I feel haunted by bots and idiots who lure me back here with their incessant postings of spam comments on posts that have not been “active” in about 173 years. I just don’t get the mindset of those who think “it’s the way to go” when it comes to developing business, visibility, or whatever it is they want to “develop.”

Who knows, maybe all they want to do is plant a virus on my computer.

Anyway, now and then I choose to respond to the stream of notifications that I have “new comments” to moderate, and then I decide I’ll hang about for a few minutes to see what this new platform is about.

Here’s a small “secret:” I really don’t like WordPress.

I know all “serious” are all about the marvels of WordPress and its assortment of themes and what-have-you… but even though I have had blogs on this platform for almost a decade, I find this THE hardest and THE least intuitive and user-friendly.

Where’s my WYSIWIG? How the HELL can you have an anno 2013 application without at at least an option for a WYSIWIG editor? And why the ferk isn’t this thing widget-driven, in the first place? And why the ferk can’t I just drag and drop an image into this text? How do I get the text to wrap… it’s not HTML, and I don’t have access to the CSS. Use inline CSS commands? REALLY bad form…

So, there’s a new Xanga.

Oddly enough, I am reminded of this on a daily basis because I get little notices to “moderate comments.” Of course, they are not “real” comments… just a variety of not-very-creative attempts by spambots to create artificial backlinks for useless stuff nobody cares about.

Makes me sit and wonder about that, for a moment. “That” being the way so much of our world “runs” on “Not Very Creative Marketing of Useless Stuff Nobody Cares About.”

And it’s not just stupid spam in your mailbox or in comments on your blog, it’s garishly colored plastic doo-dahs screaming at you from the shelves of A Wal-Mart Near You™.

From where I am sitting, it really feels like we need to UN-create the world we have created and are living in. We seem to have fabricated a world in which the income we depend on to buy food (and garishly colored plastic doo-dahs) is inextricably interwoven into a chain of events that makes it essential that we “participate” in creating aforesaid doo-dahs. In other words… if we don’t buy (“consume”) the useless plastic doo-dahs, we won’t have the job that buys us food.

Of course, that’s a very simplistic way of looking at the chain of commerce and consumption. But no matter how you turn it, the shoe does seem to fit. In so many ways.

When I was a kid, “buying furniture” was something you did ONCE, after you left home. It was when you traded in your “student crates” for the coffee table you expected to be using for the rest of your life. Furniture wasn’t a “fashion statement” that required you to change it out every few years to “keep up with current trends.” Sure, you probably spent $400 on that coffee table, rather than $39.99 at Target.

You might be thinking “What’s the big deal? So I buy 10 coffee tables in my life, instead of one.”

Let’s keep in mind that “coffee tables” are just a metaphor, here.

The point is that it’s about more than just the cost of coffee tables. It’s that you make TEN trips to Target or Wal-Mart, rather than one trip to a cabinetmaker, or a local store. It’s that you support faceless mass-market stuff TEN times, rather than a “real” person. It’s that you give your time and bandwidth to buying coffee tables TEN times, rather than once. You consume fuel, time, worry and bandwidth TEN times, instead of ONCE. Not only do you help “feed” the “machine” so many of us (at least philosophically) rail against, you waste an assortment of personal and global “resources” in your efforts to “support” it, even while despising it.

“Oh, but I don’t have a CHOICE!” is the most common refrain.

We always have “a choice.” Whenever we claim to not “have” a choice it’s usually a reflection that we really don’t like any of the choices… and their consequences… we are faced with. “Would you like a sharp stick in the eye, or a shit sandwich?”

Ehhmmm….

It’s easier (or more palatable, or whatever…) to claim “not having” a choice and then moaning and groaning about the outcome “happening TO” us, rather than being active agents in our own lives.

How does this relate to spammy comments? It’s all part of the same “edge of desperation” trying to create incomes out of… nothing-of-value.

Think about it. It’s everywhere, all the time.

Only WE can choose to change it… by becoming conscious and aware, and acting from consciousness.

So, theoretically this is now a new platform for Xanga, and all my stuff has made it “over here.” All ten years’ worth of posts.

Except (if I understand all this correctly) this is now “a WordPress site named Xanga.” Which seems really weird, as I already have a couple of WordPress blogs.

I am not even sure if we are going to “subscribe” here, and whether it is going to cost money. There are so many free blogging platforms on the WWW that it would seem a little odd to have to pay for one. But we paid to have “premium” over at the “old” place, so I guess that’s OK, on some level. I just wonder how many are actually going to come onboard with that.

I suppose it makes sense to pay for the service if you’re “invested” in a huge body of work. And you have links all over creation, and those links still “work” now, even though we’re on a new venue.

