also with a feeling about life--a feeling of strength, of energy, of time, effort, freedom, flow--a feeling based on being happy with how I'm spending my energy--the work I do and things I learn. A feeling of hopefulness based on my own ever-changing capacities---and the capacity for change and growth that accompanies effort and openness.
The morning was confusing--talking to a lawyer for help on a house--too much to get into. And then minor setbacks--no wallet equals no food, and pants that cannot be returned. Silly things, they did not phase me. News from the west coast was pouring in--it's really going to happen, they'd say. They were going to the hospital.
As my phone's battery died at school, the bounciness of my knees increased. I felt disconnected, out of touch. I called in sick to work.
At home I was greeted by a loving girlfriend and a slew of birthday surprises. As the day wore on, it felt less and less like my birthday and more like the day Everett is born. I did not mind this one bit. I had felt my birthday so much the whole morning, and felt it so good, I didn't care that our collective energy was directed so much at Evie and Catie and their actions.
The parents came over; we ate, sat anxiously; most of the pacing took place in our minds and hearts--and most of it during the last 10 minutes, the time when things shifted from anxious to frustrated then, finally, to frightened. In the end he came out and he came out fine. Happy, healthy, tired, beautiful, safe, loved.

Personal Statement

2009-09-15T14:16:00.001-07:00

Whilst considering my upcoming application process, I came upon my personal statement from my previous:

Personal Statement
George Washington University
Michael Mintz
Applicant: Doctor of Psychology Program

In considering my passions, I realize that there is an underlying theme that connects the various interests, hobbies, activities and employments. I believe that the theme reflects the core of my interest in psychology. The theme cannot be expressed with a simple adjective, but perhaps I can explain myself better with what follows.
The two most important aspects of my life may seem incongruous at first glance. My relationships, spending time and connecting with my family and friends, drive my day-to-day life. My escape from this day-to-day life, and from my relationships, traveling, is a passion of mine as well. In my travels and experiences living abroad, what provides me the biggest thrill is the feeling of complete solitude, the challenge of knowing that I must fend for myself, with nothing on my person except a backpack full of dirty clothes, a passport and some traveler’s cheques. Whereas in day-to-day life I thrive on the depth of my interpersonal connections, while traveling I thrive on the intensity of brief yet meaningful interactions with complete strangers. Whether it’s a significant personal interchange during a week on the road together with a group of Australians or the simple exchange of direct eye contact with the woman from Varanasi who sold me a samosa, the feeling of depth attached to these connections drive my travels. In day-to-day life, the depth manifests itself differently. The moments where I feel most useful are moments in which I help a member of my family, a friend, or a client, overcome a challenging situation. Whether I’m helping them through a difficult moment, providing personal insight, or simply giving them a chance to talk something out, I feel most productive as a person acting as a source of interpersonal assistance.
My two years living and working in Costa Rica were a combination of both worlds. My life there had the thrill of being a foreigner and the challenge of mastering a second language, combined with the stability of meaningful friendships. While teaching English at the Universidad Interamericana, I enjoyed the challenge of learning how to connect through cultural and language barriers, of making an entire classroom of university students release their natural first-day jitters and laugh, open up, express themselves. I consider my ability to evoke expression, both emotional and otherwise, as a skill that will help me immeasurably in my future as a psychologist.
During my years at the University of Michigan, I worked as a Behavioral Therapist for autistic twins in Ann Arbor. ‘The boys’, as we called them, taught me that there are numerous perspectives of reality, and the challenge of my job was to find my way into their reality. During those two years I became a part of their world, a world that was often characterized as lacking interpersonal connections, as being motivated by objects, stories, movies, and repetition.
When I started working as the Case Manager of the Transitional Living Program of the Latin American Youth Center, I was somewhat intimidated by the population with which I would be working: homeless males, ages 16-22, straight off the streets, many of whom had recently come to the country ‘on foot’ from Central America. I knew that they would be some fairly tough guys. I also knew that, unlike younger or more privileged youth, an open heart would not be enough to win their respect or affection. But I trusted in myself, and I trusted in what I had learned in my time abroad: that a warm, genuine smile, plus an ability to talk about a common interest, an ability to make another person comfortable and even make a person laugh, could win over just about anybody.
The lesson that was hardest for me to accept was that of dealing with problems that were outside my abilities as a professional and outside my control as a person. In working with youth with problems ranging from substance abuse issues to severe mental health issues, I had to learn that there are some problems that cannot be solved by a healthy chat. I have never felt as hopelessly incapable as I did in dealing with issues that were, to say the least, over my head. While I hope to hone my skills in dealing with issues such as these in a professional psychology program, I need to recognize, both for professional and personal reasons, that there are some problems that will not be solvable, some problems for which the goal will be to learn to live with rather than to solve. I must also learn that I cannot place too much blame on myself regarding cases that have not turned out ideally and to recognize that we are all works in progress. Lessons such as these drive my day-to-day life and, in a manner of speaking, are the fruits of my labor.

I am returning to Costa Rica in January. It will be my first time back since leaving my job, my students and my friends behind to work on the presidential campaign in May of 2004. I will be the Producer of a National Geographic-funded educational quest called Blue Zones that aims to understand why there are such a high percentage of centenarians in the country. The trip will combine several of my passions: the inspiring unknown of traveling, the logistics coordination and media production skills I learned working on the Kerry/Edwards 2004 campaign, the quest for a multifaceted answer to a challenging but significant question, the chance to make new interpersonal connections, and the chance to reconnect with old friends.
The future is exciting, but I see the past as the true source of knowledge of self. In addition to enjoying experiences retroactively through memory, the past is a source of lessons, and is the key source of growth. My knowledge of psychodynamics is limited, but my experience in utilizing my conscious past, my thoughts, my emotions and even my dreams as a road to introspection, to self-understanding and to learning is vast. I see every day, every experience as a valuable lesson. I try my best to learn from each simple occurrence, to be proud of myself for my successes, to be wary of making the same mistake twice, to understand why I do what I do and why I am who I am. These are questions that drive my life. To me, psychology is not only a science, a study, a route to a profession. To me, psychology, as the exploration of the self, is the main goal of life.
I am wise enough to know this: my knowledge is limited, my experiences numerous out of infinite, my ability to function as a psychologist fledgling. I recognize that I am years away from being the professional psychologist I hope to be, years from having the skills to sit in a room with a person and know that I’ll have the academic, experiential and professional knowledge to truly help them. This self-awareness of what I lack drives me. It has driven me, in this instance, to apply to George Washington University’s Professional Psychology program. But I also know that my self, the combination of my family, my relationships, my education, my experiences and my life have prepared me in the strongest way possible to do what I want to do and to become who I want to be. And I look forward to it.

Visionary

2009-08-10T13:11:00.000-07:00

Hello people.
This photo was taken at the American Visionary Arts Museum in Baltimore, Maryland, where my bumper sticker has been on display for approximately one year (along with the piece of art on which it is stuck---Cram Guy, by Dr. Seth Goldstein). Dr. Goldstein bought the sticker at our only retail outlet (the Bethesda Co-op). We at ienjoysneezing.com are honored to have be included in such a fine kinetic sculpture as Cram Guy and at such a fine venue as the AVAM. Once I can procure enough stickers, the AVAM will become the second retail outlet of such stickers. (After touring the museum (which is awesome, by the way), I asked the employees at Side Show, the museum's gift shop, if they were interested. They said that "we get asked about that sticker all the time." 'Twas an honor.)

"Visionary...," Lasitha said, "...visionary."

2008-12-03T15:21:00.000-08:00

DC on Election Night

2008-11-05T13:18:00.000-08:00

Below I've posted a story by a DC friend, Emily Cohen. My experience of last night was fairly similar, save a few details. Emily has managed to capture some of the most beautiful and meaningful elements of what took place in this city on November 4th, 2008. Thank you, Emily. :

This is what democracy looks like

I wish you all could have been in DC last night.

We all witnessed history yesterday, but I wish you all could have been here, so that you could have seen what I saw. Here's what the Post said about it, to be concise: "From outside the White House to U Street, Obama's victory sparked one big street party that had folks honking horns, racing through the streets and chanting across the city, 'Yes We Can, Yes We Can!'"

I started off the night at Red Derby, a neighborhood bar near my house, where the energy of anticipation was intense. It was packed, with one projection of CNN on a wall. The crowd cheered with each state called for Obama, and when Ohio was called it got even better. When the election was called, we were standing on chairs screaming, jumping, and hugging each other. We went outside and for about an hour we cheered with every passing car on 14th street. Almost all of them honked their horns like crazy (DC voted 93% for Obama, but I'd say our honking ratio was more like 95%) while we jumped and cheered and yelled. Even metrobus drivers were honking their horns, and all the passengers were hanging out the windows cheering.

The thing I found remarkable about that first part of the night, and continuously throughout the rest of the night, is that amid shouts of "Yes we can!", "Yes we did!", "Obama!", etc., that we were also singing America the Beautiful and chanting "USA!". Now, the Left is often criticized for being unpatriotic, and frankly, we haven't had much to be patriotic about in the last decade. So I don't think I've ever heard genuine expressions of patriotism like that in liberal crowds in recent years. But last night, without irony (and you know hipsters do everything ironically), we sang songs praising our country because for the first time (for a lot of us) in our lives, our country accomplished something that made us deeply, undeniably, proud.

So at around 12:30, we thought our night was about over. The beer/tequila/whiskey/champagne mixture in my stomach was telling me it was time to go home. I'd taken pictures until my camera ran out of battery (I'll try to post them later). So Brad, our roommate Emily and I headed back to the house. As soon as we got home, though, we heard through text messages that there were masses gathering at the white house. We had to be part of it. So we raced back to 14th street and jumped on the last bus headed downtown.

As we approached U street, we saw a police barricade up ahead, so the bus driver had to divert his route to 13th. But over there it was the same - U street was shut down by the crowds. The sight was unbelievable. Masses of people packing the streets, people hanging out of their cars, honking, cheering, hugging, dancing... From there to the white house it was the same - huge crowds of people, screaming, running, celebrating the night together. I can't begin to describe the feeling it elicited in all of us, to see our whole city erupt physically with the joy we were all feeling.

Forty years ago, there were race riots on these same streets. Literally. In 1968, after Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated, rioting broke out on U street and spread throughout the city. The neighborhood was devastated for decades. And last night, people of every skin color - and I'm talking huge masses of people of every skin color - walked out on these very same streets in the spirit of pure and utter joy. All the way down U street, at the very same intersections where windows were getting smashed and buildings were being burned in 1968. All of us - Black, White, Latino, Indian, and everything else - stood in these exact same places and CELEBRATED together. Perfect strangers, in the middle of the night, hugging each other, lifting each other into the air and screaming "We did it!" Standing on the exact same ground where 40 years ago it was desperate and sad, there were masses of people celebrating how far we've come.

In front of the white house, there were more gathered like a protest rally. People singing the "na na na, goodbye" song to Bush, people chanting "Whose house is this? Obama's house!", people just cheering and hugging and dancing together. I take for granted the fact that I work 2 blocks from the white house and it's lost some of its majesty for me. Standing in that place and expressing anti-Bush spirit is nothing new. But last night I felt something incredibly powerful, that brings me to tears just writing about it, to stand in front of the white house and declare with fellow Americans that we have put a black man in that house.

DC is one of the few (maybe the only) places in the country that has the right mixture of factors to have brought out that kind of fever. First, as I already wrote, in the District of Columbia 93% voted for Obama (That's right, 93%!) so there's not a huge risk of offending McCain supporters by yelling in the streets. Second, obviously, folks tend to be politically aware in this city. Third, DC is a predominantly African-American city (though the black population is declining, the 2007 census showed 55% of DC's population is African-American). DC is small, and although it's been mostly racially segregated by neighborhood, the physical segregation is starting to break down with the gentrification of poor, mostly black neighborhoods. Racial dynamics and gentrification are complicated here, as they are in all redeveloping post-industrial American cities. But the combination of these factors created the perfect storm for this massive eruption of joy to resonate throughout the city.

