Liz Baumann

A couple weeks ago I kidnapped myself and took me to Southern California. The initial reason for my trip was to do trail work on Santa Cruz Island, but as it happened I also got to spend a bit of time in Newport Beach with a couple of close friends.

When I lived in California I did hundreds of hours of trail maintenance with the Santa Monica Mountains Trails Council (SMMTC), mostly in the Santa Monica Mountains, but our group also developed a relationship with the National Park Service on the Channel Islands and have been going out there for about a decade. I’ve probably been out about 6 times, usually for a 4-day, 3-night excursion.

It was foggy this trip, the weatherman said something about “zonal flow”… I don’t know, but it reminded me a little of “June gloom”, only it was cooler and March. I don’t recall it ever being foggy on one of my trips to this part of the island, so it got another chance to make a first impression for me.

The trails didn’t have a whole lot of growth compared with some years, aside from Scorpion Canyon trail. Wednesday’s weed whipping began at the top of the trail. This kind of work is what I come out here for: sweat dripping, covered in plant debris and smelling of gasoline while enjoying sweeping views of the island, ocean and Ventura County. The second best I-like-to-be-useful experience was on Friday: we moved dirt around until we’d fashioned a 120 foot new trail diversion to “keep people away from the bat cave.” There was no sign of Bruce Wayne or Alfred, but we (hopefully) saved the bats and it was rewarding to see the end result.

In addition to the work there were a few other memorable island moments: A hike up to Montanon Ridge, a view of Potato Harbor like I’d never seen it before with the spectacular ever-changing fog, and on the boat ride back we happened upon some gray whale sex. None of my photos came out really, but I can confirm that it did look a lot like this. An interesting bit of trivia is they normally perform this activity in threes.

After the island trip I spent quality time with some friends who were RVing it in Newport Beach for the weekend. I always wanted to sleep in one of those granny’s attic parts of an RV and I got my wish. I also enjoyed some really fun kayaking in the bay past really expensive yachts and waterfront homes.

More photos on my Flickr.

I flew to LAX yesterday for a week.

I’m expecting fresh air on my trip, yet I’m afraid I won’t be able to breathe.

A magnitude 4.6 earthquake southwest of LA shook things up 1 minute after my flight landed. I didn’t feel it.

Tuesday through Friday will be a working vacation. As it turns out, it is to be my 243rd week of my 244-week vacation. It will be on a tiny island in the Pacific without a big volcano, where the rule is that big things get smaller and little things get bigger. The crew list includes my dear old friends Barry and Jerry, me listed as “Liz Badman”, and someone I’ve never met before whose name means “good wind”. How poetic.

I planned this trip in January, at the same time I had a strange burning desire of unknown origin to move to Boston. The coast was calling, and I picked the other one.

I’m bookending (and beginning) the ocean voyage spending time with a couple of dear friends, one of whom seems like my publicly personal psychic at times. I’ve never been to see a ‘real’ psychic. I’m not the only one for my friend.

Yesterday afternoon I just wanted to lie on the hard ground and nap in the sun in front of a beautiful mountain. So I did.

It’s strange being back in a place I lived for 8 years. I’m a mix of who I used to be and someone new.

The theme for February was UNPREDICTABLE… according to a website I sometimes visit which gives monthly spiritually-directed forecasts. This intrigued me on a couple of levels, one, a forecast that is defined as unpredictable just makes me giggle. Two, the idea of a lot of unpredictable things happening just makes me feel hopeful and the opposite of bored. While I remain rather agnostic as to whether the forecast really is a forecast and applies to everyone, I find what is said there to be helpful and encouraging in general terms.

Here’s what my February was really like.

At the outset February seemed to be Circus Month:
Feb 2: Visindi Circus,
Feb 8: Moth Poetic Circus. Both of these events were spectacular and unique.
Feb 13: A friend and I invented a new holiday: Imperfectivus, in the spirit of Festivus, it’s “Valentine’s Day for the rest of us”.
Feb 14, Valentine’s Day: As a friend put it, in the news, “The Blade Runner was arrested for retiring a basic pleasure model.” That’s worse than imperfect.
Feb 15: That morning, it rained a sun in Russia. That evening, at the F#@&ing Unicorns “Taste the Rainbow” party, my last trade at the end of the night was for a gold coin necklace. I was also offered some marijuana. I turned down the pot but took the gold.
Feb 19: The toilet overflowed at the Hackerspace. I recalled the February “unpredictable” theme had, in fact, predicted “water issues”.
Feb 20: We found out someone wants to sign a 3 year lease on our space and we have to decide whether to move or not. My gut feel told me this was a good thing, however the Boulder market is tight and expensive so we’ll see.
Feb 23: Let’s just say that what happened today was tough and still is but hopefully something good can come out of it, or at least that it gets better than it feels now.
Feb 26: The flooding toilet was not a water issue after all, it was due to roots grown into the drain, i.e., a tree issue.
Feb 28: The fire marshall finally visited us too. Luckily we don’t have many issues there.

