The Long Boat

The time has come to bring this journal to its end. It has served its purpose - documenting not only the small steps of my guitar quest, but also the ending of my marriage, quitting my job, travels through SE Asia, and creating a new home in Oregon. I want to create a new life inside my mind.

When his boat snapped loose

from its mooring, under

the creaking gulls,

he tried at first to wave 

to his dear ones on shore,

but in the rolling fog

they had already lost their faces.

Too tired even to choose

between jumping and calling,

somehow he felt absolved and free

of his burdens, those mottoes

stamped on his name-tag:

conscience, ambition, and all

that caring.

He was content to lie down

with the family ghosts

in the slop of his cradle,

buffeted by the storm,

endlessly drifting.

Peace! peace!

To be rocked by the infinite!

As if it didn't matter

which way was home;

as if he didn't know

he loved the earth so much

he wanted to stay forever.

Stanley Kunitz

Defeat

"It's just a matter of doing what you want to do : not one man in a thousand is doing what he wants to do. My defeat will be my victory."

Hank Chinaski

Don't Try

“If you're going to try, go all the way. Otherwise, don't even start. This could mean losing girlfriends, wives, relatives and maybe even your mind. It could mean not eating for three or four days. It could mean freezing on a park bench. It could mean jail. It could mean derision. It could mean mockery--isolation. Isolation is the gift. All the others are a test of your endurance, of how much you really want to do it. And, you'll do it, despite rejection and the worst odds. And it will be better than anything else you can imagine. If you're going to try, go all the way. There is no other feeling like that. You will be alone with the gods, and the nights will flame with fire. You will ride life straight to perfect laughter. It's the only good fight there is.”

Hank Chinaski

Blue Notes

At the suggestion of my guitar teacher, Mike, I have been keeping daily notes of my guitar practice -

Tuesday, 10/30/12

2:00-3:45pm - Jam/lesson with Mike. Fun time, felt comfortable and fresh, fingers accurate and strong. As Mike suggested, would like to begin working on rhythm basics. I believe I have the finger skills to quickly pick up on new chords, just need to learn which chords to play depending on the key of the song. Bob wants to jam tomorrow, but I told him I won't be fresh because of today's practice, so will hopefully get together with him next week.

Wedndesday, 10/31/12

9:00pm-11:00

Walking exercises with metronome, flat palming chords, stretching 2 & 3 finger with bottleneck.

Thursday, 11/01/12

12:00pm - 12:15

Watched a Joe Bonamassa lesson video on 12 bar blues - as he is explaining some of the chords, he says “a lot of these chords that I use, a lot of these inside things, I learned from a guy named Danny Gatton, and this is good stuff to know, but don't ask me to name them because I have no idea what they are.” - pretty funny that a master blues guy does not know the names of the chords he is using!

7:00pm - 9:30

Walking exercises to metronome set at 60, 2 notes per beat. While doing this discovered a 7 note bass lick which sounded familiar, not sure from where. I kept searching for notes until the lick was complete.

___________________________________________________________________________

___________________________________________________________________________

____________________________________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________________________________________________ 7 7 _____________________7 pause____________7 7 _________________

__0 0 0 h-7 h-9_____9__7 7 h 9_0 0 0 h-7 h-9________0 0 0 h-7 h-9____9 7 7 h-9 0 0 0 h-7 h-9 0

The above lick can be expanded to other notes and riffs. The key is D minor.

3/4 exercise. Jam to Burnside, backing tracks, and some BB King.

Friday, 11/2/12

5:30pm - 8:30

Finger exercises, 3 note pent exercise (skipped the 4 note because 3 is hard enough at this point), flat palming chords, stretching 2 & 3 finger with bottleneck, jammed to various blues songs.

Saturday, 11/3/12

7:30pm-11:30

Finger walking exercises with metronome, stretching 2 & 3 finger with bottleneck. Long jam tonight, almost 3 hours of non stop blues fun. Things are starting to slow down (mind comprehending things which it could not 6 month ago), so I can concentrate on finer details. Focused on making the notes clean and solid, definitely a lot of mistakes, but some good passages. Feel for bends is improving, so is vibrato, just have to keep at it. Fingers sore at the end, otherwise would have played longer because energy was good.