I live in a historically black, gentrifying, increasingly racially-mixed neighborhood (Columbia Heights/Petworth) in a historically black, gentrifying, increasingly racially-mixed city. Blacks, Whites, Latinos and others occupy the same space in my neighborhood, but we are not yet the same community. With many exceptions, of course, social groups in my neighborhood tend to be fairly homogeneous by race. One quick example: recently, there was a double homicide/robbery at an illegal Latino-run brothel and gambling house around the corner from my house. I didn't even know the place was there, but that's not surprising because I'd be one of the last people to know something like that. A friend of mine, an older black man who grew up in the neighborhood and hangs out at Red Derby, said something about the murder like "damn, I know a lot of Latins in this neighborhood and nobody told me about that place. I would've hung out there." What that said to me is that we're only letting each other into our respective lives so much. We might be friendly in passing on the street (and often times we're not), we might chat at coffee shops and bars (and many times we don't), we might know our neighbors, but when it comes down to who we feel closest to and who we consider "our people", our community is still as segregated as we've always been in this city.

So to see what I saw last night - all of us rallying together to celebrate the victory of a man we all believe in, and to celebrate the fact that we now live in a country that elects itself a black president - elicited a feeling of community I have never felt before in my life.

One of my favorite moments of the night was when we were walking down K street, towards the white house at about 1:30 AM. A black woman was standing on the sidewalk, holding a bunch of ballons and talking on the phone. Just as she was saying into the phone "I've never seen so many white people...", Brad ran up and gave her a huge hug. She laughed, as I ran up too, hugging her and yelling YES WE DID! She pointed the phone towards me and said "Here! Tell my mom!" so I yelled into the phone "We did it!" The woman put the phone back up to her ear and said "And mom, that was a white girl!"

Don't get me wrong. We still have a long way to go before we have true equity in this country. But I believe last night in downtown DC was one of the most beautiful moments in our generation's history and I feel incredibly lucky to have witnessed it.

Videos of the night:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/video/2008/11/05/VI2008110500629.html

Dream

2008-10-09T19:25:00.000-07:00

I am with my family at a sporting event. I leave to go to the library where I have tasks to take care of. I am to perform a psychological evaluation, only when I get there I realize that i cannot perform it on the child that i was supposed to, and instead i have to ask my coworker, a PsyD, if i can test him. he reluctantly obliges, but says that we have to do it upstairs. Himmelfarb of my dream has no internal staircase, and so we must go up the fire escape to get upstairs. as we are climbing up the metal grate-stairs, i try to grab these tennis balls that will serve as diversions, rewards, for my subject, my coworker. the balls are small and deflated, and as i try to grab them they fall between the metal grates of the fire escape, out of my reach and to the ground below.
i begin my evaluation. my coworker, the subject, is participating well, though he has an attitude about it. we are moving forward with the testing on the fire escape, outside, since he wants to do it there. i am fine with this at first, and only once we are well into the process do i start to question the location. very quickly i move from content to terrified. i wonder what will happen if the wind picks up and carries my testing supplies, my cards, away. and i wonder what if i happen to reach after the card...then i myself could fall. i am in danger. i could fall. and what if there is an earthquake and this whole fire escape comes crashing down? this is a terrible place to be, a horrible place to do the testing...i am terrified of heights all of a sudden, aware that i am usually not, aware that just seconds ago i was fine, and now i am terrified. i MUST get back into the building IMMEDIATELY.
we go back inside and i return to where my family is watching the sporting event. what previously was a baseball game is now a women's water polo game: Michigan versus Ohio State. it is in the waning moments of this tie game, sudden death, of a water polo game that i decide that i should substitute in, that i should be playing. i sub in and we are on offense. we turn the ball over. as we are swimming back to the defensive end my teammates cannot tell who on the other team has the ball. grey and buckeye red, the ball blends in with their uniforms...the goddamn cheaters! i see who has the ball and i make a move to knock it out of the girl's grasp as she swims. my attack was illegal and they call a penalty on me. play is immediately restarted and i make another aggressive move, this time stealing the ball legally. i try to pass it down the pool, towards our offensive end, but nobody is open. i am being double-, triple-teamed. i see that their goalie is not in the goal and, despite the distance, i decide to go for it. i launch the ball three quarters of the pool, realizing that if i throw it long it will go over the goal and out of bounds, and if i leave it even a few feet short, it will get stuck in the water. i try to throw the ball with a low angle, but very fast and hard. it lands just short of the goal, stuck in the water. only a few inches short of crossing the line and ending the game. i try to make it go in with my mind, for a wave to push it in, or for one my teammates to take it the last few inches. then i decide to swim for it, and as i swim i try to make waves to force it in. i get to the ball just as an OSU girl does, and we fight for it, and i manage to push it just across the line. we win! i turn to the crowd, to a buckeye fan in the first row, and as rudely as i possibly can, as hatefully as possible, yell at her that "the buckeyes fucking suck!!!" and i mean it sooo much.
i celebrate the win with my family, receive the praise and love of the victory. then i head back to the library. the feds are there, investigating a case of a fallen child, a child who has fallen out of an open window to the street below. my PsyD coworker is liable, and he maintains a surly attitude despite the investigation's seriousness. the feds show us a video of how and why small children fall out of windows...of low windows that open like blinds...the video is disturbing and i fear and wonder whether it is the video of my coworker's child-falling-death circumstance. this is all very painful to watch. more clips are shown of children falling. in one the child steps over the edge and falls below, landing on its feet and crying based on the pain and the scary feeling. the child's caretaker has thrown himself over the edge too, only a few stories down, and he lands less easily. it is all very disturbing.

What are the chances that we will win...

2008-06-12T15:06:00.000-07:00

DEM Total 289
Solid Dem (Above 80%) 190
Lean Dem (80% to 60%) 99
Toss-up (60% to 40%) 22
Lean Rep (40% to 20%) 70
Solid Rep (Below 20%) 157
REP Total 227

Expected Value of EC (% to win times # of EC) 288.4 (0.5)

Dems to Win: 65.0%

State Electoral Votes % on Intrade as of 11-Jun
DISTRICTOFCOLUMBIA 3 96%
ILLINOIS 21 96%
HAWAII 4 95%
MASSACHUSETTS 12 94%
RHODEISLAND 4 93%
MARYLAND 10 92%
DELAWARE 3 90%
VERMONT 3 90%
WASHINGTON 11 90%
MAINE 4 89%
CONNECTICUT 7 89%
NEWYORK 31 89%
NEWJERSEY 15 87%
CALIFORNIA 55 86%
OREGON 7 85%
IOWA 7 80%
MINNESOTA 10 79%
WISCONSIN 10 75%
PENNSYLVANIA 21 72%
MICHIGAN 17 70%
COLORADO 9 66%
OHIO 20 62%
NEWMEXICO 5 62%
NEWHAMPSHIRE 4 54%
VIRGINIA 13 52%
NEVADA 5 48%
MISSOURI 11 40%
FLORIDA 27 28%
INDIANA 11 23%
NTH.CAROLINA 15 23%
ARKANSAS 6 20%
MONTANA 3 19%
WESTVIRGINIA 5 18%
GEORGIA 15 17%
NEBRASKA 5 15%
STH.DAKOTA 3 15%
KANSAS 6 15%
OKLAHOMA 7 13%
LOUISIANA 9 13%
MISSISSIPPI 6 12%
TEXAS 34 11%
TENNESSEE 11 11%
ALASKA 3 10%
STH.CAROLINA 8 10%
ARIZONA 10 10%
WYOMING 3 10%
KENTUCKY 8 9%
UTAH 5 8%
NTH.DAKOTA 3 7%
IDAHO 4 7%
ALABAMA 9 6%

Courtesy of Dan Mintz

Self-described

2008-05-13T14:54:00.000-07:00

Below I've posted my self-description, which I originally wrote for my work with Blue Zones. They asked me to write about myself in terms of childhood and in terms of travelling/exploring the world (and also to list my accomplishments*). Here's what came out:

* Traveled in six of the seven continents
* Was once in the room with four living Presidents
* Won High School Championship in Volleyball
* Lived and worked in Costa Rica
* Worked on Kerry/Edwards 2004 Campaign
* Slept in over 135 beds from May 2004- May 2005
* Founded the philosophy/travel Web site ienjoysneezing.blogspot.com

As a kid I was mostly into playing sports with my friends. I always said that I wanted to be a psychologist when I grew up. I wasn't much of an explorer. The first exploration I remember took place when I was around seven years old. My older brother and his friends were planning on heading into the woods behind my house to find the abandoned (and supposedly haunted) house deep in the forest. I begged them to let me come along. The house had been destroyed in a fire many years before and my brother told me that the ghost of the witch who had lived there still haunted the premises. I was scared out of my mind.

When I was a kid I hated having to change my clothes with the turn of the seasons. In the fall, when the weather turned cold, my mother would force me to wear long pants instead of shorts. I always said that I didn't like the feeling of the pants. In the spring, my mother and I would have the exact opposite fight: I always refused to start wearing shorts again, claiming that shorts didn't feel right.

It wasn't until I went to Spain at age 20 to study the country, the language and the culture that I became interested in travelling abroad. I have spent more than three out of the last six years out of the country and I believe that it has shaped me into who I am today. I have learned that the society that I grew up in is just one of the infinite realities that exist on our planet. I have learned that even though there are six billion people on Earth with six billion different lives, there are certain pieces of life that all people share. I have learned to be patient, to trust the righteous path, to trust myself and my choices. I have learned when to swim with the current and when to swim against it. I have put myself in difficult situations, mild danger and physical discomfort. The more I challenge myself through travelling, the more I appreciate the warm comfort of coming home---the familiar faces, my family and friends, the food I grew up eating, and, perhaps most of all, my bed.

Despite all I've experienced and learned in the past 20 years, despite the physical discomfort I've put myself through on my travels, the 30-hour chicken bus rides through mountainous northern India, the extreme heat of New Delhi in May, and the insatiable hunger that two months of eating noodles left in my meat-deprived stomach during my time in Asia, some things never change. To this day I struggle with pants. Yes...PANTS. I tend to find a pair of pants that I really love and wear them everyday for 6 months, maybe a year, until they fade away and die. I struggle to adjust when I lose a pair of pants to the gods of wear and tear. I mourn the loss. Then, some day not too long after, I find a new pair of pants, which I will undoubtedly wear for the next 6-12 months. Also, I haven't worn jeans since the early 1990's. I tried a pair on at the Gap a few weeks ago. It was repulsive.

My point is this: after all I've experienced, all I've learned, there are certain pieces of our personality that will never change. And that sums me up pretty well. I put myself in tough situations, I challenge myself to adjust, to change, to become a better person. But there are certain parts of me that are simply me.

That's Michael.

