In my tight budgeting of the past few years, I have become accustomed to not spending much to any time in shopping areas. This means that when I do go to a shopping center, it feels almost otherworldly. In a store or in a collection of stores, I feel out of place and overly conscious about how much $$$ I am $pending.
This doesn't have to be this way! It's all relative!
Yesterday I bit the bullet and bought two books at Marin's best bookstore Book Passage for $45. While that is not cheap, again, it is all relative. $45 is also 5 1/2 Marin-SF commuting trips (and 4 if it is on the ferry), several trips to the coffee shop, a certain amount of food purchases... all of which I have done and continue to do.
And though it may seem that I am spending alot of money in the moment, it evens out, ultimately, and I stay grounded.
Wednesday, May 11, 2011
Friday, May 06, 2011
Effortless or Effort Filled
I am perplexed by the increased effort that long form blogging (as I like to call it) seems to generate these days. It seems that I, or others, have become accustomed to quick little instantaneous updates on people's lives, and may have lost the patience for composing or recounting additional details. Clearly this is a casualty of the Twitter era, and it is an unfortunate one.
Even on this blog, which I hadn't realized that I had treated with a level of depth and precision, it is evident that I used detail and emphasis in the past. In fact, I was surprised by the level of detail, especially with my first Cross Country trip in 2006. It suddenly came back to me that this blog had been a chronicle of that experience. Interesting how I had forgotten that.
In the present day, I want to continue to re-engage with this blog. I found that some of my most engaging posts appeared when I wrote about something in the present tense, as if it was happening while I was writing it, and you were reading it. I want to keep that in mind for future chronicles, especially when I travel to the Mojave Desert one week from today.
What could appear from recent events (within this past week) that is worth chronicling. Let me look at my calendar... Oh, yes, now I remember.
In San Francisco, I generally keep a fairly tight routine centered around my school in the SOMA district of the City. On Wednesday, I varied that up a bit, visiting the offices of Theatre Bay Area (TBA), where I worked in a long-term internship two years ago. Since my stint there, TBA has moved to another office just two blocks from my school. I don't visit them extremely often, but I am struck by the "parallel worlds" when I do go there. It's fascinating that my two (dual?) worlds in the city are so close together, and yet far apart. I can always feel the noticeable transition when I do that walk up or down Mission Street.
Even on this blog, which I hadn't realized that I had treated with a level of depth and precision, it is evident that I used detail and emphasis in the past. In fact, I was surprised by the level of detail, especially with my first Cross Country trip in 2006. It suddenly came back to me that this blog had been a chronicle of that experience. Interesting how I had forgotten that.
In the present day, I want to continue to re-engage with this blog. I found that some of my most engaging posts appeared when I wrote about something in the present tense, as if it was happening while I was writing it, and you were reading it. I want to keep that in mind for future chronicles, especially when I travel to the Mojave Desert one week from today.
What could appear from recent events (within this past week) that is worth chronicling. Let me look at my calendar... Oh, yes, now I remember.
In San Francisco, I generally keep a fairly tight routine centered around my school in the SOMA district of the City. On Wednesday, I varied that up a bit, visiting the offices of Theatre Bay Area (TBA), where I worked in a long-term internship two years ago. Since my stint there, TBA has moved to another office just two blocks from my school. I don't visit them extremely often, but I am struck by the "parallel worlds" when I do go there. It's fascinating that my two (dual?) worlds in the city are so close together, and yet far apart. I can always feel the noticeable transition when I do that walk up or down Mission Street.
Wednesday, May 04, 2011
JP in May
Looking back through older journal entries gave me a sudden idea to post a photo of myself from May of the past five years. Narcissistic for sure, but actually an intriguing exercise.
2006: I clearly recall lying down on the grass outside my Hampshire mod to take this picture. Just a few days shy of Graduation, I had recently shaved off my goatee, which I had sported for the previous three months, originally as a beard. I had no conception of the complete tonal shift that post graduation life would bring.
2007: Leaving my apartment home base of three months in St. John's Wood, London. Attempting to grow (hair) back out of the preppy look I had been carefully groomed in for working on THE BOURNE ULTIMATUM.
2008: Sporting a floppy and relaxed California look while touring Hearst Castle.
2009: A similar relaxed California look while visiting the Point Reyes Lighthouse area for the first time.
2010: Hanging out in Santa Barbara on a weekend return visit to the Central Coast. Sporting my slightly spikey look that I realize I tended to favor off and on over the past few years.
2011: Back to the buzzz in Point Reyes again. Recently purchased an at-home clipper kit and making use of it. Realizing that I prefer the buzzz look for here and now. Noticing with surprise that I acquired a mole of sorts above my right eyebrow sometime within the past year.