Sunday, 11/4/12

6:00pm - 11:00 (a few breaks thrown in)

Finger walking exercises with metronome. Discovered a new way to walk the pentatonic - hit first note once, second note twice, third note once, fourth note twice, etc, good sounding riffs from variations on this exercise. Came up with another low note riff while doing exercises :

__________________________________________________________________________

__________________________________________________________________________

__________________________________________________________________________

________0__2__0_______________0__2__0________________0_2_0_____________0____

_____2___________2__p0_____2___________2___p0_____2________2__p0____2________

__0 _____________________0______________________0_________________0________0__

Flat palming chords, vibrato practice, repeated difficult riffs from yesterday's jam and repeated them slowly to figure out how to improve the finger movements. Studied picking motion to discover best movements for particular fast passages.

House of Rising Sun practice with 4-5 different versions streamed through the amp. I discovered something which could be a step in understanding how to find chords for rhythm - some of the versions are in different keys, when not in A the open chords won't work, at least not the normal open chords. Saw that the open chord structures work 5 frets down from the main box pattern of the pent scale - if the key is G minor, then the main box pattern starts at the 2nd fret, or the 14th, backing down from the 14th 5 frets is where the main chords are, so use capo at 9th fret.

Jammed to Bar B Q Bob and the Spare Ribs (what a name, haha), the band played in a bar, the video captures the entire concert, they played almost 2 hours without break - played along to all the songs, lots of good blues with different keys and rhythms - Fun!

Monday, 11/5/12

10:00pm-11:45

Finger walking exercises with metronome. Flat palm chords. House of Rising Sun practice. Jam to Junior Wells South Side Blues.

Tuesday, 11/6/12

Break

Wednesday, 11/7/12

5:00pm-7:00

2 hour jam with Bob at his auto garage. Bob is good at playing rhythm, so we played 2 hours with me mostly on lead. I tried rhythm for 15 minutes, not too good with it because lack of knowledge of how to stay in key, which hinders creativity for spontaneous music. Positives - good to test myself in the presence of another musician, learning through watching what Bob was doing (he also explained a lot of stuff, which was helpful). Negatives - Bob hesitant to break away from playing a song in an exact way, which hinders creative jamming. Similar to a conversation, where one wants to recite exact lines of poetry or dialogue, while the other speaks his mind. I prefer music to be an open conversation, flowing and in the present moment. For my part, too weak with rhythm due to knowledge gap - my fingers have the strength to play rhythm, I just don't know where to put them. Will continue to research this and will eventually figure it out if I'm lucky.

Thursday, 11/8/12

7:00pm-8:00

One hour of jamming to blues songs, not inspired to do anything else.

Friday, 11/9/12

7:00pm-9:00

finger exercises - good control and sound.

Saturday, 11/10/12

5:00pm-8:00pm

Finger exercises. 3 note pent repetitions. Jam to blues songs. Worked specifically on sliding more than usual, trying to be quicker and more proficient, especially the longer 3 fret slides near the nut. Watched a portion of a dvd which I got at Eugene library - “easy steps to blues guitar jamming” - included was a booklet which showed chords for jamming in E. Quote from dvd - “first rule in playing with a friend is... leave space...I mean, you can't have too much space in music...and so if your'e in doubt of where you are, you can just wait...” and “jamming the blues really does have a lot do with that, it becomes intuitive, and hearing the spaces also becomes quite intuitive, you don't really want to have to think about it too much...some of the great blues players played just one or two notes, and repeated them over and over again.”

Fingers got sore earlier than normal, probably from practicing slides.

Sunday, 11/11/12

6:00pm-11:30 (with breaks)

Walking exercises, flat palming chords, House of Rising Sun, Outside Woman Blues, jam to various blues songs. Bends are getting better, nice feel and sweet sound. Vibrato improving, but still a ways to go. Practiced long slides, making improvements. 

The Arrow of Time

"Time flies faster than an arrow; life is more transient than the dew. No matter how skillful you may be, it is impossible to bring back even a single day of the past. To have lived to be a hundred years old to no purpose is to eat the bitter fruit of time, to become a pitiable bag of bones. Even though you have allowed yourself to be a slave to your senses for a hundred years, if you give yourself over to Buddhist training for even one day, you will gain a hundred years of life in this world as well as in the next."
Dogen

Walked to Mike's a few days ago, set up the gear, and got to jamming. He let me borrow one of his distortion pedals, which gives a bluesing sustain. After a few minutes of feeding off of each other's sound, Mike asked for a suggestion on what to stream through the amp, and I offered up the tasty Clapton/Allman 6 song jam album. After jamming to songs 1-4, we played along to a few miscellaneous beats and ended the day. Definitely worth $50 due to being in the presence of a master guitarist and absorbing the action. I believe this absorption is just as, or more important than, listening to him talk about theory. I was pleased with my playing, my concentration and composure were at a high level and I had no troubles with losing the distinction between master/student.