Well. Not sure if this “new beginning” is going to inspire me to start blogging here, again. I sort of gave up on having a “general” blog, in favor of pursuing a number of “niche” blogs.

So evidently it appears that the Xanga community… and people in general… actually “put their money where their mouths are” in a substantial enough fashion that Xanga– as a blogging platform– will not go away, after all. There was actually a progress announcement posted today, suggesting that things are “happening.”

Well, it seems pretty much like this is the end of the road… I’ve snagged nine years’ worth of archives (well, only the first six really amount to anything) and I guess that in less than a month there will most likely be no Xanga, anymore.

Wow. Years. It has actually been years since I last posted here.

A couple of days ago, my 92-year old stepdad died. He and my mother got together after my parents divorced (when I was about ten), and he was her companion until her death in 2009. He was never quite himself, after she passed.

When I look at relationships, I’m sometimes not quite sure how they “work.” Whereas I have a reasonably good sense of what my stepdad saw in my mom, I was never quite sure what she saw in him. Much of their relationship seemed to exist against a backdrop my of mother’s litany of complaints about all the things that were “wrong” with him, and that he “didn’t do.” And yet, there they were… together for 37 years, all in all.

I am not sure what it’s about, but sometimes when people die I end up feeling guilty that I am not “feeling more.” I’ve been offered up a smorgasbord of psychobabble as to why this is… from accusations of being “a cold bastard” to assertions that I “don’t experience grieving in the moment.” As I sit here, I don’t feel much sadness… just a sense of quietude, a peaceful gratitude that he has passed from this world he never really seemed to like very much.

There is no doubt in my mind that my stepdad was “a good man.” He stood by his word, and he stood by (and in his own way, adored) my mother… even though her flights of fancy drove him nuts. During his moments of frustration, I could almost hear Rex Harrison singing “Why can’t a woman… be more like a man,” inside his head.

On the whole, I don’t think he liked people very much… and many of his and my mom’s “battles” were (in some fashion) related to their polar opposite differences, when it came to the importance of people and socializing. My mother– the social butterfly– would clash with this isolationist hermit curmudgeon over issues as small as “going out to eat dinner.” Money was also a regular bone of contention between them… mostly surrounding the issue of his unwillingness to spend anything on a better quality of life in latter years… he could afford it, but chose to “do without” almost everything.

With his passing, I no longer have any relatives “of my parents’ age.”

And as I take these moments to ponder his life I’m considering what the significant lifelessons and takeaways might be, here. The one that most readily comes to mind is that you can completely be a “good and honorable” person without in any way being personable or likable. Some people may have really good hearts, but lack the temperament, interest, desire or even social skills to develop an outer expression of what’s inside them… this is a reminder that merits some long hard consideration, in my own life. Thankfully, I have inherited elements of my mother’s personality… and even though I always find being social to be “hard work” I do get out there and engage; and like my stepdad, I am married to a very social and outgoing person.

Well… I’m not really sure where I was going with this; just wanted to “mark a spot,” I suppose.

I don’t remember the comedian’s name, but he did a piece on the tendency we have to “clean our desk” before we can get ourselves motivated to get any of our stuff done. Somehow (for example) the simple task of paying bills becomes an all-but-impossible nightmare if our desk is cluttered. I know this to be a fundamental truth of my own life… so I consider myself busted.

What made me contemplate this “illness” (in between slurps of coffee) is that I’ve been feeling the urge to start writing again. But… of course… I can’t just sit down and resume where I left off, several years ago.

No, no, no, no, no, no, noh…

First, there is a taking of “inventory” and planning.

Maybe it’s the side effect of being a pathological planner and control freak. And– perhaps– a side effect of living for too many years with people who insisted we can “get organized later,” typically with the result that things did get done right away, but then the “retroactive planning” would take forty times longer than a little foresight.

So… I’m “tidying my desk” because I hate wasting time, later…

So next time you find yourself “getting ready” to do something… or resume something you used to do… ask yourself if your “planning” is necessary, or actually an avoidance technique that’s keeping you trapped eternally in a “pre-doing” holding pattern.

Strange how life unfolds.

Strange how, as I look at these pages, it seems that I have come back here about once a year… to write a few words.

Is the idea of blogging still alive? I wonder, sometimes. These days we have CrackFaceBook, Twitter and a million other venues that allow people to connect on the wings of ever shorter bits of information.

I don’t write so much, anymore.

Strange, that. As a kid, I had a feeling I’d grow up to “write stories.” I wanted to… At the time, I wasn’t really sure what motivated me to write– 40+ years later, I understand that I had a purpose, a very specific purpose. A goal, if you will.

