Traveling Too Rare

This past Saturday, on my way to my university alumni rugby game against the youngin's, I was pulled over for my first time in a while. True, I may have been going a little quickly, and it was true that I had sped up to make two yellow lights through an s-like intersection, but I've been pulled over for a lot more. At least I was in my own car.

I spoke with the officer, who was pleasant enough, who told me he hadn't liked the way I had come through the intersection. He stated this to me the same way one would state that they hadn't liked the olives in their Greek salad. I justified to him that I felt I had committed myself to the intersection and that hitting the breaks, especially on wet pavement, through a circuitous intersection seemed to me to be more dangerous than making the light. I apologized for the maneuvering in and out of traffic I had done to make the lights, and he gave me the impression that my answer was thoughtful and somewhat reasonable, given the situation.

He took my license and registration with him back to the car, and I waited in mine, listening to Van Morrison and nodding at the gentleman across the street who was half-working, half-checking out the scene in front of his business; the expression he wore was one of curiosity more than accusatory. The officer returned a few minutes later and handed me a written warning: traveling too rair. (It took me a few minutes to make out what the offense was, until I remembered the average intelligence for police officers is around 100.) For the first time since law enforcement officers have been writing me citations, fines, tickets, and court appearance dates, I smiled in light of my transgression.

Traveling too rare. I still like the sound of that.

Pickle Smoocher

Well, dear readers, subscribers (all 13 of you), and SmileyNDE (I know you're out there), it's been a long time since my last blog post, this is true. When last you read, I was picking up dog poo at and Animal School in Warren, Rhode Island, and that was about it. Well, my professional career has improved. I now work for a Fortune 500 company as an administrative assistant in the rehabilitation departments of three different nursing homes, as well as for the district as a whole. It's a lot of work, but it pays the bills and provides me plenty of time for my personal life.

But all of that news is just an update. I realize it's boring.

My Sunday mornings as of late provide the real entertainment in my life. I have been meeting on Federal Hill in Providence, the "Little Italy" of the city, to play afternoon street hockey with some colorful characters. For the most part, I would describe them as hard-working, hard-drinking, blue collar, hockey superfans. Several of them wear Boston or Providence Bruins jerseys over their hooded flannel sweatshirts. One guy always plays in a thin black leather jacket; another guy, Mikey Nails, is missing all of his top teeth from bicuspid to bicuspid. They affix soccer shin guards to the outside of their grey sweatpants with electrical tape. The goalies play with second base gloves.

We congregate behind an elementary school, and play for 2 - 3 hours on a portion of a back parking lot. I was invited my first week by a friend on the Providence Rugby Club, Meaty, and have been going back ever since. I'm known as, "the guy in the pink hat," for the Goorin pink knitted hat I wear each week. Street hockey is not at all like field hockey, or ice hockey; it is a sport entirely unto itself, especially in this company. I'm constantly being rotated between forward and defense--it seems I haven't found a position where either the team or myself is entirely comfortable.

We play, usually, with a hard yellow plastic ball, which is always sailing over one of the fences and into the houses or cars on the opposite side of the street. After temporarily losing the yellow ball last week, someone threw in a pink ball, which was almost immediately thrown back in disgust. "We don't play wit' no pink balls out here," one guy in a running suit adamantly shouted back at the sidelines. "We don't got no pickle smoochers on this team!" A few of the guys looked at me and then up at my knitted hat.

"Pickle smoocher." What an inventive term, I was thinking. There was a sense in the air that I should reply. The game play had temporarily stopped and everyone seemed to be looking back at me, as if this was my moment to stand and defend myself, to come back with something that would affirm my place on this parking lot, my right to be there. The moment was becoming too long. I shifted my stance, pushed up the brim of my hat with my ice hockey glove, tapped the ground with the end of my stick twice and shouted back, ... "YEah!"