Next week I will be walking to a music space on 6th st to jam with Bob. He was disappointed that I could not jam with him the day after I had my jam with Mike, but my energy and motivation was low so I decided to wait a week, letting the excitement build and continuing to practice along the way.

Meditating every day, I am slowly breathing my way to a nice place inside my head. I close out the night reclining in bed reading Zen books.

Delta Blues

"It's mostly like I was when I started, just for somebody to show me. I didn't have nobody to show me. I bought an old guitar from another guy for $1.50. Old piece of guitar. But I didn't know the difference too much. I just knowed it was supposed to be a guitar. And I got this boy Willie Wilson to tune it up for me. And so that's the way I started myself. None of them showed me nothing but I just got the sound in my head and I'd just hit on round on it till I found the sound I just like myself."
Son House

My guitar lesson with Mike went well enough, yet at the end of the lesson I felt dissatisfaction due to the nature of the material - mostly theory and the music covered (basic blues shuffle) I learned way back when I started almost 3 years ago. I told Mike this and we discussed it for 15 minutes, and came to the conclusion that the best path would be to jam together during the lesson, minimizing the talking and learning through doing. That sounded good to me, but a couple days later I received an email in response to my CL ad, a guy wanted to jam with me, and he had the studio space downtown to make it happen. I decided that paying $35 for a 45 minute jam with Mike was not better than jamming for free for 90-120 minutes, so I emailed Mike and told him the situation, thanking him for his time and kindness. He wrote back and said he understood, and wished me luck.

I breathed easier, something about music lessons brings a hesitation and fear into me - fear of losing my freedom in relation to the creative beauty of the guitar and music. This feeling is instinctive, but is backed up by stories I have read of famous musicians who had the same problem with music teachers - loss of freedom, the things taught being too constricting and rigid. I understand where the problem arises - teaching an art requires speaking about it, analyzing how things work and don't work, and in a way, the analysis kills the spirit of the art. Joseph from Urbana told me that his gf majored in art, and when she graduated never wanted to do art again!

The next day I received another email from Mike. He understood my desire to play a longer jam session, and so offered a reduced rate of $50 for 2 hours of jamming. He ended the email by writing -

"You are a serious player. Rare and Sacred according to my value system. I am happy to be part of your musical community." 

There was no way I could pass up a 2 hour jam with a master guitarist for $50, so I decided to go ahead and jam with Mike once or twice a month. I can ask questions during the jam, and I believe this is the key to learning from a teacher - playing along, asking questions when needed. I suggested getting together this Tuesday, so hopefully all will go well. 

I recently ordered a guitar gig bag, when that arrives I plan to make the journey downtown to jam with the other guy. 

Guitar practice is still moving in a good direction, making small steps of progress from session to session, which quickly add up. My bending is getting better due to increased finger strength and agility. I am beginning to acquire a touch and feel which gives the bend a nice flow and sound. Vibrato is ever inching closer to where it needs to be. My left wrist is getting quicker and more coordinated, and the sound isn't half bad, but still a long way to go. Guitar phrasing and licks vocabulary is expanding, I discovered last night while jamming to a Clapton/Allman studio session that hitting an out of key note one fret before an in key note and bending into the note works and sounds good. Continuing to work with the metronome for speed and accuracy. 

Guitar is getting interesting - I have enough skill and knowledge to make good sounds, but have so much more to learn - the momentum I have makes it easy to practice 2-3 hours a night. 


"This time I wisely shied away from organized music theory. Sounds from my head found their way to the guitar. I concentrated on playing and not learning about sharps, flats, time signatures, key changes, and chord structures. I didn't want to be cramped by words."
Stefan Grossman

Living and Dying

"The birth of a man is the birth of his sorrow. The longer he lives, the more stupid he becomes, because his anxiety to avoid unavoidable death becomes more and more acute. What bitterness! He lives for what is always out of reach! His thirst for survival in the future makes him incapable of living in the present."
Chuang Tzu

The Way Home, III

I just finished reading my friend Melinda's beautiful blog post about the mysteries of time, fate, and how we end up where we do, and I remembered that I have fallen behind on my own posting. It is not because I have lost the desire to write, on the contrary, after meditating from 5:00-6:30am at the Zendo, I arrive back at the studio with a mind full of clarity. Although somewhat groggy, I have a desire to paint a picture with words. Something about the early morning hour creates a beautiful inner landscape in which to create - it buzzes with energy and light, full of hope and the joy of being alive for another day.