Life these days

2008-05-07T14:33:00.000-07:00

I just finished my second semester of school. Life is good. The end of the semester came and went without causing too much damage or taking from me too many hours of sleep. There were days that schoolwork pressure tightened the knot behind my left shoulder, but all in all i maintained equanimity, I maintained the perspective that my feelings of stress or nervousness about achievement versus failure were normal, expectable feelings that one in my position might feel. The knot has faded considerably in the last four or five days. I handed in my last final on Thursday night at proceeded directly to a friend's house, kicking off a 10-day period in which the goal is simply to feel as though i am truly "on vacation". Jordan and I went canoeing the following day, after a Parisian lunch on the pedestrian mall in Georgetown---only 8 blocks from school and work, yet a world away. The weekend and days since have been filled with sports and outdoor fun, happy hours and long, drawn-out baths. I even went "on vacation" to my parents' house for a night.
School was good. The Rorschach is some crazy stuff. There were times when i worshiped it and times when i cursed it; in the end i feel: that test sure does show a lot about an individual. It has also shown me a lot about myself. I've learned what aspects of my mental/emotional state are most distressing and what proverbial cliffs i would be most likely to fall off of.
School, and the mode of thought that accompanies the psychodynamic learning environment, in combination with psychotherapy, has been a source of intensity in my life, providing me new depths of self-understanding. Sometimes it is confusing, sometimes it solves all confusion. in general it is enlightening.
i think of my dreams often these days. i write them down a couple of times a week. they become more and more vivid as time passes. i feel as though the introspective forces of the various aspects of my life combine as multipliers or exponents, not as sums. i am becoming deeply engrossed in this world. there is no separating my education from my life, in a sense. psychology, at this point, fills not only my intellectual pursuits but my spiritual ones. psychology fills it, but it does not fulfill it. there is still room for more. i try to meditate, though i find it challenging. i go to church (yes, church) every couple of weeks, and that provides me with a semi-distanced sense of belonging to a community, a sense of belonging that, unlike my Mt. Pleasant community, values me as a human and not as a person. whereas in Mt. Pleasant i am who i am, and i am expected to 'be' or 'do' according to others' perceptions of who i am, at church i am just a human, among other humans. it is refreshing and i feel no expectations on the part of the fellow churchgoers, i feel no sense of responsibility or owing. therapy is the same way. i pay with money and therefore owe nothing else. in other relationships there is a mutual obligation based on trust, love, support, etc. these are the most important things we have, but these are also burdensome and, at times of deep introspection, oppressive.
living with seven people is good and hard. living with seven people who are among your closest friends is better and harder. we all struggle in our own way to adapt, and the house feeling ebbs and flows. we are in a flow right now. the weather is perfect and we smell the freedom of summer approaching. the sun stays out late and i arrive home after work, 8.30pm, to find friends and neighbors in the backyard. road trips and camping trips approach.
i, however, have one more semester between then and now. for seven weeks i will be busier, and more weighed down with schoolwork, than i have been so far. in mid-June i will have patients, a relationship in which the burden of responsibility and obligation fall one-sidedly on me (perhaps the true source of my feelings). i have never been so excited for something yet feared it so much; i have never felt so naturally predisposed to be skilled at a task, yet also so deeply afraid to do it. to quote Dr. Zweig/Lowenstein: "yes, yes, it's all a rich tapestry" (Groening et al., circa 1993).

thursday morning

2007-10-18T15:21:00.001-07:00

i was moving my car from our parking spot in back to an unzoned street in our neighborhood when i heard police sirens and saw the cops coming up behind me. i wasnt sure why they had pulled me over, but i knew that a) my seatbelt was unbuckled, b) i had probably not completely stopped at that stop sign and c) i did not have my license on me.
obviously, i was upset. i was upset at myself for being so careless, for the fact that i even had to move the car in the first place...i had a whole day planned ahead of me and it was going to be ruined by a ticket, loss of cash, court date, points on my license, etc. if only i had left the house before i showered instead of afterwards, or turned right out of the alley instead of left, or registered my car weeks ago so i could park it anywhere....or even just stopped at the stop sign. argh.
a mosquito flew in my open window and i moved to strike it. i paused and realized that taking my anger out on the mosquito would do no good, and what i needed right now, in the moments as i waited for what would either be a set of asshole cops trying to bust my balls or some reasonable men willing to let me off with a warning, the last thing i needed right now was more bad karma. my mind thought of all the things i'd done wrong already today, the minor mistakes and personal flaws that put us in these situations, and the internal issues that make these situations so painful. i did not kill the mosquito. instead, i thought of the dalai lama, who i had seen speak the day before at the capitol, who, i had heard, was known to let mosquitos bite him from time to time, for it benefits them much more than it injures him. i decided to do the same.
the mosquito landed on my face and i brushed it away. not there, i said. it landed on my bicep and i watched it poke its nose around, looking for a good spot. i watched him penetrate the skin, his tiny needle burying itself in my muscle. it was nice to watch, to know what he was getting out of it. it did not hurt, i did not feel it, but it was also a freaky watching a needle go into your body. i blew him off after a few seconds, once i knew he had gotten his sustenance, once i could no longer stand to watch him eat me.
i used that situation to find calm, to find peace, to know that this moment, like any other moment, will come to pass. that this feeling of frustration, like any other feeling, will come to pass. i found calmness in my interaction with the mosquito and i chose to apply it to my interaction with the cops.
the cop came to the window and i immediately apologized for not having my ID. and i apologized for rolling through the stop sign. and i played the passive role, and i deferred on all accounts to his greatness and his dominance in the situation. he was nice enough about the situation and took my registration, along with my name, date of birth and social security number. he came back and said that it didnt come through, that my name was not in the system. i realized that they had probably checked with DC's license database, not maryland's, so i told them my license is from Maryland. i said that i had just moved to town. i offered to go to my house to get my ID. they rejected this offer for the first of many, many times.
they went away to try again, and nothing came through. there were three or four cops there, uniformed secret service agents to be precise. one of them was clearly being trained, and i could hear the others explaining to them what was going on and why it was happening. when they came back to me a third or fourth time, this time asking for my middle name and inquiring about past tickets, instances of DUIs, reasons why i wouldnt be in the database, etc., i could tell they were starting to get suspicious. naturally, i told them that i only live two blocks away, hence not having my ID on me, and that i'd be more than willing to go get it for them.
by this time the mosquito had set up camp near my feet and was feasting on my ankles. i was regretting many things at this moment. about 20 minutes had passed since they pulled me over and it didnt look like i was going to make my 11.30 meeting, so i asked if i could call to let them know. they asked me to step out of the vehicle and before i could make a phone call they had me handcuffed and were searching my body. they told me that driving without a license is grounds for being arrested. "isnt this a little absurd?" i asked the cops as they cuffed me. out here, on this quiet neighborhood street, a normal thursday morning, and me getting cuffed for not having my ID on my person. i think he agreed that it was a little absurd.
"you dont have a belt or shoelaces?" he pointed out. "nope" i said. "good, cause they dont let you wear a belt or shoelaces in the slammer." "why?" i asked, " you think i'm gonna hang myself for not having my ID on me?" arlo guthrie.
the agent asked me if there was anyone i could call who could go to my house and get the ID and bring it. by now the other secret service agents were calling for back-up. the sergeant showed up, and all of a sudden there were 6 secret service agents and 3 police cars. i told them that i work with secret service, that i had some buddies who are agents. "like who?" one of the agents asked. "um...in my phone there's a guy named Chip, an agent in San Francisco....let's give him a call..." the agent had lost interest. i didnt know anybody higher up the chain. Chip, rocks, by the way, and i wouldve loved to have given him a call. a really nice guy out of Petaluma. i told the agent that. by this time one of the agents and i had formed a pretty good rapport, and he offered to call my roommate, Abigail, and have her bring the ID to where we were. he even held the phone up to my ears. "umm...Abigail, uh...i'm actually in handcuffs right now....any chance you could swing by 1824 and pick up my ID and bring it over to Monroe Street?"
once i made the call they told me to get in the back seat of the police cruiser. "seriously?" i asked, " come on, you dont need me to get in there...it's such a nice day out here." i think my calmness was starting to have the appearance of insanity. i realized at this point that none of the agents believed that i actually had a valid driver's license. i overheard the one i like saying "you know, i actually kind of believe him." the other ones were more skeptical.
at this point i was scrunched in the back of the cruiser, my knees pinned against the driver's seat, still handcuffed with my arms behind my back. point of interest: did you know that cruisers have a hard plastic casing instead of a normal seat, and the casing is molded such that your arms have a spot to rest in. there is even a spot at the base of the seat for your cuffed hands. it's pretty sweet. except at this point my wrists were starting to hurt from the tightness of the handcuffs. i still have welts on my wrists.
i wondered whether it was possible that i didnt have an ID, in a kafka-esque kinda way. maybe i am not a licensed driver, maybe i do have something on my record, maybe i am exactly who they are looking for. it was a funny thought.
i decided to try the "work with secret service agents" line one more time. the asshole agent was reminding me that the situation was all my fault, when i told him that "i work with service, i get vetted all the time, my record is clean." using their lingo caught his attention for a second. "what do you do?" he asked. "i do presidential campaign work" i said, trying to avoid revealing my political stance. "but for who?" he responded. "i work for Obama" i said, loud enough that i thought the black sergeant might overhear me. if he did hear me, he did not care.
i still knew that i had a valid driver's license and that i was going to get out of this okay. the agents were getting antsy, as we had been there for over 40 minutes by then. "if she doesnt show up in 10 minutes we're gonna have to take you down to the 3rd district station." they said. i overheard one of them say to the trainee "you want to see someone get arrested, dont ya? i was screwed. i offered to walk to my house in the cuffs. while i was still enjoying the absurd nature of the event, i was starting to worry that abigail wouldnt get there in time. the sergeant left to go meet abigail at 1824, to wait for her there. they were really getting anxious now.
once they told me that she had arrived at 1824, i relaxed a bit. i small chatted with the nice agent, asking him about the job of secret service around here. i could once again appreciate them moment, and i wondered how it would transpire once they knew i was clean.
the call came through that i had a valid license and they let me get out of the cruiser. "you're free," they said, and i started to wonder whether they were going to bring up the whole running-a-stop-sign/no-license thing.
they had parked my car for me and they gave me back the keys and my cellphone. they apologized profusely and i really came to realize that they thought i was full of shit, that i had given them a fake name, that i wasnt a legal driver, and that i deserved to be arrested. i realized it must be extremely uncommon for one's name not to come up in the system.
the sergeant had returned from 1824 and had my license in his hand. he told me that i have to take abigail out to a nice dinner. i reached for the license. "i told her to give me a call if you dont take her out to dinner..." he smiled. at this point i had a wide smile, and was realizing that i was off the hook for the stop sign incident, the no license, the unbuckled seat belt.
the sergeant and the nice agent apologized once more. "no problem," i smiled, "this was a good life experience."
they looked at me like i was crazy.

Adjustments

2007-09-10T05:30:00.000-07:00

I just read Kyle's new blog and I'm struck numb. A photograph reminds my mind of an experience that somehow slipped through the cracks of memory, bookended by too much intensity to be fully remembered in its simplicity and comfort. A blue shirt shows me a piece of myself that has remained there, in that state, and with him. Words speak clearly to a past that has become a part of who we are and therefore go unspoken for years at a time. No longer 'a revelation', simply a 'part of us', or even, maybe, just 'us'. It's scary to remember things that are so true, pieces of the past that at one point were so important, such vital conscious tidbits of our development; and today, developed, they fade from consciousness, and we are better people as a result, as we've moved on to new challenges and new things to think about.
I had forgotten how hard freshman year was for Kyle, and perhaps I never really tied it directly to his being raised in a small town. We blamed his frustration on Markleyism, Long Island jews, capri pants and the greek system. Only today does it seem that it was really an adjustment period for Kyle, and it would've been hard for him pretty much regardless.

I'm tired all the time these days. I don't think it's a physical thing. I had a dream that felt like it summed it up pretty well, and I awoke feeling as though I had had many dreams with the same challenge. The challenge was that I was at the top of a large ladder or metal structure, way high up. I had to somehow manuever my body in such a way to get off of the structure and to a safer place. I think I was holding something, making the task that much more difficult. Naturally, I was terrified of falling.
There was somebody up there with me. I think the person was on the safer structure, and he or she was trying to help but it really wasn't helping all that much.