What happens after you’ve climbed Everest? What happens after the marathon is over? What happens after the party ends and everyone has gone home?

As one of my Teachers once pointed out, when you close a door behind you, it also means that you have stepped into a new room.

I’ve opened a door and gone through. There is a new room. I wonder what’s inside it….

I don’t write here much, anymore.

Strike that… I stop by, once in a great while, to remind myself that I still have this site. I believe I have actually said this a number of times already… so it’s a bit redundant, and there’s an echo in here.

Just like I don’t write long and involved emails to people anymore, like I used to– if that includes YOU, I’m sorry. I don’t have the bandwidth or the energy…. it doesn’t mean I don’t like you, it means I don’t have the bandwidth or the energy.

It’s nothing personal (the lacking blog, or the lacking emails)– I have to make a living, and it’s a recession, and since nobody has stepped up and offered to sponsor my life, I have to do so, myself. Plus, there have been– and are– other important things that use(d) my time.

Once upon a time, I thought nothing of writing a general blog rant a day, posting on a dozen message boards and sending several long emails. I spent hours, every day, on this. Now? When I am writing long emails, they are mostly reserved for Sarah (in case this is news to you and the little picture at top left didn’t clue you in, she and I have been A Couple In Love for a while… well, forever, really… but that’s a very long story… suffice it to say that Love is a beautiful thing… that expression on our faces? That’s called JOY… she’s “All That” and more to me, and the cool thing is that she digs me, too… The end… and to those of you who kinda figured this out YEARS ago, congratulations… ), or it takes place in one of the venues, below.

[Ponders, for a moment...]

There’s a very, very long story that goes with this blog and its reason for being, in the first place, but I really don’t have the time to tell it, right now. “Buy the book,” when it comes out.

My “Thought du Jour” is that “general” blogs where we rant and rave and just generally empty our brains through tapping away at a keyboard… well, they serve their purpose, when that’s what we need for them to do because we’re in a particular place, in our lives.

Most blogs, these days, are specialized. They are about spirituality, collecting wooden horses, politics in Lithuania or making jams and jellies… less about vomiting up personal trials and tribulations for public Internet consumption. Don’t get me wrong, I said this kind of format has its place… I’m just not in that place, anymore, see?

My point being that I am still blogging and writing out there– just not in a “general” format.

I don’t have much time for words, these days. Most of the words I share in publick are dedicated to my HSP Notes (HSP = Highly Sensitive Person, for the uninitiated) blog, which you can find here:

HSP Notes Blog

For what it’s worth, I’ve been writing it a good bit longer than I’ve been writing here. It’s worth a read, especially if you happen to be an HSP. Or so people tell me.

Other than that, I’m not really very involved in the HSP community, anymore. Again, I don’t have the time, or the bandwidth. My contributions were always a labor of love… and these days I only labor for compensation, and my Love belongs to someone. Someday, I may return to a more active role.

Well. Wait. I do write over here:

Tribe Magazine for HSPs

Again, worth checking out. If you’re an HSP, go there and subscribe!

If you really want to know on which side I part my nostril hair in the morning, you can look me up on crackbook…. ummm… that is, facebook. If you send me a friend request, please let me know that you’re from “over here” or I may just ignore you. Again, nothing personal.

Sometimes I write at Trujournal on matters more spiritual and relating to personal contemplation. Carrie-Anne, Scott and Steven have created a beautiful community, which also includes the Token Rock web site. Seriously, consider joining. You’ll have to create an account to find me (or other friends– several oldxangans are there), anyway.

And since you’re from here, I’d invite you to join Sarah’s “Your Soul’s Plan” interactive journaling group, too. Again, you’ll have to create an account, before that link does anything.

So… what do I DO, these days?

Well, generally, I have created a life in which my “living” comes from “playing with my hobbies,” that is, writing, collecting stamps and beach combing.

And yes, that IS “possible,” thanks to eBay and other internet venues. It’s not about “thinking outside the box.” Or in it, for that matter. It’s about throwing away the box, and creating a new “language” to define the meaning of living, working, happiness and Love.

My mom died, early this fall. She was 87, and during the past 12-18 month suffered declining health and loss of cognitive functions to advanced dementia. This has been another reason why I’ve not been around, very much. As her only living relative, it largely fell to me to manage her care and well-being, from 8000 miles away. Needless to say, not such an easy task… especially the bit involving getting her moved into an assisted living facility. These days, I spend my energies trying to console my 91-year old stepdad, who still lives in their apartment… again, from 8000 miles away.

So why am I here, today? For some reason, I decided to step back and have a “housecleaning day,” to clean up and update various bits and pieces of my life. Because sometimes… that’s just the easiest way to get the news “out there.”