So I am attempting to write a short story. I have noticed that my writing has become more precise and fluid over the past few years, continuing to grow and improve. The few poems I wrote while on the road this year came out better than expected, and when I read them months later, they still seem true and good to my senses. So why not expand and reach out for a further exploration of what writing can express in my life? I am approaching the writing of the story to see how it can alter time and space through imaginary sequences of events. To dig through memories of a specific time and place and write about them in a way which clarifies for myself what really happened, or, to see them from a different angle and view, learning more about myself than I thought possible. The idea of publishing, or having others read it, is a voided concept - I am not pretending to write for other's eyes, I am writing for my own. Not that the story will be understandable to others anyway - this being my first attempt at a short story, it is surely going to be a mess, if it even gets finished at all.

That being said, the writing of it is going better than expected. I have written 5 short (very short) chapters thus far, each one tracing further into a nest of memories which have been dormant for many years. Writing about such a small time period of my life has allowed those memories to breathe again. If I get no further with the story, the attempt will not be a total bust because I was able to alter my consciousness in a small way, reading deeper into my motives and visions. I find it interesting how the story flows from one sequence to another, exhibiting that words can indeed create an imaginary universe of time and space. Of course all the good books I have read through the years have already proven this to me, but it is interesting to watch the sequence unroll from my own hand.

Guitar practice is moving along. I recently put an ad on CL looking for beginning guitarists/musicians to jam with. I got 3 replies so far, one being a guitar teacher who offered to help me reach my music goals. After my negative experiences with two guitar teachers back in Urbana, I am not keen to again put myself into a volatile situation where two egos collide. While I try to keep my ego in check, in certain things, such as the setting of goals and the attempt to complete them, I don't see how to avoid bypassing a will which wants to forge its own path and way - someone who comes along after the goal has been set is going to get in the way of it. However, if I can find the right teacher, where two egos can exist in harmony, I believe I could make progress, and so I have not given up on the idea of following the advice of a music master. I therefore replied to the teacher and explained my situation, and we are going to give it a try. The odds are small that things will turn out as I hope they will, but I will keep trying because I believe in the idea.

The big change, or addition to my life, is meditation. I am practicing every day, in hopes of altering my consciousness so that I can fulfill my life in a proper and meaningful way. I can see clearly that without meditating I will be unable to advance very far. It is hard to change certain habits of the mind, actually, almost impossible, and so the journey and the quest take on the tone of Don Quixote battling windmills - attempting to see more clearly by burrowing deeper into the nature of mind and reality, I flirt with going over the edge of sanity. After adventuring about in the outer world, I now begin a more difficult and perilous task - removing myself from the shadows of the mind to reveal the true shapes and colors of the universe which I find myself living in.

"The teachings reveal to us the possibility of an astounding and finally boundless freedom, which is ours to work for now, in life - the freedom that will enable us to choose our death and so to choose our birth. For someone who has prepared and practiced, death comes not as a defeat but as a triumph, the crowning and most glorious moment of life."
Sogyal Rinpoche

The Way

Chanting the Way - Dedication and Discipline, Round 2

"The thought of this completely thrilled him. It was like discovering a cancer cure. No more explanations of what art is. No more wonderful critical schools of experts to determine rationally where each composer had succeeded or failed. All of them, every last one of those know-it-alls, would finally have to shut up. This was no longer just an interesting idea. This was a dream."
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