Also this month: I became VP of Education for my Toastmasters group and became (I think officially) Treasurer for the Boulder Hackerspace. I was also told I could expect a job offer; March finds me hopeful for that.

What of that prediction of “Unpredictable”? I would agree that there were a bunch of surprises… although some of these things were already set in motion, some felt like prophecy in hindsight, but then a lot of other things that could have happened didn’t. Glancing over the rest of what was said about February, it did ring eerily true.. but maybe it would feel that way if I substituted January as well.

As a side note, a friend saying “it’s just funny how things keep happening right after we talk about them” makes me lean toward saying that February was not all that unpredictable.

For me personally, in the end I would describe February as “invaluable”. A mix of hurting and healing, obscuring and revealing, rooting and reeling. I’ve learned a lot about myself this month, what is important to me, why, how it is different from what is important to other people, some things I will not change about myself, and that things are often not quite as they seem.

I wonder what March’s forecast will be… something to contrast upredictable? serenity? tranquility?

I wrote this last summer. It isn’t finished.

I remembered it the other day during a conversation with a friend and I decided to share these half-assembled fragments anyway, not so much because of the content, but rather as a statement about the symbolism and beauty of the unfinished. I could add a few paragraphs explaining what I mean by that, only I suppose I would never finish them… so I’ll leave it for you to ponder.

* * * * *

at the asylum we conspired
polishing twigs with sand
for the impossible fire
unburned upon the land

wood pieces of me
let what wasn’t be?
bury my treasure in the sand
happy by my own hand

be the gorgeous tease
if you please
I break the rule unwritten
shy but smitten

stuck in the middle
with a catch 42
half-plus-seven
there’s recursion for you

another dimension makes it simpler
entanglement
the Wind carries echoes of the Sun

broken glass, broken clouds

The Observer chases its tale
like a Fairy Tale Fail

while we ponder the closure
clocks locked inside
buy another ticket
to not ride the Red Tide

. . .
like Sophie’s choice
when time isn’t

wild wild things
not to control
not to analyze

The Skye so bright
heart unripened
why spoil the connection
with one-sided affection
add another dimension
to belief’s suspension

I remember passing myself the other day, going the other direction on my own path.

Waving frantically, my savvy Socratic self heartily held my hand and said: “Finally, what took you so long? Didn’t you get all those cryptic messages we sent you? You’re pretty dense sometimes.”

“I-I was busy, and my soul was caged, what do you expect”, stammered my insufferably stubborn insensibly sensible self.

“Yes, it was for a while – but you saw the mystical message from the Moon that we sent you earlier this month, surely you heard that.”

“I remember it well, indeed it spoke to me. But I get insecure and wallow in self-pity sometimes and miss stuff like this.”

Socratic self agreed, “Tell me about it… We saw you coming around though. We wondered if it was the words from the Sage that shook you out of your cage.”

“Hehe, yes that was … that became… oh, that’s the best part. I only realized I was set free by finding I’d fallen into the trap I’d fashioned for myself. Since then, I keep recalling all those other things I’ve been saying… when I really had no idea… I’m kind of embarrassed, so slow I am…”

“Surprise is best for you, we know you like to discover these things for yourself. At least you figured out that you are mysterious too, a product of your environment perhaps. That actually impressed me a little, renewed our hope in you.”

“I’d been giving up for some time,” my tirelessly timid and sometimes insecure self admitted. “I keep thinking, this is so like what happened last year. I called it ‘premembering‘ then… when it felt like I’d sensed the signs, but only really saw them after I passed them. Foresight in hindsight, I guess that’s called hindsight bias… But, this time I noticed it before anything happened… or, will anything happen? It does seem so highly unlikely.”