The overwhelming part of my life these days is, ironically, not the world of academia I've just entered. That part feels totally under control, despite the intimidation factor. The hard part is everything else: my social world, my sense of personal space, a feeling that the external world is grabbing at me, trying to take pieces of me for themselves.
In my quest to find balance I am distanced from a great many people. To be as open as I want to be towards my new classmates, to fully embrace a whole, new universe I must, to some extent, close myself off to my other worlds. I have become worse at returning phone calls, I have sought out solo-time and solo-space. I owe some people an apology. I need this, though. I'm sorry.

Kyle and I don't talk on the phone very often. Still, we've seen each other at least once each year since college, including a solid 10 days in Colorado this past August. It's remarkable, the effect on your inner self that spending time with people from the past can have...I need that in life.
Kyle almost died a year and a half year ago. He doesn't talk about it a whole lot, and I'm not even sure that he's comfortable with me writing it, but to me it's important. When I read his writings I see them as a version of reality; and I see that they could fade away like the images in Back to the Future. To go back in time and look forward to May 2006, it is not a fact that he will survive that incident. It is by chance that he is alive, and I see each moment I spend with him and each beautiful concept that he writes about as a bonus piece of life, an energy that could have just as easily not existed, or as an energy that could have just as easily manifested itself as a whole in my heart. Then I realize that all existence is this way, my own life as a lucky confluence of events that has somehow not yet killed me. Cereal tastes much better when you view each bowl as a fortunate set of circumstances based around the luck of not being dead.

I wept when I read Kyle's blog. I saw pieces of myself throughout, and to inspire and be inspired by one person is truly a beautiful relationship. In a sense, that is the goal of all relationships, and inspiration has become more and more in my life a defining feature of my closest relationships. I am honored and proud to be a part of his blog, and of him. He is one of the purest individuals I know. I aim someday to have the internal purity that he emanates without effort.

A side note: Food helps me realize: a brownie once showed me that time is finite, that there are only a limited number of brownies that I will eat between the time I am born and the time I die. This makes brownies taste much better.

Vipassana

2007-08-03T07:22:00.000-07:00

Someone may ask me what Vipassana was like. This is the best i can do for now:

Upon wake-up time, 4AM, the sky was dark, the air cool and clear. The twilight that remained until after bedtime had long passed and for the first time since the previous morning you saw true night. In the darkness there was a lack of vision, one that does not come at night, when the ideas are fresh. The air was cool, even cold, and the bite against your half-awake lips and cheeks was refreshing, sharp and simple. The skies clear overnight, showing you the stars in the morning, and the moon, which progressed from half to full as you did, peaking in size and clarity, quality and self-actualization around day 8, leaving no place to go but down in the last two days which, in itself, is also an important part of the process. To end on fullness would provide an inaccurate sense of reality, of how things really work.
Coming out of the morning sittings the dawn light had filled the camp. Clouds had yet to roll in, making for unimpressive sunrises. You could anticipate the moment where the sun would finally become individually visible over the high east ridge, and then it would come, shining direct rays on certain spots, by the bathrooms, on the backside of the dorms, a spot or two down by the meditation hall, but otherwise providing no sense of spirit in and of itself.
At this time of day, with the air still cool, the rays were beneficial, and could be used to shed the feeling of it not being right. The tall mountain grasses, paintbrushes for heads, would wake up with this light, and the spruce trees and the benches would offer more comforts, a spot for tea and rice cakes.
By the morning group sitting, the light was still low but less noticeably. The clouds at this time of day, small, wispy and low in numbers, were not white, and the sunrays were still yellow, but your thoughts were otherwise occupied. It wasn't until after the third morning sitting, just prior to lunch, that you would once again notice the world outside; the mind would stay in the meditation hall during your breaks. Even, in a moment of highness, of self, when you would feel and see the world around, the big spruce by the creek just outside the course boundaries, or the two-dimensional nature of the bushes that the benches faced, even then your mind was not fully outside.
After the third morning sitting, we would file out on by ourself, at our own pace and of our own volition. A moment of high, coming down from what was usually a good sitting, clarity and confusion combining with the knowledge that our one hot-cooked meal was not far away and that we had made it through another section of another day. The sun had managed to heat things up, and socks were no longer necessary. With a two-hour break ahead, the acts of stripping off your socks and actively strapping your sandals was well-worth the effort, and a feeling of long-termed-ness accompanied the act.
By lunch the sun had begun to heat the camp, but not so much that you weren't sure whether you needed a layer beyond your t-shirt and loose-fitting pants. The dining hall and meditation hall remained cool into these hours, not picking up steam until the mid-afternoon. On the gravel roads, however, pacing at this hour had an added element to the mental game that it already was.
Walking was an action in and of itself, one of the few separate actions that one could pursue. If you were walking out of excitement and clarity, your mind would smile at itself and your eyes would pick up on exciting tidbits of life. A rock to you would seem perfect, or funny, and it would walk with you for some time. It would provide you a way to stretch your back, or in your hand it would find a way to help you set a rhythm to your steps. The rocks were there the entire time, and if you set one down somewhere before lunch, it would be in the same place come the afternoon break. The stability was comforting. Several others picked up on these characteristics of these palm-sized rocks, and seeing another find the same essence there was reassuring to the self, and bordered on interaction, which was not wrong but was not right. If you set a group of rocks, each near-perfect in their own shape and way, on a concrete tablet, and a day later found that someone else had added to the collection, there was a sense of sharing, of interacting. Perhaps he had different goals, different reasons for choosing those clearly different rocks, reasons that could not be understood fully by another, but an understanding of a different kind was there.
The clouds that had rolled in harmlessly during the morning, puffy and white, amiable, began to change towards the end of the first afternoon sitting. A cloud above the ridge to the west that seemed to carry the same characteristics as its morningtime cousins also seemed to have a different essence, a different goal. The heat had begun to set in and the mind was affected. The early rumblings of thunder in the distance became an oasis in the mind. The heat was not intense yet, and would remain unable to harm until many hours later into the afternoon, but it was known that good storm would be a preemptive strike against the heat, which before the storm rolled in would remain the central reason for the desire.
When the storm came, it came hard. The lightning and its closeness, the strength of the thunder and directness with which it followed its causing bolt more often than not preceded the rain. There would be drops on the metal roof of the meditation hall, and one would perk up in one's seat, excitedly anticipating. From inside you could not see the flashes and would have no warning of the thunder. If you were outside, however, you may have thought that knowing the cause-effect of these two forces may prepare you for the noise, the blast that was often shockingly loud, shockingly close, even if the rain had barely begun to fall or if the last bolt seemed to strike down miles away. Even these steps of preparation would not prepare you for them, and you would jump. Outside these jumps were funny but scary. Inside, in a sitting, even a cough or loud sniffle could make your mind flicker in an obtrusive way, yet the thunder and all its comparative force could not inflict much more than the slightest noise. The outside world was all one slice of the mind, it all came in through the same door, and, whether it be big or small, loud or quiet, it could only have so strong an effect on the mind.
When the thunderstorms manifested themselves in their fullest form, vivid bolts of lightning, crashing thunder, sheets of rain, the effect was heaviest. Inside the hall the storm outside would provide a sense of depth and intensity, a sense that we were doing something meaningful. Outside the hall, standing in the doorway of our camp-style dorm room, getting sprayed with mist, water in a drainage ditch rushing by, it was entertainment, a distraction, something to see, to feel, to relate to. The storms would come just at the right time of day, the time when nothing else seemed to be going right. The post-lunch heaviness and the body buzz that accompanied this all-too-comforting act of indulging oneself in the physical had subsided. A gluttonous lunch was the one chance of the day to feel something familiar, and we took advantage, not caring that it would ruin our first afternoon sitting, simply because it felt too good. But with that feeling gone, and the hours of meditation that lay ahead between now and the next familiar act, a lull had set in. A lull in the body and a lull in the mind, which came in form of a cloudy head, unclear thoughts, confusion, a sense that this was somehow just not working out. And when the storms came in you understood them, their anger and frustration, and they took actions when you were not allowed to. You not only respected them for that, you were grateful to them for showing you that, although you were in a world in which you could not, it was still possible to do so, with force and honesty, with no regard for silence or composure. The storms released all that you could not.
By late afternoon, during the snacks of fruit and tea, the storms had usually subsided and a sense that the day was mostly over came across the camp. If sunlight shone, it shone through the remaining clouds, still dark yet somehow benevolent, satisfied with what they had accomplished they seemed only to want to stick around. We welcomed them and, now with the cooler temperatures, also welcomed the sun to shine between them. All was well now. We had gotten through the harder parts of the day; the heat, with nothing seemed to go right and the thoughts would weigh down on your shoulders like the beating sun; the storms when it finally came out and did what had to be done, said what had to be said; and the interval in between where the mind did not understand how any of this was going to work itself out. Now it was simple, and clear, and calm, and easy. How had we not seen this before?
The camp was on a slope, built on the western foothills of the Rockies. Snow-capped mountains were a distant sight if barely that, and the rolling ridges of the dry countryside were green because of pine trees and brush. Facing east there was a river in the small but sharply cut valley below. Only 30 feet down and 20 feet away, the river was barely visible from only a couple different spots on the edge of the course boundaries. They did not provide us that luxury. The sound was there, that they could not take away, and the rushing water made us wish we could sit by its side. The truths that a river can teach were familiar to us, and this river fell quickly, passed over rocks loudly, and we knew that to sit on its bank would provide respite from the mind, but we could not.
On the other side of the camp, the west side, the big spruce that stood tall 25 feet from the posted boundary line was visible trunk-to-top from the trailhead that lead to it, the point near the meditation hall benches where we gathered in our highs and in our confusion. On the first day, before the rules came into effect, I had explored this area, the spruce tree, and found that beneath it, like many large trees, there was a clear space that the tree had claimed for itself, no bushes, no brush, not even any low-hanging limbs. It was for sitting, said the spruce tree. It was not for us, said the regulations. Perhaps it would've been better not to know it was there.
Alongside the big spruce was a stream, and a small footbridge, maybe 12 feet across, that led to a stone bench set between two trees on a minor uprising in the ground. It was shady and cool back there, and upon seeing it on the first day I considered that this may be my place, to steal away and be alone, and that no one else would know about it or our affair. This did not come to pass. It felt oppressive, the rules that kept us from seeing the river or the stream, and it seemed purposeful that they would keep from us these gifts, these potential external sources. It was sad at the time.
The slope of the foothill that the camp lay aimed west. We would gather there before and after our evening sittings to watch the sun play in the clouds and the green ridges behind it, two small rock faces exposed on the otherwise vast expanse of earth and trees. At times we stood as trees, all facing westward, and shared all that we could not share otherwise: a moment when each persons' head is, to some extent, focused on the same simple thing in the same clear way. By comparison it made the dhamma talks seems complex, yet at the same time it gave them a simple clarity, a sense of truth that manifests itself naturally on a continual basis in innumerable ways, if only we had the time, energy and mental space to see it. At these moments, as the sun dropped behind the western ridge and the clouds remained dappled with pink and purple light, our purpose was clear, our reason for being there obvious, and our sense that we could carry this with us beaming.
Directly prior to the last sitting of the day the light had become minimal. Only a few clouds had subtle pastel colorings. A bunny rabbit roamed the grounds nightly and seemed unfettered by our presence. When deer were around, they also did not move quickly as we approached. The moon rose on the east and somehow, at this time, as twilight dwindled, with the moon there remained very few yet somehow sharp strokes of pink and orange. Even with a sky full of clouds, a grayish white above and only light color to the west, these high puffs to the east maintained brightness. There was variation up there, high above our heads, so high above that we could not tell that these clouds were not all at the same altitude. What seemed to us like a two-dimensional mass of clouds was now clearly something very different. The thick clouds directly above us must be lower, otherwise how could the rays of light bypass them and shine on the eastern clouds. There was a depth to the sky that our vision could not have otherwise understood. To know that there were truths that our senses could not understand, a physical fact that our eyes could not see, seemed to open up a world of possibilities. A number of facts that portrayed themselves as truths faded away. Reality set in, and the new-found ignorance of the reality was liberating.
The last sitting of the day ended and we would be told to take rest. The words "good night" echoed in our minds, the only other place they were allowed, as we gently moved up the hill towards the dorms. The moon shone firmly, sharply, despite the last phases of twilight that hung on, and the earth smelled of calm. In bed we found comfort, simplicity and the feeling of having made it through another day felt like an accomplishment. We slept well, generally, and cool mountain air moved freely through our rooms, the doors left wide open. We would smile at ourselves, at the comfort of our sleeping bags, the freedom of allowing oneself the luxury of thinking about whatever one's mind chooses to think about.

to the mountains...

