You Don't Choose Terlingua…

Dec31

You Don't Choose Terlingua…

I just went on an amazing solitary hike around Terlingua, over a hill, past Clyde's house that burnt down and back into the Ghost Town where I currently live at Sinta's. The wind had whipped up my dry seriously unwashed hair into a vision I can only describe as a bunch of desert twigs scrunched with hairbands covered in old nests and leaves. I love how in Terlingua that passes for "looking pretty good". I felt pretty good too. (more...)

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Dec31

Loving Like There Is No Tomorrow!

Oh Frank, how do I love thee? How do I begin to count the ways!!! (more...)

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Dec31

Jam Sessions Around a Terlingua Firepit

A spontaneous jam session happens around the firepit for hours outside the Starlight Theater, Terlingua TX in the middle of the night. Jim Keaveny (guitar and harmonica), his girlfriend Anna on the fiddle, my friend Frank (Cuatro), Shand Walton (guitar), my travel buddy Brett squeezed in between and the rest of the locals around. I'll never forget this night.

Watch it on Vimeo.

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Dec30

Be Free

I left for this adventure with a wide open heart, somehow instinctively knowing I would never forget it, for everything I would learn. Weeks before the trip I felt the rumble of thunder in the ache of my bones, knowing the experience would widen and shape me like a young canyon hit by a flash flood, stuck debris rocked from the foundations, ground into fine sand in moments that polished my edges and deepened new gorges before being carried away.

I was lucky in the first place to get to go on a journey like this, at this exact point in my life, with Brett. (more...)

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Dec21

Brett Delivers!

Meet Brett - who could best be described as my 'super psyched' companion for the week or so long Texas adventure I mentioned a while back. As you can see he's a mechanical midwife of sorts, an engine gigolo, which has come in very handy with the guaranteed, yet somehow 'completely unexpected' mechanical failures on extended roadtrips. Women expect them. Men don't. At least at first. That's all I'm saying. So here he is during the birthing process.

Our original plan of leaving on a dirtbike hiking/camping trip around the deserts of Texas had to be modified, because his bike broke down shortly after his own roadtrip began. (more...)

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Dec21

Sugar Oom Pa Pa

Yeowww!!!! *dance* *dance* *dance*

YouTube

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Dec20

Best Pet Insurance

So I usually don't do the whole insurance thing, I don't have any for myself, not even health insurance until its more affordable, but for some reason its different with my kitty Frolina. I realised that she likes to jump up into warm car engines, run all around town in a 3 mile radius, run up trees into stalking cats, wrestle with dogs, lie like a black shadow in dark places I tend to step. She is very high risk. Her enjoyment in life is all about risk. And with my travelling lifestyle on a shoestring I'd never have a spare few grand to cover major surgery that always tends to happen at the worst possible time. So I've been looking around for a month for the best most inclusive Pet Insurance, at a very affordable price, with a very low deductible - $100.

I found Pets Best, and got her insured with more coverage and cheaper than I found elsewhere on the most basic plan. Just around $12 a month. In case anyone is interested.

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Dec19

Embracing the Pain of Freedom

I am currently reading The Road Less Travelled, slowly, a segment at a time, because there is so much to digest and reflect on. Its been a few weeks and I'm only on page 43. As part of my reading today I came across this passage, which is a lesson I learned about a month ago, which I was unable to express through my own writing, but it is so perfectly captured here. I really have a sense I am meant to post this today for some reason, and these days I always trust my gut instinct.

"...basically all patients come to psychiatrists with one common problem: the sense of helplessness, the fear and inner conviction of being unable to 'cope' and to change things. One of the roots of this 'sense of impotence' in the majority of patients is some desire to partially or totally escape the pain of freedom, and, therefore, some failure, partial or total, to accept responsibility for their problems and their lives. They feel impotent because they have, in fact, given their power away. Sooner or later, if they are to be healed, they must learn that the entirety of one's adult life is a series of personal choices, decisions. If they can accept this totally, then they become free people. To the extent that they do not accept this they will forever feel themselves victims."

Embracing this truth really hurt, realising I was suddenly living in the middle of the remotest desert on my own and completely responsible for my own survival scared the wits out of me. But the freedom I now feel after accepting it is immense. By giving into this truth I also had to let go of everything I had invested in that didn't pan out, to acknowledge I made poor choices and that I had given my power away, over and over again in my life, in an attempt to escape being completely responsible for myself. I think this is something we all do to some extent - every time we leave a decision up to someone else, whether it be a partner, a boss, a guru, a parent, to escape ever being responsible for our destiny. And this is just one way. There are so many ways we give up our personal power without realising the huge cost.

I will never hand over my personal power again. I will never allow my fate to be in the hands of another. I have honestly never felt more powerful or more empowered in my life and I can truly say, I have never been happier.

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Dec19

Daily Mantra

At the center of my being I have the answer. I know who I am, and I know what I want.

(more...)

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Dec18

A Boy's First Igloo

From the wonderful BBC documentary, A Boy Among Polar Bears, this video clip shows the young Inuit building his first igloo.

Watch it on YouTube.

I think I may have enjoyed this part even more:
Following his father's footsteps - A Boy Among Polar Bears

"The hunters must journey far out over the frozen sea, leave the modern world behind, travel back in time, to experience the world of the ancestors. This is when our traditions come alive.

Inuit children learn by watching and helping their parents, not by being told what to do. That's the Inuit way."

More clips from A Boy Among Polar Bears.

Thanks Beverley!

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