The Way Home, II

It appears I have returned to the monkish dedication which I began when I was in my early 20's. The changes which meditation brought were startling and mystical, and the cumulative experience I still carry inside my heart. I believe now is the proper time to return to my meditation studies, and so I have been practicing in my studio, at the Garfield Street Zendo, and today, at the 40th Street Buddhist Institute. I set a walking route for the 2.5 miles, and enjoyed yet another sunny and warm day in Eugene as I sauntered through town.  Earlier in the day I stopped in at the Zendo and partook in the Sunday meditation, which is at the pleasant hour of 9:30am. At 1:00 I began my walk to the Institute and when I arrived I was greeted by one of the practitioners.  He explained what they would be doing from 2:00-4:00, and I was unsure if I should stay or leave. The Institute is home for Tibetan style Buddhism, and this involves a lot of chanting. When the practitioner told me I could sit and breathe and not be expected to chant, I decided to stay, with the idea that I would use the chanting as a meditative music. I took my seat inside the beautiful hall along with a small group of six or seven. I was given two notebooks of chants and prayers as I settled into a western style chair, knowing I could not handle sitting cross-legged for 2 hours. The time went by quickly, and I found myself humming and even chanting a bit, finding it to be relaxing and unforced. After the service ended I was getting ready to leave when the practitioner said that participants are welcome to stay for a meal. Seeing that the group was small, I decided it would be rude to refuse, so took my seat at a table and listened to interesting conversation. There was a bottle of wine served, but I took fruit juice instead. The topics of discussion ranged from politics, conspiracy theories, to radiant heat flooring (which my apartment has). The thing which struck me throughout was that a few of the people were able to flow into normal conversation immediately following an intense 2 hours of meditation. It was as if the meditation had not affected them in the least. I was feeling relaxed and confident due to a peaceful breathing pattern which had emerged during the time spent sitting, and did not feel the need to speak, yet I was quick to comprehend what was being shared. Later, as I was walking home, I had an insight about my meditation practice - it teaches me how to breathe, or, breathe in a way which is good for my health and well being. For some reason I do not breathe well if I do not practice meditation - maybe it is this peaceful, rhythmic breathing which leads to a good and healthy life.

I hope to attend the 5:00am meditation at the Zendo tomorrow - because I do not use an alarm it will be up to my sleeping mind to get me out of bed.

Reflected

The Way Home

I am settling into my new life in Eugene. I have a few goals which keep me busy morning noon and night. I have begun to meditate at the Eugene Zendo. Wednesday I woke at 4:36am and walked the mile to the Zendo soon after, missing the first session of the 5:00am zazen. Later that afternoon I was wiped out from the early morning rise and fell asleep in the easy chair while reading. I skipped Thursday's  zazen but awoke today at 4:15 and made it in time to do the full 90 minutes. The session ends at 6:30, just as the sun is rising, so the walk home is quite the enchantment. I brought my camera along and made a few pictures - I see better after a long meditation. The morning was cold - ! - I had 4 shirts and a mid range jacket on (which I bought at Goodwill for $7) but my hands were shaky with the camera and my feet went numb. When I got home I took a hot shower and then ate a breakfast of sushi, yogurt, and tea. When I got out of the shower I noticed my reflection in the steamed  mirror and was inspired to make a photograph - not everyday I make a picture of myself, and more rare when I do it without clothing on!

I have been spending my afternoons walking, running, and exercising. This week my energy  hit a low point, I almost feel like I did a few years ago when lack of energy made me too lethargic to want to do anything. I stopped taking B12 when I got to Thailand, so maybe my body has run out of it again - time to get to the vitamin store to buy B12.

In the evenings I read and play guitar. I have made more progress, the speed work with the metronome is making my fingers and sense of timing stronger and more accurate. I was jamming last night and created a speed riff which was faster and cleaner than anything I have done. It is ridiculous how much progress I am making, as I don't really deserve it because I practice only 1-2 hours a night, and sometimes not at all. Oh well, I won't complain about my good luck!

The Absurdity of Walking Alone

"The truth cannot be contained by any word whatsoever. The truth can only be experienced. The truth can be lived, but there is no way to say it".  Osho

Stepping outside the door to throw out the trash, I find this at my feet

My first day in the studio - moments of excitement, wonder, and surprisingly, waves of nostalgia which trigger memories of Chiang Mai, Urbana, Chicago, most of which elicit a bittersweet sadness. Perhaps this swift moving sadness is a result of untying the anchor to Illinois and the people who remain there. Memories of Rachel resemble a rich tapestry, a piece in a museum which I return to, each time finding details which I had missed from the previous visit.

I am still without a key because the local hardware store clerk cut it sloppy, so for now I live as if in Portland, leaving the door unlocked and wrapping positive thoughts upon the house. On the walk to the hardware store I cemented a bucolic route which will lead me to Woodfield Plaza (Market of Choice/Sunrise Asian Grocery), parts of which lead me through quiet allies and byways.

Lawrence Alley on the way to Woodfield Plaza

Odd sensations to be living in solitude once again. Spending no time alone in a house for 30 days caused me to alter certain habits and routines which I am looking forward to returning to - the afternoon nap, getting up before 7:00am, making meals with slow deliberation, sitting in late afternoon dusklight pondering the days activities. Having stepped out onto the ledge of otherness, it will be a relief to return to the quiet safety of my being.