2007-07-19T07:23:00.000-07:00

i'm going into the mountains soon, with some very specific goals. i am intimidated by what is coming in a way that i have not felt in some time, and i look forward to that.
i wrote once about fear in such a way that one could say, "yes, i am afraid", and that could be true, or the same person could say, "no, i am not afraid, not really..." and that could be equally true, and that they are only different versions of one's self and one's feelings. neither are lies, and in neither is one necessarily lying to one's self either. they are just different values on a number line that really only expresses itself in a binary form.
today i am not here to write about fear, or even about truth. i'm here to write about Vipassana, why i'm doing it, what i hope to get out of it, how i hope to have it change my way of being.
starting on Sunday i will be in the mountains of Colorado learning the Vipassana meditation technique. for 10 days i will remain silent and hopefully focused on the goals of the technique. i foresee in me some challenges that i would like to address so that i may understand them more clearly.
a friend of mine who has studied the technique to a great extent (two three-month stints) asked me this: "are you very hard on yourself?" i understood her point immediately; that if you are, dealing with the tough moments that come as a result of living solely inside your own head for ten days could be difficult. when your mind steps in and interrupts your attempts at meditation for the hundredth time, will you be frustrated at yourself, or will you kindly, and without judgement, simply ask your mind to exit?
am i hard on myself? in some ways, yes. i pay a lot of attention to what goes on inside my head and heart, and i do judge it; i try to keep myself in check. but at the end of the day i am proud of myself and i do let myself be myself. i let myself make poor decisions for the sake of ego. i let my ego run free sometimes.
and this is what i really want to write about: i want you to know why i am really doing this course.
i am doing it to distance myself from one world and reconnect with another. i have had an incredibly successful time since i left my job in December. grad school interviews went well and, although i was tested, i ended up getting what i wanted. the campaign tested me too. i had to play the role of the assistant, be treated with less than the full respect i prefer, but in the end i was given the opportunity to have control, to be in charge, and i have succeeded in that, and my pride has grown, both in a positive sense and a negative sense.
the campaign world is a world in which the strongest version of oneself must be presented. to show power, control, self-assuredness is to receive respect, to be treated as though you have power, control and self-assuredness. and thus begins the cycle. at first you pretend you know what you're doing, and people respond by assuming that you do; and when you succeed, all of a sudden it is no longer an act, it is only you. the part of you that doubted, that wasnt sure, that maintained humility, has now faded, and only the proudest, strongest version of your self remains. and the world of the campaign rewards this. it rewards the ego. the cycle continues and the ego gains momentum.
the ego will continue gaining momentum until something happens, which it invariably does, that somehow takes a knock at the ego. your hubris gets you into trouble at an event and you get scolded by a superior, you get rejected by a girl, you get turned down at a job application...these things hurt, yes, and they should. but the problem is that they hurt even more because they are chipping away at your ego. they do not hurt so much in themselves, but they hurt because they do no align themselves with the way that you view yourself. there is dissonance between your own self-perception and reality. and once you see a gap there, once you know that your own self-perception is not the exact same as reality, your entire self is called into question.
it is harsh in me because i see it in myself. i see it so much that i even talk about it, write about it, joke about it. my ego, for me, is a separate entity with its own personality, its own tendencies. i am not the only one. it is a problem for people of our culture, a culture that, on the whole, rewards such egos. this is America.
but i have chosen to avoid this. i am no ascetic, i have not rejected the material world for a life of the cloth. but i am not going to business school, law school, or vying for a job in the White House either. i am choosing to work in a world that focuses on other things, things that, in reality, may actually make me more of an egoist at the end of the day, but in a different way from the K Street/Capitol Hill egoists, and i am proud of that.
but this is a balancing act for all of us. and in this balancing act for me there must be this choice, this space for me to back away from everything i've done for the past 9 months and recognize which parts of it are for me to take with me and which parts are for me to leave behind, to have as a part of the past, of memory. i am proud of things i've done and i am ashamed of things i've done. i have made decisions based not on true feelings, on the seeking of truth, but for self-aggrandizement. and the inverse reaction of this is that when nature's path leads to the natural chain of events, the events that do not align themselves with one's self-aggrandizement, it feels like an attack at the ego, which it is only because the ego is not trying to follow the natural path, but instead is trying to find the quickest route to the highest point, to look over the sea of people below and be looked at by them, be seen high above, arms raised in a V.
i can apologize for this but it wont mean shit. i'm not even sure what specifically i would be sorry about...speaking mostly in allegorical terms at this point.

i know that there are answers, and i also know that, at the end of the day, i will find those answers. i know that they involve adjustment and alignment. the ego adjusts to counteract the feelings of shame associated with self-aggrandizement, and as a result it can align itself more smoothly with reality. and this is all a process. i will have to do it all over again many times over the course of my life, sometimes in more life-shifting ways than others. in little ways i do it everyday. now that i feel more done with the campaign, i suppose i can start shifting the pendulum back this way, towards the mountains, with Vipassana as its guide.
it will be a shock to the system, though. living in comfort these past several months has altered me. in a classy hotel room with a comfortable bed high above downtown Oakland, views of San Francisco across the bay, i bitched about slow internet. i was rude to the hotel staff and was frustrated when it didnt work smoothly on the first try. in New Orleans i struggled to adapt to my sister's air conditioning-less flat. rental cars and hotel rooms, airports and my parents' house. the comforts have become the norm and, at times, i have become to accostumed to them. it is time to reconnect with the other side. i haven't slept in a tent in over a year. i have lost touch with that side of me. this is what i have lost by not choosing to travel abroad. i have no regrets, but i am sorry.

San Francisco highlight

2007-06-20T07:40:00.001-07:00

There were many highlights of my trip to San Francisco, no small number of which took place the day of Shira & Dan's wedding. I suppose I was able to write about this one because it was simple, and not all-encompassing or life-adjusting like the wedding or the feelings surrounding my time spent with my Cambridge boys or the other UofM folks I had not seen in years.

This one is for Teddy Martens, for his appreciation of my writing and his encouragement of it, but also for his love of music:
Latenight at the bustling sushi joint on Mason Street, a rock band arrives having finished their night's gig. "Where should we set up?" they joke as they stash their instruments alongside their table. A guy with straggly black hair takes a seat at the mini-grand piano that somehow previously went unnoticed in the notably cramped basement sushi shop. He begins to play a heart-wrenching tune that aligns itself smoothly with our high, our beer, and our deep-fried unagi.
The place is packed and rowdy despite the face that it is well-past midnight on a Wednesday night. The crowd responds positively to the man's impromptu song, so he plays another one, also well-received. Then he takes a seat at the table alongside his bandmates and their girlfriends as their sushi arrives.
Ten minutes pass before the man retakes his position at the piano. This time his bandmates also stand up, remove two guitars from their cases, and begin to wail. A girl has joined the lead vocalist; one can tell by her confidence that she is not a regular in the band. She does well, lacking composure more than talent. I glance over to their table, now empty but for one man, the drummer, who has managed to set the beat using his chopsticks. The table provides one tone, the candle-holder another, and his glass of water a third. He clearly knows what he is doing, as the wooden sticks follow the melody perfectly or, should I say, the melody follows the sticks perfectly.
He looks up at me and smiles, and keeps looking at me, grin widening, even after I return his smile. We see that something magical has broken out here, and, in this town, it does not feel like a rare occurrence.
After the performance, the waitress offers them saki, shouting to them from across the room. The band has returned to their table and the other patrons to their conversations.

Obama for America

2007-06-05T19:03:00.001-07:00

I've been out on the road doing this type of work for several months now. With my experience in the '04 campaign and 5 or 6 trips already under my belt here in '07, I was getting tired of the small sites I was in charge of: a 300-person closed-press luncheon, a speech at a pre-set annual dinner, a house party....

Important things

2007-04-16T10:39:00.000-07:00

I haven't written for a long time, since January in fact. It hasn't been because I haven't wanted to, that I havent had experiences worth sharing, or that I havent wanted to share. Nor was it that i didnt have the time. It was that i didnt have the information that mattered to me. i was buried in doubt, up to my neck in question marks. my future was uncertain, and it paralyzed more than even i realized at the time.
the last three weeks were especially hard. my whole family, lasitha and catie included, were at 6600 the day i heard back from grad schools. i had already gotten into Maryland, which surprised me b/c i thought that they knew that the program just wasnt right for me. it was a Marriage & Family Therapy program, a Master's degree, which would provide me the skills and rights to function as a therapist, but not be a psychologist, not to officially diagnose or treat severe mental health issues, not to perform psychotherapy and, perhaps most importantly, perhaps least importantly, not to BE a psychologist.
when i was ten years old i used to say i wanted to be a psychologist. is that normal for a ten year-old to say? did i even know what a psychologist was? i remember Alan Thicke's character on Growing Pains, (or, the celebrity i most resemble vibewise, the dad on Family Ties---was he a psychologist too? perhaps not). i remember the leather couches, no back on one side. something about those couches, that lifestyle, that job, called out to me from the beginning.
people who saw me develop during the college years can most clearly understand how the field of psychology came to call me. weeknights freshman year consitently showed the two Michaels parts of themselves they had not yet understood; ephiphanies abounded. he taught me and i taught him. i had been through difficult times in high school and only active, directed, conscious growth would help me actualize myself. this included adjusting my perception of myself, with confidence in myself and trust in others. it took time but i learned. psychology i believe is best suited for those who have actually seen themselves change, for we must believe that change is possible. i thank adam denenberg and michael ellman, along with countless others, for this gift.
my teaching him also pushed me towards psychology, for i changed him too. i showed him introspection. i taught him the game of trying to understand one's self. i learned that i have a skill; i believe it is my greatest skill.
sophomore year was a flood of ideas. we searched for answers everywhere and found answers in even more places. strong personalities, extreme people with brilliant minds, and a fondness for utilizing those minds on themes more important than academics, showed me much. i still look back on that age as the peak of ______. there is one photo i have that sums it up pretty well. seven of us on the stoop of 1315. a moment. in pictures at that age we begin to look like younger versions of our older selves...pictures that we knew, even at the time, that our children would see of us and think of us as grown-ups but know that we were young. it's funny, that unspoken moment where you become a grown-up.