“That may be up to you. What do you mean by ‘anything’, and what makes you think it hasn’t? Time will have told.”

“Truly. And yes, the purpose may not be primarily personal, perhaps it points to peripherals along my path. Like they were saying in that meeting. May be more about ‘what’ than ‘who’. What has been revealed to me is only half – or maybe less – of it.”

“Oh, so you do listen to us once in a while, maybe you are learning after all,” sly Socratic self said.

“Of course I am. I just don’t always believe it. Reminds me of something I heard a machine say yesterday: ‘I need to remember the data points I predict wrong, otherwise, how am I going to learn?’”

“Definitely. It is discerning to disbelieve by default. And we can learn a lot from those we teach.”

Another LED turned on in insufferably sensible self’s head. “Jeez, I just remembered something else I said that matches up as I was writing this.”

“There’s a lot. You’ve barely scratched the surface.”

“What – what IS this? This… delightfully dizzying disentropy? Did I manifest this? Did you? Did someone else? Is there really such a thing? You’ve been saying ‘we’; who are you? I mean, are you just me, or multiple versions of me?”

Socratic self returned: “We are all one. We have always been here. We are primordial.”

“Huh? Oh never mind, I can’t look. It paints such a pretty picture, but I’ll destroy it by looking, I know I will. I better not dare say anything either, and no short-cutting. Focus on presence, not prescience. Practice patience to prevent pernicious peril.”

“Precisely.”

“So where are you off to?” sensible-sounding self asked.

“I thought I would prance around a bit in the slightly-more-predictable past for a while.”

“Nice. Maybe I’ll see you here again sometime soon.”

“It’s impossibly probable. Or improbably possible. Maybe…”

“We keep being preminded of Björk. Let’s listen to another one of her songs.”

“Ok.”

This past week my thoughts have been connecting like pieces falling magically into place in a multi-dimensional jigsaw puzzle. It dawned on me that I’d felt this way before, but it has been a while and I almost forgot. I think of it as “seeing the matrix.”

I’ve spent most of my life not experiencing and not thinking much about things like this. Is this sensation real and significant? Why? Is it meaningful? While I sense it may be beneficial not to ignore the feeling, I would be amiss to claim I really know any of these answers. I did push on something a couple weeks ago and since then have been wondering about repercussions. On the surface it would seem nothing of any significance transpired or is going on. But in recalling how one mystery led to another, I am suddenly led back again, and in between I found a couple more. I found myself staring at the ghost… I never expected to see him there. Maybe it wasn’t him, it was far too bright to tell; but if not then maybe it was in spirit.

If I’ve learned anything the past couple years it’s that this experience or sensation or whatever is just another tempest in a teapot. When I step back I question if my role is meant to be as a spectator or a participant. More likely perhaps, is that I am just the narrator: barely getting my feet wet as I observe the swirling realignments, noticing things that are significant only to me. As I spin in these pointless circles, connecting the dots, I finally take a friend’s advice and ask: what meaning should this have for me, is there anything of value here?

At last I think I may be coming to some real answers. It’s been leading me back to my roots as well as toward something new. I can do better than this; but even more I found I want to, I need to, and I feel indebted to do better than this. Purpose.

* * * *

Like my series of plotless Monster stories this probably appears to be going nowhere, and so I’ll simply close with a phrase, a quote and a song, some things that this senseless tirade brought to mind:

P. “Suspension of disbelief.” To me it means having no preconceived notions, suspending judgment, elevating the initial agnostic position as default – as the null hypothesis requiring proof – instead of giving in to first impression, what I want to hear, or don’t want to hear. I think people are sometimes too quick to believe things. But I have no proof of that; so I guess it is a belief (or disbelief) in itself. I suppose that means I can suspend it once in a while.

Q. “The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function.” – F. Scott Fitzgerald

When I first read this quote a couple months ago I was at a bit of a low point and it made me feel demoralized and inadequate. But now I ask: why just two?

S.

It’s been almost a month now and this story is old news, but perhaps it’s never too late to give old news a new spin.