Flowing into Dreams

After writing my last post about struggling to find my way in the apartment search, I decided to look at an apartment which I did not have much hope for, as it did not seem promising from the description and pictures which were posted on CL. I felt that the act of walking to an apartment, looking it over, then moving on to the next one, would begin to create a flow of energy which would eventually lead me to something. Like looking for a job, where it is rare to be offered something on the first try, and maybe after 10 interviews things fall into place. The place is on 23rd, which is almost 2 miles west of where I am at now (also on 23rd), and oddly enough I had already walked the same route a few weeks before when I visited the Eugene Zendo on Garfield.

When I arrived I looked at the surrounding houses and immediately eliminated the nicest house, leaving places which made me feel correct about my initial misgivings. I searched for the apartment and when I found the address painted on the curb, discovered that the nicest house was indeed the one I was looking for. Upon walking in I knew I had found a place I could be happy in - quality in the details, warm light, quiet - something which gives a good feeling. Although quite small, I could imagine myself living a peaceful, monkish life, striving for...the elimination of striving. I filled out an application, and within a few days found out I had been chosen. I accepted, signed the lease, and will move in this Monday, Oct, 1, 2012. I was over there today moving some things into the apt, and later in the day realized I had lost the key due to a hole in my pants pocket. I can't recall ever losing any type of key, so I am a bit embarrassed to have to ask the owner for a replacement before I even move in. Well, there are worse things that can happen, so no complaining, just pay the fee and move on.

Somehow I have shaped a vision and a dream into a more solid structure. The past couple of years I have been dreaming of running in a place I had never been before. The dream would recur, and I wondered about it because it was beautiful. While the landscape of Eugene does not exactly fit the place in the dream, it has a similar feel, and I recalled the dream recently as I was running up Spencer Mountain. So many ways to go, yet my heart led me to the place which my soul had given clues about.

What next?

Zen, Motorcycles, Guitars

"I feel happy to be here, and still a little sad to be here too. Sometimes it's a little better to travel than to arrive."

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

Coming to the end of my 2012 journey, I find my vision a bit rigid, the flow of time becoming heavy and torpid. I am reminded of an observation of travel, and also life - the hardest part is starting.... and ending. I am having trouble finding the correct mode of observation for finding an apartment. I am hoping to rent something furnished so that I don't have to buy things, which will allow for an easy migration if I feel the need to travel again, but most apartment listings on CL are for bare houses. I am considering renting a room, but this time with just one person - my experiment in Portland (renting a room from Morgan) showed that I can tolerate living with someone if our vision is somewhat parallel. So I plod on, hopes of fate placing an apartment squarely into my vision as I blissfully wander about gazing at enormous trees.

* * * * * * * * *

If the run described in my last entry could be considered one of my weaker efforts, the run yesterday up Spencer Mountain was one of my higher moments. I was relieved to find that my energy had risen dramatically, and I loped along the Amazon Trail with a yearning for the forest trails of Spencer. I love the laborious plodding up the mountain, passing trees which fill me with awe and wonder as I wend and bend my way up and up, carrying a cliff bar in my left hand, looking forward to sitting on the summit in solitude, eating and gazing upon the vast vistas which I am unaccustomed to seeing from on high. On the way down I passed a group of five hikers at a crossroads and it did not occur to me to check if I was going in the correct direction after I chose to turn right. Within a half mile I knew I was going down the trail which ended at Willamette Road, so I turned around but after a few steps up I had the impression that the hikers arrived at the crossroads at precisely the time I did so that I could discover this new trail, so I turned myself around and began running fast, gazing at new scenes and trees and when I got to Willamette I rode the shoulder and within a quarter mile passed a Welcome to Eugene pop. 157,00 sign and I ran that hilly pavement back to my normal stopping point, creating a perfectly tuned loop - flats, roads, switchbacks up and down the mountain - I knew I had a new route which I will be running again and again.

* * * * * * * * *

I bought a paperback copy of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance ten days ago at Tsunami Books (along with books by William James, Emily Dickinson, HD Thoreau, Cesar Vallejo, and Thomas Moore, all books found in the dollar bin!). It was a book which I heard about during my first year at NIU. I was night walking with a guy I met at a philosophy club meeting and he told me it was his favorite book. I soon found a copy at the library but after reading the first page put it down, knowing the time was not right for such a book (I read no literature/novels during my 3 years at NIU - I was chasing the cornerstones of truth and decided that nonfiction was the first step in this long path of curious discovery). I never forgot the book, likely because of the Zen word, as I have no interest in motorcycles or maintenance. Twenty years later I begin to read it, and yes, the time is right, words resonating, the experience gained with twenty years of risk taking leading to a clearer sight of the author's vision. Today as I lounged in the backyard, bathed in the blue afternoon shade of an ornamental tree, I began to read chapter 10 and understood that the first life altering decision I mentioned in my last entry mirrored what happened to Phaedrus as he quit science and went in a different direction - "Phaedrus didn't understand this, but after arriving in Seattle, and his discharge from the army, he sat in his hotel room for two whole weeks, eating enormous Washington apples, and thinking, and eating more apples, and thinking some more, and then as a result of all these fragments, and thinking, returned to the University to study philosophy".