i got into Maryland. i was feeling confident about GWU and the Wright Institute. it would all come down to one day--March 26th. i had just gotten back from a magical weekend at 'the cabin'. happiness and love, freedom and music, fresh back from my weeks on the west coast, new hampshire for my first Obama trip.
the night of the 25th i dreamt rejection. i had tried to convince myself that it wasnt a sure thing, that i might not get in, just in case, to soften the blow. i dreamt it so clearly that i woke up reeling. i knew it was just a dream, but it felt so real that i believed it would become true.
an hour or so later i got my Waitlisted email from GW---the school i really wanted, close to home, a bike ride from Mt Pleasant, my parents, my friends, my sister, my dogs, my life. i was hurt. i went into the family room and told becca and mom. i had tears. "i just wanted it so much" i said. they were supportive, but sad for me, sad for themselves.
an hour or so later i heard back from the Wright Institute. i was shocked, but their rejection was a relief. it meant i would stay in or around DC, that i was an east-coaster again, that i would stay near home. i told my mother and she cried "i didnt want you to go to Berkeley...i knew you wouldve had to, but it wouldve been so hard." we were relieved.
the next week was really hard. not only did i have to deal with the waitlist issue and pressure from Maryland to make a decision, but i had to adjust the image inside myself and of myself that i was going to be a psychologist. that was possibly the hardest part of the ordeal---the fact that this tiny difference was going to not only affect the rest of my career path, my life, etc., but that it would also affect who i am, what i am. it was nearly unmanagable.
the pro and con of the week was that my whole family was there. they were supportive, but the week was challenging. i felt as though i was never quite there, as if, even in the shining moments, a dark cloud hung above my head, a black cloud buried in the pit of my stomach. i hurt.
by friday of that week Maryland demanded an answer. i had no choice but to accept. the night before i accepted i lay in bed thinking about what i would do as a therapist, who i would be, and the fact that by accepting i would be releasing the dream of ever being a psychologist. it's difficult to explain the practical difference between these two professional fields, but there is a difference at the very core of their understanding of what "the self" really is, and i wanted to view things psychologically, work with selves from that perspective, and i was losing this. on this night i knew that i was effectively killing this dream of mine. as i fell asleep that night i knew it was wrong, and felt as though i shouldnt do it.
the next day i had no choice but to accept Maryland's offer. partly due to financial pressures they were putting on me in terms of their offer, partly because i simply needed the security of knowing i was going to study somewhere. it did not feel right, but once i accepted i was able to forget about the situation, to an extent, and enjoy my last two days at home before heading off to Iowa. we threw a party for Dan & Catie, my friends catered the event. faces from my entire history appeared. it was less difficult to talk about Maryland, the MFT, the waitlist, than i wouldve expected. i was beginning to accept my situation.
the next day i left my house. i said goodbye to my family and i looked into Lasitha's eyes as i walked out and asked if i would ever see him again. he is going back home soon, to Sri Lanka, for-possibly-ever. i am happy for him, sad for me. he is a remarkable person. we are lucky to have had him in our family, in this golden age of our family. he will be missed.
Iowa provided me respite from the graduate school process. it was a week of campaign work, flying high, taking care of business, feeling good about the campaign. thoughts of staying on, working for the senator for the next year and a half, were present. the events went swimmingly and the buzz of the positive energy, the feeling that he is the answer to our country's problems, and the idea that i could be involved in that sucked me in.
i had been slated for a trip to South Carolina that would start two days after the Iowa events. they were going to send me home in between, but i worked things out such that i could spend 36 hours in Chicago rather than heading home. i would see Ellman, Mason, Scotty et Al. there was to be a campaign party in Lincoln Park. it was all set. on the drive to the airport i spoke to my mother. mildly hungover but still buzzed from the previous day's event and the trip to Chicago, my mom and i spoke about Maryland, about the MFT, about options. i was immediately shocked back to reality. i had been floating in this distant land, a land where my real life could not reach me, where my tasks were of the greatest short-term importance but of none whatsoever thereafter. we build a site with great time pressure, we form intense bonds in a matter of hours, we love our volunteers and fall in love with our site contacts. over late dinners and long drives we learn to trust our teammates. when the sh*t goes down on gameday we are there for one another. only we know that bond, and the intensity of knowing that wheels are down. we thrive on it. and we are addicted to it. those who have real jobs struggle to re-enter their lives after an event. where's the thrill? they wonder. when can i go out on the road again? they ask their bosses. can i quit my job? they secretly ponder. advance is _______.

i didnt go to Chicago. blame the airlines, blame TSA regulations, blame the ticket-nazis behind the counter at American Airlines, blame myself and my hubris. i didnt go. i was devastated. but i was tired. and i was unhealthy at the very core of my being. things werent right. decisions were hard to make, and i knew what the root of the problem was. i was not stable. i went home in an attempt to regain some stability; 36 hours at my parents house, a good night of sleep. i watched the movie "Castaway". it helped. i understood it differently. i realize that he did not escape that island without losing something along the way. i'm not sure whether he would've kept it had he not lost his friend, but when the ball floated away a piece of himself also left. something there made sense to me.

i left Monday morning to South Carolina. i arrived happy. the sun was shining and it was warm. green trees, blue skies, the way April should be. i hadnt heard from GW and knew that my chances were minimal. i had given up on it.
i called a family friend, an MFT, to discuss the degree. he had his doubts. he wishes he had gotten the doctorate. it hurt to hear that. most MFTs i had spoken to were more optimistic, thought that if i wanted to do therapy that the degree was a fine option. i sank more into the thought of sticking with the Obama campaign. i knew it wasnt right, but it was damage control time. i could not let myself go after a degree i wasnt sure i wanted. i could not take the path of least resistance simply out of fear, out of decisions made. i had to consider my options. even when you dont have any options, you still have some options, right? i did. many options--apply to PsyD schools that still accept applications, wait a year and apply again, go for the MSW/MBA combination. many options. i didnt like any of them, but at least they were plentiful.
it was one of the hardest weeks of my life. i did not sleep well. my dreams were disturbing; not as though they were directly related to graduate school, nor were they nightmares. simply that i would wake up each morning and feel perturbed by what my mind had chosen to show me the night before. i was tired everyday. i felt as though i was, in my own way, depressed. why was it hitting me harder this week versus the others? was it because this was the last possible week of hearing back from GW, because i knew that the day of reckoning was the 16th and that, since i hadnt heard yet, only bad news was on its way? was it because complications lied also within my main means of support for that week? was it because i was losing steam for the campaign work? i didnt really know.
on Monday afternoon i jumped in the hotel pool and tried to stay under water as long as i could. i looked up through the water at the sunlight glimmering through. there was no noise down there. my body sank heavily, my limbs weighty. i swam hard for 20 minutes, doing frantic and angry laps in the small pool. i felt better with the exercise. i did flips underwater and tried to be a seal. seals dont have to worry about much, i thought.

Wednesday and Thursday were the toughest. i grappled with confusing feelings and held a general heaviness in my body. Friday, gameday, was better. the thrill of the event sucked me in, at least for the most part. i knew GW was over. i had sent the director an email Thursday morning, mentioning that i still had high hopes despite the miniscule probabilities, and that i would appreciate any thoughts on how to improve my application should i choose to wait and apply again next year. she hadnt responded. it was over.

the event went well, and afterwards i was back to normal. no post-gameday buzz like last time. i was heavy again. i napped, as i always do once the senator leaves. i woke up heavy, as i always do from long naps. we hit up the grocery store for dinner food and to buy some booze for the wheels up party. all the women on our trip had gone with the senator to Columbia and would not be back til later. back at the room we ate food, got started on our Southpaw Lights and watched The Wonder Years (yes, the show is finally back on the air...see me for details). At 11pm i checked my email. i was in shock. i had gotten in to GW. 10:16 on a Friday night she writes me to offer me a position. i called my parents, tears in my eyes. my mother, who was half asleep minutes before, was now dancing around her bedroom. we were joyous.

i began to take off my socks before i got off the phone with them. i knew i needed two things: to be alone and to be clothes-less. i put on my bathing suit and ran down to the pool. in the cold, dark air i sat alone poolside in our mini-mall in Florence, SC. there i wept. i wept because i had gotten what i wanted. even i had no idea how badly i had wanted it. i had wanted it so badly that it hurt to want it. i had wanted it so badly that now that i had it, it hurt to have it. it hurt in a good way now. i wept for the love and support i had gotten from my family & friends, for happiness that my mother now felt for me, for the future of living in Mt Pleasant and riding my bike to Foggy Bottom, living my life in my city. i wept for me and my hubris and my humility, for the lessons i had learned and who i want to be and how now i get to be it. i wept dryly and harshly and my insides were strained and rough and i didnt care.
once i had tried to contact my siblings i decided i needed to jump in the pool. i stood on the edge where days before i had leaned in the afternoon sun, exasperated, not from the sun but from myself. i was alone. i jumped in the pool and did not float and did not sink. my body was weightless to me and my mind was free. i did not swim or spring, i did not do flips. i just was there, in the pool, alone, tired and happy.

Dusk in Hojancha

2007-01-31T06:04:00.000-08:00

This is an excerpt from BlueZones.com trip leader Dan Buettner:
It's 6:00 pm now and this is a magical time in Nicoya. I'm sitting on second floor deck of our bunkhouse. It's a place that looks a bit like a tree house with long pole railings, expedition chairs and lizards skittering over creaky floor planks. It's very calm. Soft light sifts through palm and mango trees overhead. This is the dry season, so the afternoon's heat quickly radiates skyward with the receding sun leaving and invigorating evening coolness. Our jungle lodge, completely filled by our 13-member team, sits on the edge of Hojancha--a typical northern Cost Rican village. Every morning, the jaguar-like roar of howler monkeys wakes us up. Now, I hear only the lugubrious whine of a million cicadas and the tinny, polka-like wail of musica ranchera from some faraway radio.

About this time every night a certain holy chaos erupts. All day the writers, photographers, and videographers have been chasing down stories, trying to find living examples of the longevity secrets our scientists are uncovering. In a few minutes, we'll eat a dinner of beans, rice, fried bananas, and river fish--all washed down with seedy, mucous-like passion fruit juice. Then, 13 lap tops will open, the naked light bulb overhead will dim with the power drain and we'll become a mobile production house. Joseph, Tom and Damian will edit videos, Sabriya, Eliza, Michael and I will write scripts and dispatches, Gianluca will edit photos, Michel, Gianni--and Dr. Elizabeth Lopez, a new psychologist who just volunteered for our team-- will compile results of today's surveys and Nick will gather up all the content and upload it to the site by 4:00 am. Then we'll slump into our bunks until the monkeys begin howling at dawn.

Tree houses, Rodeos and Centenarians

2007-01-29T07:24:00.001-08:00

The Blue Zones www.bluezones.com website is up and running. I've been in charge of the Mystery Photo and Daily Data sections...other than that I've been doing direct interviews with the centenarians and
nonegenarians (age 90+) which has been pretty cool. These are some
phenomenally happy people. The guy we hung out with yesterday lives about 30 minutes from the nearest paved road, up in the hills above Nicoya town, with his wife, daughter and grandchildren. He never went to school, doing agricultural work his whole life. I was amazed how well he and I could understand each other, how well jokes flowed
between us.
We're staying at this great lodge that feels like home just outside
this small village called Hojancha that has a central park painted in
pastel colors. There is a rodeo/festival that has been going on near
here and I've been lucky to end up there the past two evenings. The
first night I was there with the photographer and a video guy. We got
into the lower level (directly behind the barrier on which all the
young men sit). When they went to shoot I climbed up alongside the
young men. See the photo attached or my blog. First they were doing
barrel races, then bucking broncos, and then the bulls. A 5 year-old
girl competed in the barrel race. I went up to the bleachers and made
friends with the ticket checker. The next night I went there she let
me and my crew in for free.
The crew is pretty cool. Good bonding situation. Every night we hang
up a sheet and show the video for the next day. Several american
video guys and journalists, the trip leader and his brother, an
Italian medical expert who studies longevity, a Belgian demographer
and an Italian NG photographer. We also have a Tico liason who works for the demographer here in CR. The science behind the trip is moving along slowly. The journalism side is moving quickly. Its an
interesting dynamic. One side is always pulling at the other.
The tree house at Tommy's farm is unreal. It's built straight up this
tree that hangs over the side of the hill, about 60 feet high. Three
walls, mostly windows. The side facing the central valley is open.
The view is so complete. You can see every piece of the central
valley. It was so beautiful to see it, so shockingly full of all the
moments and feelings I've had about being back in this country, that
when I looked up after ascending the first staircase my knees buckled
and my head had no choice but to look away. I dont know if a view has ever affected me so strongly. It took minutes for me to be able to actually look up, stealing only glances at first. I stayed behind to
be there alone and saw the sunset from my spot curled up in the bed up there.
There is a full bathroom up there too. No door to the bathroom
though, open faced, exposed to the distanced central valley. The
shower is encased in glass too. The view will be enjoyed there too. I
plan on spending the better part of several days up in that tree once
the Blue Zones trip is over.