On Saturday November 10, after safely traveling the 20 or so miles round trip to Boulder and back for a workout, I was on the street directly in front of my apartment, driving at what I thought was a safe slow speed given the 231 types of cold November rain that fell that day, with the 4wd lulling me into a false sense of security, and not too worried about the diminutive unthreatening-looking trees behind the shallow ditch up ahead after a gentle curve. When I reached the curve however, I could not get my car to steer left. I tried braking, I tried not braking, if I’d had a little more time to think I might have tried downshifting. But I didn’t, and I couldn’t stop, and was left to watch helplessly as my vehicle and I slid into the gutter and struck the tree. I was fine personally, not even whiplash, the tree only had a little gouge in it, and my pickup started up again, but the right front end was a mess.

I later considered that earlier that morning I had set “drive my karma” as my gmail status, a stab at humor brought on by some more serious thoughts about a relationship in my past that I invariably spin my wheels on every so often, blaming myself for it not ending better while never coming up with something I could have done differently to make it better. It is almost fitting that I can also now spin about how maybe if I’d gone a little slower, or not went out that day, or not made jokes about karma, I wouldn’t have hit that tree. … Tree… in German the word for tree is Baum.

I could (and too frequently do, annoying or amusing friends and strangers alike) muse about goofy connections like this in a variable combination of seriousness, wonder, and jest. While I know that seeing a pattern does not prove underlying organization or cause, they tickle my imagination and frequently lead me on to other thoughts wherein I do find useful messages.

In this case, what I’m taking away from this (besides the repair bill) is that it’s time to act more responsibly and make more effort to control where I’m going. This is not an isolated conclusion, for there are at least two other areas in my life right now (sticks and carrots) where I feel I’m being sent a similar message as well as one or two positive lures encouraging me to do so.

(Apparently though, I think it’s still ok to make jokes about karma )

I’ve succumbed to a fear of expressing myself lately. It started with politics and this year’s election, but has bled into other areas. At times I’ve felt it pointless to express any opinion, regardless of how something moved me. On the one hand it’s selfish and rude; on the other, I just haven’t been feeling strong enough.

Consequently I’ve been depressed, holding a lot of emotion in, and suppressing things that I wanted to say. I am using this post to relieve some of the pressure. Unlike most other posts, I decided not to include a link to it on my Facebook, in part because this is way too long to ask or expect anyone to read, but also because deciding to not do so has freed me up a bit more to add about another page or so of content to this post.

I’ve not sure I’ve ever really pointed it out, but I call this blog “my public diary” because it is first and foremost a form of a diary for me, i.e. the primary audience I am targeting is myself – myself of today, tomorrow, next year. This is especially true for this post. The “public” just means I’m comfortable enough making this public, not minding if others read it. For this post, I mostly want to record that these things have been on my mind a lot lately, in a place that I can look back to next year, four years from now, etc. I’m a bit curious to see if or how my views might change over the course of time.

Below are my feelings on a number of topics that have been on my mind. A bunch of them are related to politics, but it extends beyond.

Politics and the 2012 Election (Barack Obama vs Mitt Romney)
Anytime I’ve expressed anything political at this election on Facebook I’ve ended up feeling horrible, regardless of how it turned out. My desire to not be wrong is matched by my desire to not be responsible for influencing anyone. Because I really don’t know enough. I may never know enough. That’s fine; I feel that this sort of thing is not my calling, and I am rather new at evaluating it all. I can say that I’ve made a considerable effort this election to learn and understand more than I have in the past. There is still a lot for me to understand – the debt/deficit and its causes; political ideologies outside the standard Dems/Repubs, to name a couple.

I voted for Obama. My vote was not based on a single issue but rather across most if not all issues. I’m genuinely impressed with Obama, I think he has done a good job given the state of things when he took office. We thought we were heading into another Great Depression when he took over. We didn’t. We haven’t recovered like some people expected… but I’m not sure their expectations were reasonable. It also seems he hasn’t gotten support like he might have expected – Congress seems very polarized. I believe Obama is compassionate, thoughtful, listens, wants to compromise, is concerned with doing the right thing. I have and still do consider myself a Democrat. In the past this has largely been over social issues. This election I have discovered my leanings are Democrat in other ways too.

I have a genuine mistrust of Romney. I don’t hate Romney nor the things he stands for, rather I don’t trust he has America’s best interests at heart. I think he wants to become President but not be one. His history in business sounds like he was a corporate looter. He says one thing and then says the opposite on many issues. His campaign seems to be made of standard Republican soundbites: lower taxes, more defense spending, and I can handle the debt better. Several studies have argued his plans are mathematically impossible. Social issues aside, I don’t trust him on his other policies.