* * * * * * * * *

I blew my amp out the first time I plugged in upon returning from Portland. I quickly placed a wanted ad in CL and a typical Eugene character (unkempt hair, disheveled clothing, hip dialect with a scent mixture of 420 and alcohol lingering in his wake) rides his bike 40 minutes carrying the amp under his arm to deliver it to me. While he stated in his email the amp was brand new, when he arrived the "chan vol" knob was missing, and one of the FX knobs was broken. Even with the defects I decided to buy the amp for $65 ($110 new) since the sounds it produced was good enough for practice, and I did not have the heart to send him off on his bike carrying the amp under his arm.

I have been doing guitar work for 2 years and 9 months, this blog being created to document the learning process of something completely foreign. Having no apparent musical talent or skill, I was curious to find out if practice and desire were enough to overcome complete ignorance. At my current level of learning I surely cannot play in public, but the progress I have made from day 1 through today has surpassed my expectations. Every time I sit down to practice I take a few steps down the road of music, and what else is to be hoped for? My memorization of the pentatonic scale has become stronger, and with the main obstacle no longer being able to find correct notes, I notice that speed and note inflection is completely lacking. So this past week the time had arrived for me to use a metronome to work on speed of musical passages. I have known from early on that a metronome is considered an important tool, but I was reluctant to use it because how can a metronome help with memorization of a scale, or getting the fingers strong enough to stretch and remain relaxed? Now that I have decided to focus on speed, the metronome becomes the natural tool, and as I used it for the first time this week I found myself thoroughly enjoying its presence because it makes it easier to play a short passage over and over without losing time or interest.

Along with speed, the inflection of the notes - vibrato and bending - is something I am also focused on. While the wrist turning style of vibrato does not come easy, and almost seems wrong, I am determined to learn it because I see in videos of the blues greats that they all have exceptionally fast wrist turning technique. I recently discovered that one of the problems is that my wrist is not accustomed to turning with speed, so I know I have to work with turning it back and forth for long periods of time.

I believe that I do indeed have the potential to be a good blues player, but only with a lot of continued practice and dedication. The main reason for my confidence has little to do with the physical aspects of guitar playing, but rather my innate feel for the blues - it is a language which is engraved into my spirit, and I yearn to set it free - isn't that the reason any good and honest thing is created?

Decision : Eugene

"There's no record of his having had close friends. He traveled alone. Always. Even in the presence of others he was completely alone. People sometimes felt this and felt rejected by it, and so did not like him, but their dislike was not important to him."

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

Yesterday was a running day, but the arrival of a decisive moment was at hand, and my psychic energy was doing all it could to put off the run. As I loped along during the warm up I could feel my weakened athletic energy being replaced by the desire to walk and ponder. It was time to decide where to put down roots. While not terribly complex, there were a number of important points which had to be thoroughly observed, and not doing so, or just glancing at them superficially, could lead to a misguided choice. Not wanting to run long, I decided on intervals. I circled the grass soccer fields at the middle school, stopping after only 5 or 6 minutes. I felt I should do more, even though desire was lacking, so I jogged to the Amazon Park wood chip trail and was determined to run circuits around the 1000m loop. The first interval I stopped at 800m. I drank water and then began the 2nd one, this time stopping at 500m. So ended my woeful day of running.

I knew it was a weak effort, but the real work was now to begin. How does one go about making a decision which is known with certainty to be life altering? How many of these decisions does one make in a lifetime? As I walked the wood chip trail I thought of the big decisions in my life, and they were few, all of them clutched in the palm of my hand - dropping out of the computer science program at college and changing to history and philosophy; pursuing photography for 10 years starting at the age of 25; accepting my first "respectable job" at 35. As I thought of these 3 decisions I recalled that I had made each one while walking in solitude, allowing the thoughts to flow calmly, observing closely all known facts, and then... the heart speaks, the body fills with an electric energy, the choice seen clearly as colored sunlight resting on the petals of a flower. So I began walking the Rexius Trail, relieved to find it empty of people. The sun was bright and warm, I sauntered along, searching the facts, turning them this way and that. When the walk was complete I knew what I had to do - remain in Eugene, if possible, to begin a new life in this place which feels more like home than any place I have wandered through.