Fear of flying

2007-01-28T05:44:00.000-08:00

I've never identified myself as a person afraid of flying; so far from me that i made effort to separate myself even further from those people.
Up high above an endless field of thick clouds, one solid mass, I see in the distance a tiny version of an airplane. It seems like it's only a couple hundred feet away, yet it's barely visible. I imagine the hundred-some people inside, the massive force that the steel structure appears to be to them, to those insde, those reliant on this object for protection.
I am humbled.
Humbled by clouds, by sheer mass and the realization of tiny-ness.
My heart soars as I struggle to maintain visual contact with the plane in the distance as it slides smoothly over the sea of clouds. I am one with the thrill of flying, I am shedding the unimaginableyet common feeling that views flying as a chore, an efficient mode of transport, a wasted day. I am returning to the root of it, the magic of it, the gratefulness for my life and my world.
And I feel connected with those who fear flying: at least they tap into the reality of the experience, avoiding the numbness that modern-day life has instilled in us. At least they realize what our bodies are physically doing, experiencing, where we are, the height of it, the speed, the celestial nature of it all.

The Wedding

2007-01-16T20:51:00.000-08:00

Back in DC

2007-01-08T08:25:00.000-08:00

This picture is from the beach that leads from Tel Aviv to Jaffa, the ancient Arab port of which Tel Aviv was meant to be the Jewish version.

I'm back in DC. On Wednesday I head west to Los Angeles where I will be serving as best man at my brother's fiancee's wedding and shortstop at my brother's wedding softball tournament. Good times will be had.
The following Wednesday I head south to Costa Rica were I will be serving as Producer on the Blue Zones exploration of centenarianism (www.bluezones.com ---check it out). I will be in Costa Rica until early March, at which point I hope to interview for grad school and throw some ragers in the DC area. Sweet joblessness.

Check out my autobiography for the Blue Zones trip:
Accomplishments:
Michael Mintz, Producer
-has travelled in six of seven continents
-speaks fluent Spanish
-successfully filled an entire US Passport (requiring that new pages be added)
-was once in a room with four living US Presidents
-won High School County Championship in Volleyball (and made All-County team)
-graduated from University of Michigan with a degree in Psychology
-worked on Kerry/Edwards 2004 campaign as Advance Staff
-lived and worked in Costa Rica from December 2002-May 2004
-has travelled in 35 foreign countries
-slept in over 135 different beds over the course of May 2004-May 2005
-founded the philosophy/travel website www.ienjoysneezing.com (now ienjoysneezing.blogspot.com)

Biography:
As a kid I was mostly into playing sports with my friends. I always said that I wanted to be a psychologist when I grow up. I wasn't much of an explorer.
The first exploration I remember took place when I was around seven years-old. My older brother and his friends were planning on heading into the woods behind my house to find the abandoned (and supposedly haunted) house deep in the forest. I begged them to let me come along. The house had been destroyed in a fire many years before and my brother told me that the ghost of the witch who had lived there still haunted the premises. I was scared out of my mind.

When I was a kid I hated having to change my clothes with the turn of the seasons. In the fall, when the weather turned cold, my mother would force me to wear long pants instead of shorts. I always said that I didn't like the feeling of the pants. In the spring, my mother and I would have the exact opposite fight: I always refused to start wearing shorts again, claiming that shorts didn't feel right.

It wasn't until I went to Spain at age 20 to study the country, the language and the culture that I became interested in travelling abroad. I have spent more than three out of the last six years out of the country and I believe that it has shaped me into who I am today. I have learned that the society that I grew up in is just one of the infinite realities that exist on our planet. I have learned that even though there are a six billion people on Earth with six billion different lives, there are certain pieces of life that all people share. I have learned to be patient, to trust the righteous path, to trust myself and my choices. I have learned when to swim with the current and when to swim against it. I have put myself in difficult situations, mild danger and physical discomfort. The more I challenge myself through travelling, the more I appreciate the warm comfort of coming home---the familiar faces, my family and friends, the food I grew up eating, and, perhaps most of all, my bed.

Despite all I've experienced and learned in the past 20 years, despite the physical discomfort I've put myself through on my travels, the 30-hour chicken bus rides through mountainous northern India, the extreme heat of New Delhi in May, and the insatiable hunger that two months of eating noodles left in my meat-deprived stomach during my time in Asia, some things never change. To this day I struggle with pants. Yes...PANTS. I tend to find a pair of pants that I really love and wear them everyday for 6 months, maybe a year, until they fade away and die. I struggle to adjust when I lose a pair of pants to the gods of wear and tear. I mourn the loss. Then, some day not to long after, I find a new pair of pants, which I will undoubtedly wear for the next 6-12 months. Also, I haven't worn jeans since the early 1990's. I tried a pair on at the Gap a few weeks ago. It was repulsive.

My point is this: after all I've experienced, all I've learned, there are certain pieces of our personality that will never change. And that sums me up pretty well. I put myself in tough situations, I challenge myself to adjust, to change, to become a better person. But there are certain parts of me that are simply me. That's Michael.

Bethlehem

2007-01-01T10:48:00.000-08:00

on Christmas Day 2006 i had the single most _____ experience of my life.
the taglit trip ended at 8AM in the Tel Aviv airport. a bunch of us headed for Jerusalem where i met up with my israeli buddy and left the others to their hostel. we made plans to meet up in Bethlehem, a short busride via the Arab bus system through the West Bank to the edge of the city which, like all Palestinian cities, is surrounded by a 30 foot high concrete wall. from there you pass through the double checkpoint and walk 25 minutes through the recently destroyed Arab city towards downtown Bethlehem.
My birthright friends had made the plans; i really had no clue what the goal was, what we were aiming to see, where i was headed as i weaved through the razor-wire fences and massive metal turnstyles of security.
i was happy to be alone, finally, after 10 straight days of zero freedom, obligated everything, very little breathing room, virtually no solo experiences. it had gotten to the point that i simply could not enjoy a moment alone. the extremity of the group-oriented nature of the trip had affected so deeply my core that on the one occassion i walked off alone on the beach of the red sea to enjoy the sunset i only minutes later returned after having the feeling/thought: "i wonder what the others are doing...i desire to share this moment with them." it was not bad. i'm proud that i so smoothly adapted to the nature of the trip and so thoroughly integrated myself into the social and spiritual aspects of the community.
i was however, overcome by the feeling of travelling once i gave the drive the 3.5 shekels and found myself without a friend on the Arab bus that travels the six miles from the Damascus gate of the old city to the edge of Bethlehem, the city of Jesus's birth. my body breathed deeply. it soaked in the sensation. alone, in a foreign country, a foreign world, already 10 times more foreign than the israel i had left as Amit, my israeli friend with whom i am staying and from whom receiving wonderful Vespa rides, and i had passed into the Arab side of Jerusalem.
it had been nearly two years since i had had that feeling. my body, exhausted from the 10 consecutive nights of 2-5 hours of sleep, found great effect in the moment. my mind had not fully recovered from the lack of sleep, my heart and soul still struggling to understand the spiritual growth that it had undergone in the past week and a half. to answer the ultimate question of Birthright: i do not necessarily feel more Jewish. i do not know if i will consider myself more Jewish. i know, however, that i AM more Jewish, and, most importantly, i walk away with the knowledge that i am a Jew, that i share a history with these people and i share a cultural characteristic that i need not define. i know that being a Jew means something, and that i am many of those things.
but the more significant effect of the trip was this: a religion is a community. anywhere across the world you can look into another Jewish person's eyes and share a moment with them. candles bring two people together, a prayer, a handshake and a hug. how could it be so simple to unite two complete strangers? i know that there are other ways, i know that these lines of identity only seperate the globe; but i also know that there is value in attaching ourselves to these traditions, to this history, ancient as well as recent, if not for the sake of our ancestors than for the sake of us.
these feelings of being Jewish came to me in a number of ways and a number of places. each one could be written in an email twice this length. perhaps the opportunity to write about each experience will pass, but for now i must focus on my recent memory, on yesterday, Christmas day, 2006.
my birthright friends were already well on their way to downtown Bethlehem by the time i passed through the security checkpoint. i walked briskly past the taxicabs waiting to take people on the last leg of their pilgrimage to the holy site, a site i did not realize would be our goal. flying high on solitude i cruised through the Arab city, soaking in the differences-a world apart from the Israel i had been introduced to in the previous 10 days. this was not Israel. that was clear. tea shops and shawarma restaurants lined the streets. a boy in a Santa costume shouted out his version of Ho-Ho-Ho as our eyes met in an alley. a ritzy house had set up a gorgeous manger scene aside a Christmas tree and sang a familiar yuletide tune. an Arab city, a Christian feel, a Jewish occupation. where am i? i thought.
i walked and walked and walked. the views from the high rode on the hilled city showed me dry olive tree terraces in the distance, still inside the massive concrete wall. the city was in decent shaped considering that, as one israeli put it "we bombed the shit out of that place two years ago." there were destroyed structures. we saw one buiding that was nothing more than a shell, with mutiple stories, concrete floors and ceilings but no walls. you could tell people lived there because, instead of the wall, there was a clothesline strung airing laundry. it may snow tonight. this is a harsh reality.
as i came towards downtown Bethlehem the amount of tourists rose significantly. ironically, there were very few white tourists. the massive groups i saw were southeast asian, most likely Philipino, and Indian subcontinent (any thoughts which country...?). it was a mixed bag. i never wouldve expected it.
i glanced up a narrow cobblestone alleyway to the right and saw an opening, a gap, light, a people. i headed up it and found a plaza with a stage that was being deconstructed. the press was there, and hundreds of people gathered despite the feeling that the main event had ended. i called my friends and they oriented me. i walked towards the doorless wall as they had directed me. i came upon a group of hundreds gathered in a circle singing, chanting words i did not understand to a tune i did not recognize. i stopped to gaze but had to continue as i had seen my friend poking out of the doorless wall. we hugged and she said: "your jaw is dropped already...wait til we get inside."
the wall, constructed entirely out of massive stones, did have a door. it was about three and a half feet high and appeared to have been dug out after the construction of the church. i bowed into the building and it opened up into a massive church-room-hall(?). the floor was made up of old wooden planks. there was one section that was opened to reveal the original mosaic floor beneath, the original floor. above us rose massive wooden support beams, the sloped wooden ceilings 4 stories high had windows that let sharp rays of light shine on the lamps that dangled 30 feet below. the lamps had red Christmas ornaments on them...the very same you'd find on any americans christmas tree. the hall aimed towards a massive crucifix, jesus with his arms spread wide. people and candles were everywhere. there was an undeniable buzz in the building. "where am i?" i asked. "this is the church of nativity. this is where Jesus was born." it made perfect sense when she said it.
we found the rest of crew, already a few spots up from the end of the endless line of people waiting to enter into the grotto door. i took the chance to explore the venue while the others waited. still in awe i examined the ancient structure, the Christian paintings, the ornate gold plates, candle holders and grails.
back in line we passed through the first grotto hole and into a smaller room where people lit candles and priests struggled to maintain the sanity of the place. the line funnelled down a set of semi-circular stairs towards an even smaller cave door. the madness of the line increased when it became, not a line, but a group of people 10 bodies wide trying to force themselves into a 2 foot wide doorway. an Arab policewoman kept the peace, and people smiled and laughed as the energy of the group wavered between angry/uncomfortable and happy/excited. a woman shouted and the policewoman asked her to be quiet. we were, after all, headed into a very holy place, the place where Jesus was born. the church had been built upon it many centuries later. the crowd got rowdy and an Arab-looking man, wide and tall in the dead center of the semi-circle of stairs extended his hands at shoulder's hide, snapped them twice then turned his palms down in an attempt to calm the massive group. i liked his effort and we smiled at each other.through the grotto door was an entrance to another world. inside was calm, other than one priest desperately trying to keep the pilgrams from taking pictures of Jesus's actual physical birthspot and, of course, failing to do so. people lined up to get on their knees and pray at the spot. "are you gonna do that?" my friend asked, pointing at the people on thier knees, bowing. "i dont think i can" i said.
next to this cave lay a sunken cave a few feet below, clearly calmer, where several priests held a grail and chanted. i came closer but could not get down the stairs, as others stood there too. i ducked my head, careful not to get to close to the hundreds of burning candles to my right. i heard the prayers and they made sense. it wasnt spanish, but it wasnt too far from spanish. portuguese, italian, latin....? i watched the mild faced 40 year-old holy man lead the prayer. he wore glasses, was unremarkable in his features, but wore a robe of colors, perhaps yellow, instead of black. after the prayer he began to pass out communion wafers. he dipped them in what i thought at first must be holy water but in retrospect represented the blood of Christ. i knew i wanted one but i could not get close enough to him. after satisfying the urges of the people around him he looked up and i flashed my eyes at him. i craned my head even lower towards him, hovering over the people on the stairs below. he held the wafer up towards my mouth and i took it in. i was surprised by the taste of wine, as i had thought the clear liquid was water. the texture was soft and i let it dissolve slowly on my tongue. it was warm with energy.the men continued their prayers and heard them deeply. when it ended, the man in the yellow robe headed out of the sunken grotto and i motioned towards him in this spaceless space. i reached out to shake his hand, not knowing whether he'd even be allowed to shake mine. i thanked him and he met my eyes firmly and deeply. "mi primera vez" i said. he looked into me with a smile, proud of me.
i backed away from the scene, overcome with tears at this point. i knew that what i had just shared with the priest was no different than what i had found amongst my jewish bretheren during the previous two weeks. i knew that this was religion, the simplicity of the connection, the shared moment, the expression of God. i was grateful for where i was and what i had been through, overcome by the feelings of the circumstances that had led me to this trip, these places, these experiences, and this moment. my body began to shake and i thought i was going to faint. i doubled over, hands on my knees and let myself cry. my head began to spin. i found a spot on the stones in the corner of the cave beneath the paintings of Jesus. my body slouched onto itself and i put my head in my hands. i know that i was crying, but at this point that was the only understandable physical sensation. everything else that my body was feeling was completely foreign, previously unfelt. my body vibrated, pulsated. warmth. i no longer shook. i tried my best to let the moment flow, to not be afraid. i knew what i was going through, i knew the reasons for it, i knew where i was, what i had just experienced. i knew my physical state. i knew my mental state. i knew my emotional state. i understood how these entities combined into what i was feeling. but i also knew that there was a point in the feeling where these entities were not the cause. i knew what was really going on.