These are only my opinions based on the knowledge I have at this moment. I’m saying that for myself as much as to anyone else who might read this.

Labels and Ideology
People like to label things and this sometimes leads to name calling of people. In trying to be objective once in a political conversation on a friend’s Facebook post, I was called (by a friend of the friend) a “liberal idealogue”. I should have asked what that meant and why this person felt this way. I also shouldn’t let it bother me… but I also need to learn to expect it, because people can and should be allowed to say what they feel. It is what it is… so what do I think I am? It would be true to call myself socially liberal – pro-choice, LGBT rights, separation of church and state, etc. Economically I feel more like a moderate, or at least, I think we need different viewpoints and would like to see a compromise between fiscally conservative and fiscally liberal. Some of my actions and personal preferences undoubtedly lean closer to Socialist than Capitalist, so I shouldn’t be surprised or insulted if other people call me a Socialist. With foreign affairs I don’t have as strong opinions, but I lean towards trying to get along, not sticking our nose into every little thing, being careful, long-term focused, concerned with what is good for all rather than just us… while recognizing some boundaries shouldn’t be crossed and some deeds need to be punished.

Political Parties
It feels to me like there is a party transformation happening: a right-wing (and/or other extremes) takeover of the Republican party, and thoughtful Republicans becoming Democrats. This may be pushing Socialist-leaning Democrats out of the Democrat party. A few weeks ago a friend stated he felt “Obama is one of the greatest Republican Presidents”. I asked a couple of other people what they thought of it and they didn’t disagree, also I’ve seen this expressed independently in blogs elsewhere. I would guess part of it is the championing of Obamacare which is based on Republican plans rather than universal coverage administered by the government, but there are probably other reasons too – handling of prisoners outside our borders comes to mind. I’ve also seen statements by both friends and strangers that they used to consider themselves Republican but are voting for Obama – or even saying they never expect to vote Republican again.

Reproductive Rights
In particular I feel those who push no contraception + no abortions + small government are being unrealistic and ignoring the incompatibilities of these views. The resulting scenario isn’t just hard on women; men in this type of situation (assuming child support is still part of the equation) start talking about fleeing the country to escape. Those who push these sort of ideals I think are really pushing the notions of dominance and submission, under the guise of religious belief. I think the BDSM aspect may be part of economic philosophy too.

Health Care
Obamacare sure seems a lot like Romneycare. This country has had a problem reigning in health care costs for years. Democrats would probably have preferred universal health care as a solution, but instead pushed through this plan, presumably as a compromise. I think it’s a step in the right direction. I don’t think a return to the situation before is smart or reasonable. It is hard for America to compete with other countries because of our high health care costs, and medical expenses are the leading cause of bankruptcy. Just hoping the problem will go away didn’t work before, why would it work to return to it now? Romney’s comment about emergency room care being a better solution seems particularly silly. It may be that spending is not brought under control with this plan in its current iteration, but at least we are trying. You really can’t always predict how something as broad and far reaching like this will turn out without implementation. But we are erring on the side of action, which I feel is better than doing nothing.

Retirement and Money
I’m actually quite serious when I joke I’ve been on mid-life-retirement (MLR). In 2008 I voluntarily left a corporate job that paid well and provided good opportunity for advancement, because I wanted to take a break and try some new things. I prefer to live modestly and had considerable savings which I have lived off of for these 4+ years. Taking this time off has been one of my best decisions.

I read a story suggesting that after a certain amount in salary, more money does not add to one’s happiness. This matches my experience. I saved up money I didn’t want to spend, to buy time in my MLR. I’m so glad I did. If I find myself in the situation of earning more than I want to spend again, I will do the same. Spending the excess on things like more expensive cars, bigger houses, more things, etc. would actually detract from my happiness (worry over theft and taking more time or stress to manage). I do realize not everyone feels the way I do, and recognize that money is one of the easiest measures of success.

Career
I miss not working. I want a real job again, in part for the structure and mental stimulation. It’s also true I’m now living off some IRA money not just savings, however the financial strain feels secondary to my other needs. In my MLR I’ve done some fun things, some of which I will continue, but I’ve realized I’ve been missing something. I imagined and explored 2 alternate career paths in these last 4 years: web development and wearable technology (for lack of a better term – mostly lighting up clothes or other portable objects with battery power, simple circuits and Arduinos). These have provided technical and creative outlets, but I’m also a very analytical person – I probably always will be – and neither of these careers are very analytical. Furthermore, the business aspect of how to go about getting paid for this type of work is something I really do not enjoy. Analytical work pays really well and I was pretty good at it. It makes sense for me to go back to it, and do the other things on the side (namely the lighting-up business; web development is not something I plan to continue pursuing).