To remain in Eugene. I did not imagine, back in January, 2012, when I left everything to wander through SE Asia, that the free ride of my spirit would end here, in Eugene. There are still practical things to accomplish, the first one being to find a place to live. I am currently renting a room, but I have learned that living with one person (I am currently living with two) is as far as I can go before I start to feel closed in and unhappy, so most of my energy in the coming days will be spent on finding a place to call home. I can imagine how happy I will be to have a place of my own, living in Eugene, with unlimited time - no one to see, nowhere to be - is there anything better in life?

2012

McKenna expressed “novelty” in a computer program which purportedly produces a waveform known as “timewave zero” or the “timewave.” Based on McKenna’s interpretation of the King Wen sequence of the I Ching, the graph appears to show great periods of novelty corresponding with major shifts in humanity’s biological and sociocultural evolution. He believed that the events of any given time are recursively related to the events of other times, and chose the atomic bombing of Hiroshima as the basis for calculating his end date in December of 2012.

With 2012 winding down, I am wondering about the future of man, earth, and sun. On my walk with Catherine through Forest Park last week she asked "do you think we have a chance to survive?" Not wanting to be overly pessimistic, I agreed that there is a chance, based on the herd instinct of humans. A large percentage of us stay in our pens of consciousness, following the outline handed to us from our ancestors, parents, teachers, scholars, and politicians. We do this from fear - fear of the unknown, of being ridiculed, of becoming a freak and an outcast. Unfortunately the leaders of the present day are guiding the herd down a path of insanity and destruction. The small chance of our survival depends upon a change of leaders (not sure who the leaders are, but they are not the politicians, who are the ones who follow orders and then order everyone to follow). If through some miracle wise men begin to lead, things would slowly begin to improve. I don't see this happening however, and this makes the end of time date of 2012 oddly accurate. What "end of time" means, I do not know - will Jesus come down with a band of angels? Will the earth collapse upon itself from a change in magnetic poles? Will the sun be pulled into a black hole, taking us with it? Will people begin to follow new and better leaders?

Thinking of the destructive circumstances which plague the earth is both appalling and somewhat religious in tone - melting ice caps; increase in intensity and amount of natural disasters; genetically engineered food (which will eventually contaminate all the food supplies of the world); the crushing swiftness of the destruction of all wild places; the extinction of most animal species (once bees are gone, so goes our food); the rapidly expanding population of humans; the paving over of the earth so that oil burning vehicles can spew forth great quantities of poison gas; nuclear power, which will eventually contaminate the entire surface of the globe, making all life extinct.

What I find to be most disturbing is that most humans are blind to the facts, and thus continue planning for future prosperity, believing that their children will be inheriting a great feast of prosperity, harmony, and a healthy planet. If 2012 does not change the direction of the earth and its inhabitants, the thing to be inherited will be war, disease, suffering, and death to all.

Portland Peculiarium

My final days in Portland - Running 3 1/4 hours on the Wildwood Trail in Forest Park; wandering the streets of NW Portland, camera in hand; observing hipsters, hipster stores, hipster bus drivers; practicing the pentatonic on the ukelele?!; watching the swifts darken the dusk sky as they descend into the chimney at Chapman School, a full moon rising.

Back in Eugene, I am trying to adapt to a household of four - KC, her son, his friend, and myself. I found myself settling into strong mindful states while in Portland, due to practicing everyday in Morgan's meditation hall. I believe the only way an introvert like myself can remain happy in a crowded house is to go deeper into meditation so that I can clearly see when my mind is turning negative and paranoid, which it tends to do when it feels cramped and stifled. I have learned that I need a feeling of spaciousness and freedom in order to remain healthy - the test is to experience this when the external circumstances are anything but.

Watermelon Seeds

Tomorrow I am moving to the NW side of Portland, staying with a friend of KC's for a few days. On the 1st KC will be passing through and she will give me a ride back to Eugene - the adventure rolls on....

#6 SW

The past 4 days I have hiked/run the #6 SW. I pick it up a few blocks from the house and it leads me through various neighborhoods before ending downtown. The portion I hike is 8-10 miles in length, lots of hills and beauty, it is dream-like in its weirdness -