alone in the corner my face was caressed, as if to calm me. the hands were fuzzy, thousands of tiny feathers extending from the fingertips and palms. this warmth massaged every exposed peace of skin. i was told me that i had come upon something, a truth for me, the secular half and half, the two sides of my family, my self, my soul. it was proud of me.

this lasted for several minutes. i kept thinking it was about to end, hoping it would while at the same time fearing that it would. then it would come on stronger and i would be thankful.when it ended my body was incapable. i tried several times to stand. i still worried that i would pass out.

i walked slowly and carefully through the grotto and found more passageways. i was lost. my friends were nowhere in sight and i knew i was not ready to find them. i found places to sit and rest. around me religious people passed. these caves seemed endless.i went outside when i was ready and found two friends by the exit. they told me that the others were waiting outside. i did not speak. they asked if i was ok and i nodded. my body was shaking.
the next two hours were a blur. i found places to sit while the other bought snacks. i walked slowly and firmly through the medina we had come upon. i floated above everything. i could not speak or look my friends in the eye. i could walk and breath and make eye contact with the locals walking past me. i saw myself in a mirror at one point. i looked like myself.

There is a story that goes like this: there are four children that go to an orchard to play. they fall asleep under an apple tree. they each dream that they see God. the first one sees God and....
the second one sees God and....
the third one sees God and....
the fourth one sees God and....

2007-01-01T10:44:00.000-08:00

Overlooking the Negev Desert.

2007-01-01T10:30:00.000-08:00

I went to Ramallah on a whim. No real reason I went there, no real impetus other than that my mind had decided at some point during the night that i would wake up when Ameet does around noon and bum a ride with him back to Damascus Gate, the leaving point of the Arab buses to the West Bank.
it was New Year's Day, 2007. i had slept well that night after ringing in the New Year with some Birthright friends.
i hopped on the bus to Ramallah, finding myself the only white person as i had expected. the twenty minute ride included a quick passage through the security gates, into the walled zone, followed by an incredibly inconsistent unpaved road. it seemed as though they had left in unpaved so that no car could move quickly from the city to the security area and vice versa. a way of control, it seemed.
off the bus i wandered through the crowded city streets. i had been to what one could call Palestine once before: Bethlehem on Christmas Day. the difference between the two trips was instantly remarkable. for one, i was clearly the only non-Arab in the city. Bethlehem is a major point of interest on christmas, with pilgrims coming from across the globe to see Jesus's birthplace on his birthday. nobody had any reason to come to Ramallah on New Year's Day. neither did i.
secondly, this was a different city. i was in the downtown area and the bustle of the city was extreme. hundreds of people, mostly men, moved quickly through the crowded streets. people looked at me as i passed. children stared in wonderment, teenage boys pointed and laughed, girls giggled. i still had not seen another white person. i got tired of being the center of attention and so i ducked into what looked like a shopping mall. three of the five stores on the street level were closed. i looked up and realized that the malls in Ramallah are designed differently from those in the states. they are built upwards. five stores on a floor, 10 floors high. very little lighting. i saw a sign for a Checkers and wondered whether it was the same as we have in the US. it was. 25 shekel for burgers, fries and a cola--the menu written entirely in English.
back outside traffic was at a standstill. a police vehicle pointlessly sounded its siren. it seemed as though even if the cars blocking the police's way could have moved, they wouldnt have. this lack of space, this mess, this crowd, all seemed completely normal. nobody acted as though something were different today.
i think something was different that day. i passed through what felt like the dead center of town, a traffic circle where men stood around. they all looked at me as i passed. it was eerie. something felt not right. i started wondering whether i was really safe in Ramallah, whether it was ok for me to be there. above the traffic circle stood metal posts 30 feet high. attached to the posts was a banner with a larger than life photo of a young Saddam. i remembered that a friend had mentioned to me that there had been protests in Palestine, that the Arab community was reacting to his hanging. i was glad that it was today, two days after the hanging, and not yesterday or the day before. i immediately recognized how i would be perceived in the situation. i knew that any trouble i might find in that city would not be improved by the flashing of my American passport, that this was one situation where it would clearly worsen any situation. i wished that i had my hat, something to cover my hair, part of my face, lessen my height and overall make me less conspicuous. i did not have my hat. everyone saw my hair, my face, my height. i hunched my shoulders and tried not to look proud.

i started to walk away from the downtown. i was looking for a little breathing room, some place to sit and eat and not be seen. a few blocks away from the central traffic circle the city became calmer. there were fewer people and i felt the space. i passed a coffee shop and a store with rugs. i heard gunshots and it sounded like they were coming from the outskirts of town. i immediately turned around and headed back into town.
gunshots were not so uncommon to hear, even in Israel. the army trains and you hear them train. it was significantly more unsettling to hear this in Ramallah. i was still calm. i wasnt even sure that it was gunshots i had heard.
i kept walking until i found a nice falafel place. i sat in the back corner of the shop and ate slowly. a man asked me if i spoke English, where i was from, and whether i was married. i tried to avoid saying i was American. he was my age, married with 2 kids. i explained to him that in my world people get married at an older age. i asked him why he was in Ramallah and he said he works there. he works as Police he said, which translates to security. i asked him about how secure Ramallah is---safe/unsafe. yes, maybe he said. and for me, as a tourist i asked. yes, maybe he said. he cracked a smile and we both knew that i wasnt in the right place. i'm not sure if his answer would have been different were it not for the day, the circumstances, the governments.
i paid and left the falafel shop. i heard more gunshots and started to move towards the bus station. it was time for me to go, i had decided. i had never really felt unsafe in a foreign country before, at least not in this sense. i walked slowly and calmly. i was not worried. i decided i was still hungry and considered more food options. i continued heading in the general direction of the bus station. this led me back to the central traffic circle.
a gun fired again but this time much more loudly. i immediately saw the man who was firing the rounds. he stood in the center of the traffic circle and fired his shots firmly and angrily into the air. i stopped dead in my tracks. i watched him finish the cartridge and waited til he gave the pistol a few shotless clicks. the man did not see me. i looked around him and saw many men with many guns. how had i not noticed all these guns around me? a crowd had gathered right below Saddam's image. a protest, a rally, a riot? i had no idea. it was a gathering and that was enough for me.
i knew i was in the wrong place. aside from the safety issue, which i considered at this point to be relatively under control, i had no right to be there. my country had killed a leader, a man that these people respected and thought of in a positive light. these people live in a city surrounded by a 40 foot concrete wall. to leave the city they wait in narrow hallways and pass through heavy metal turnstyles. they are not free. Saddam Hussein is dead. i am white. i am jewish. i am America.
i reached into my pocket and pointlessly attempted to tuck my passport even deeper down. i started to walk towards the traffic circle, the one man's gun empty and no other men immediately planning to fire skyward. i had to pass through the circle. i felt exposed, no city walls to walk along, no sense of protection. i walked quickly and impossibly tried to be invisible. on the other side of the traffic circle i filed into the masses on the sidewalk. i was two blocks from the bus station and i felt safer already. i heard gunshots behind, a machine gun this time, and i instinctively shifted towards the buildings. i kept walking, my pace determined by the crowds around me.
on the bus i felt fine. i knew that i was never in any direct danger, but that i had tested my personal limits and found a line. i was proud of myself for trusting my instinct and getting out of there. i was happy to be heading back to Israel. in the Arab quarter of Jerusalem i felt at home.

2006-10-03T12:35:00.000-07:00

Dad and I overlooking the Sierras. Cool stuff. I had an 11 X 14 inch copy of this bad boy printed out for papa-dukes. He is starting to appreciate his own vulnerability that the photo exposes, poco a poco.

Welcome...

2006-10-03T12:14:00.000-07:00

So I guess this is the new i enjoy sneezing (.com). The question you may all be asking yourselves is "why did ienjoysneezing.com disappear in the first place?" The answer is simple. Lack of inspiration. Or time. Or energy. Or.......motivation...? I don't know, I guess the answer ain't so simple. I suppose it's just so easy to keep in touch with my peeps when I am in the states that the website seemed unnecessary. But once I'm traveling again, oh yes, that is when the need comes back again. And that is when I will utilize this service to share with my friends, family, fellow sneeze-enjoyers, my stories, pictures, etc from my travels. Can somebody help me connect ienjoysneezing.com to this blog?
Here's the plan, in case you're curious:
December: I quit my job, move out of 1824, finish up my grad school apps, head off to Israel (ojala) and visit my sachbucks.
January: Dan's wedding is the 14th, so as soon as they need me, I'll be there. After that I may head to NoCal to check out the Wright Institute, SanFran, etc. After that time, all is unknown.