2006: I clearly recall lying down on the grass outside my Hampshire mod to take this picture. Just a few days shy of Graduation, I had recently shaved off my goatee, which I had sported for the previous three months, originally as a beard. I had no conception of the complete tonal shift that post graduation life would bring.
2007: Leaving my apartment home base of three months in St. John's Wood, London. Attempting to grow (hair) back out of the preppy look I had been carefully groomed in for working on THE BOURNE ULTIMATUM.
2008: Sporting a floppy and relaxed California look while touring Hearst Castle.
2009: A similar relaxed California look while visiting the Point Reyes Lighthouse area for the first time.
2010: Hanging out in Santa Barbara on a weekend return visit to the Central Coast. Sporting my slightly spikey look that I realize I tended to favor off and on over the past few years.
2011: Back to the buzzz in Point Reyes again. Recently purchased an at-home clipper kit and making use of it. Realizing that I prefer the buzzz look for here and now. Noticing with surprise that I acquired a mole of sorts above my right eyebrow sometime within the past year.Tuesday, May 03, 2011
Tomales Point Trail
Yesterday I ventured back out the Point Reyes Peninsula to the Tomales Po
int Trail, a 9.5 mile long round trip hike to the extreme northern tip of Point Reyes. I had a teaser visit to this area of Point Reyes in mid-March, when I chose to visit nearby McClure's Beach. I knew that tackling Tomales Point would be more of an epic affair. I also felt embarrassed as I struggled to make the time to visit the trail. Suddenly, an opportunity arose when I received an assignment for my "Wilderness Rites of Passage" course with its upcoming trip to the Mojave Desert. What better location would there be to take a solo hike than going back out to Tomales Point?
I was certainly not disappointed, though I may have not realized the epic scope of the trip. In fact, one of the more surprising elements of my hike was how the "out" and "back" segments felt like two different trips. The culprit was ostensibly the heavy fog that enveloped the point on m
y way out. Whereas when I returned, the fog had vanished and the surroundings took on a completely different feel and flavoring. I quickly realized that I had taken little to no notice of certain features of the landscape. The return trip also played with my expectations, where I anticipated the return trip would feel shorter... but it did not. Ultimately both segments of the walk took exactly the same length of time: two hours. I felt that time ceased to matter out there at the tip of Tomales Point. I was shocked to find that my cellphone had service, and expressed the sentiment in a brief perfect 140 character text tweet:
Cant believe I have cellphone service here on the northern tip of Point Reyes (Tomales Point) after hiking for 2 hours.
I actually came to regret pulling out the cellphone, which I had carefully kept off on the way out. It made me rely on it much more for the time and to see what was going on as I returned to the parking area. In an odd though probably symbolic coincidence, the professor of the Wilderness course called me while I was driving away from the Point.
The focus of the hike was encouraged to be about noticing one's own personal process, and seeing how that affected a physical activity while one also chose to fast during the hike. I found fasting to be surprisingly easy and all about the INTENTION. Being comfortable with my own thought process and place in the world is another matter, and a worthy focus for the vision quest.
int Trail, a 9.5 mile long round trip hike to the extreme northern tip of Point Reyes. I had a teaser visit to this area of Point Reyes in mid-March, when I chose to visit nearby McClure's Beach. I knew that tackling Tomales Point would be more of an epic affair. I also felt embarrassed as I struggled to make the time to visit the trail. Suddenly, an opportunity arose when I received an assignment for my "Wilderness Rites of Passage" course with its upcoming trip to the Mojave Desert. What better location would there be to take a solo hike than going back out to Tomales Point?I was certainly not disappointed, though I may have not realized the epic scope of the trip. In fact, one of the more surprising elements of my hike was how the "out" and "back" segments felt like two different trips. The culprit was ostensibly the heavy fog that enveloped the point on m
y way out. Whereas when I returned, the fog had vanished and the surroundings took on a completely different feel and flavoring. I quickly realized that I had taken little to no notice of certain features of the landscape. The return trip also played with my expectations, where I anticipated the return trip would feel shorter... but it did not. Ultimately both segments of the walk took exactly the same length of time: two hours. I felt that time ceased to matter out there at the tip of Tomales Point. I was shocked to find that my cellphone had service, and expressed the sentiment in a brief perfect 140 character text tweet:Cant believe I have cellphone service here on the northern tip of Point Reyes (Tomales Point) after hiking for 2 hours.
I actually came to regret pulling out the cellphone, which I had carefully kept off on the way out. It made me rely on it much more for the time and to see what was going on as I returned to the parking area. In an odd though probably symbolic coincidence, the professor of the Wilderness course called me while I was driving away from the Point.
The focus of the hike was encouraged to be about noticing one's own personal process, and seeing how that affected a physical activity while one also chose to fast during the hike. I found fasting to be surprisingly easy and all about the INTENTION. Being comfortable with my own thought process and place in the world is another matter, and a worthy focus for the vision quest.
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