Building Things
Something else I don’t intend to give up is the Hackerspace culture. I’m proud to be part of the Boulder Hackerspace, Solid State Depot, where people get together and share ideas, projects, etc in engineering and art. Regarding this organization, my primary goal of my involvement is to see the group succeed. My personal role in it is secondary. Building things yourself is fun, but it’s even better to collaborate and say “we built this”.

Gender Segregation
I mostly dislike the formation of women-only groups, mostly because I expect it will (or even, should) lead to men-only groups that I’m no longer allowed in, and I really appreciate the mix and perspective of a cross-gender group. I probably tend to feel more comfortable and relate more to a group of men than a group of women. For one thing, I don’t have kids and have never yearned to have any of my own, and kids tends to be a more central focus and thus topic of women’s lives than men’s. For another, I’ve grown accustomed to being in male-dominated groups since my teens. Another reason I don’t like gender-specific groups: as an advocate for trans-gender… where do they fit in?

Ayn Rand
I recently read the 1000+ page Atlas Shrugged. I found it a worthwhile experience, a thoughtful and meaningful book with lessons based on historical experience. In particular I found a number of her quotes to be relevant and thought-provoking. I realize there is personal historical significance for the author and in regards to Russia and Communism. I don’t however feel that the scenario portrayed in this book is reflected in our current reality in the US as some do. Early on I viewed it as portraying a polarized world of extremes without much attempt at compromise. I suspect you can get to a dismal state such as that portrayed in the book through either the Communist extreme portrayed there or through its opposite extreme of Capitalism.

Separation of Evil
Segueing from Ayn Rand – calling Communism “evil” just doesn’t seem a compatible term to me – “evil” is a religious term, and I don’t view Communism as being a religious philosophy. Calling something evil demonizes it so it can be put down with less guilt, and I agree with the suggestion that “evil begets evil”. I also do not like that people refer to a choice in political candidates as “the lesser of two evils” – thinking like that will make you believe more strongly that it’s true. It takes a lot of effort to run for office or hold one and I respect people who make those choices. Deifying or demonizing political candidates also doesn’t seem compatible terminology, maybe it’s what leads to other expectations like these people being all-knowing, but furthermore, it provides a huge discouragement to anyone who might think of running for office. It’s like saying you’re born a sinner, which I have a hard time believing. Speaking of which…

Religion
I’m probably best described as Agnostic. I’m not busy searching, looking to “decide” on a religion to believe in in my lifetime. Rather, I have no such expectation, preferring to continue to learn and question, and choosing to “believe” one would be lying to myself. The Abrahamic religions in particular (Christianity, Judaism, Islam) don’t ring as believable to me, in part because it’s clear so much must have been left out and/or tampered with. A huge part of this is that they seem like men’s religions; women are portrayed as external objects, and this doesn’t match how I feel. I realize that it’s a function of patriarchy, but it makes the whole thing less believable. That doesn’t mean I don’t find value and meaning in Biblical stories. Eastern philosophies (whether these are religions is not clear to me) hold truer to me, but taking anything to an extreme seems foolish. I like learning about religions and hearing people’s personal stories about why they believe what they believe. That being said, it isn’t always easy – so much is done in the name of religion that I don’t agree with, that I forget sometimes that not all religious people think that way. But I know a fine group of Christians here in Colorado, not to mention most of my family is Christian.

My Own Moral Code
Being religionless does not mean that I have no morals. In particular I view these ideals as important:
Truth – to others and to oneself, being logical, being objective, scientific reason, striving toward solutions that are good for the most people, having compassion, keeping an open mind, openly expressing oneself, resisting the temptation to take things to extremes. There is something to be said for attitude, too – being angry, for me at least, is destructive and makes all those other good things harder to come by. Sometimes living by my own moral code is a struggle, but these are goals I strive for.

****
That’s all for now. Thanks for listening, Liz of 2013, 2016, etc. and anyone else who may have tuned in and stuck around to the end!