Filipino DemiGod in the Days of Friendster

There have been so many new social networking sites develop in the last few years that now many people have multiple accounts; I, myself, have one on Facebook and Myspace, although I rarely ever use the latter.

Does anyone remember Friendster? Does Friendster still exist, I don't know. The one thing I remember about Friendster--that's happened to me nowhere else--is that I was befriended by a large number of Filipinos, who I had never met, nor spoken with. I only have two Filipino friends, brothers, and neither of them knew any of the people who had befriended and were following me online. Their belief was that the name "Freeland" must be closely related, and therefore easily mistakable, to one of the demigods within the Filipino pantheon. I couldn't find a better explanation for it then, or since.

This phenomenon only happened on Friendster, failing to happen anywhere else. Maybe it was a system glitch. Maybe the world got too big and the amount of people online and logged in to social networking sites became too massive, too diluted with people. Maybe the world got worse, and demigods don't cut it anymore.

Dog Day Afternoons in Poo Corner

There is pee on the floor.

I'm sitting with three dogs underfoot: two labradoodles, and one blue heeler. There is a brown-spotted dalmatian, Balzac, who is walking around sniffing the floor, most likely waiting for one of the other dogs to crap. So he can eat it.

In the other pen, the Puppy Pen, most of the dogs are laying down for their afternoon nap.

Yes, my latest occupation: Pooper Scooper extraordinaire! I'm sitting for dogs at a daycare and animal school in Warren, Rhode Island. While I'm still aggressively searching for work, this job pays the bills and allows me time to read, write, and continue drinking copious amounts of coffee. I'm learned to almost ignore the smells.

A Tribe Disbanded

The summer is over, and I have again parted company with those glorious individuals I have had the pleasure of living and working with these past few months. Camp has demobilized its summer force, sending them across the globe from which they came. Most have returned to college life, but some are beginning new lives, unemployed and focusing on that next horizon, whether that be an Australian one or an Iowan one.

And my tribe, my Hero's Journey tribe, which disbanded months ago, has settled into their new lives, as white-green as spring buds, in West Virginia, Washington state, Oregon, Colorado ... My fellow shepherds, all of us without a current flock, still standing with crooks in one hand and coffee mugs in the other, not wondering where our sheep have gone, but wondering instead where our next pasture lands will be.

For the next 9 months at least, my pasture lands will be close to Bristol, Rhode Island. I have interviews and meetings arranged for employment, but nothing definite yet. As for residence, I am waiting to hear whether or not I have been approved for a studio apartment two miles north of Roger Williams University. In the mean time, I am reading Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance and Pride and Prejudice in tandem, starting rugby practice with the Providence Rugby Club again, and taking free yoga classes, all in the hopes of trying to find a center again from which to work, from which, I hope, creativity and design will wellspring.

Gang Aft Agley

It's been long, too long, since I've published a post. Those both of you who are waiting for me to write again may even be disappointed with this post as well.

There is no such thing as "me time" when you are working at Camp. The best intentions I've had to publish something small over the last few weeks have, ultimately, gone awry.

I can tell you that there is a strong possibility that I have found a job, post-Camp, and that I will most likely be living in Bristol, RI, for the next 9 months. Once I've had a chance to settle in somewhere, the writing will be more frequent and, hopefully, more consistent.

If I hope to accomplish anything with this blog, it is to provide all both of my readers with a humorous thought or image to carry with them for a second, a minute, an hour, or the day. That image today is ...

I cut myself shaving last night. I was exhausted and not being careful, and when I brought the razor back up to my lip, I came across my upper lip, sideways, and sliced two, neat, inch-long cuts into my upper lip, on the left side of my mouth. Now, for the next few days, I anticipate all food and drink having to enter through the right side of my mouth before it can be masticated and swallowed.

Defining "Haussome"

Session 3 of the Hero's Journey program wrapped up two days ago, and tomorrow we will be heading into the woods for another Session. There are so many observations, reflections, and stories from the week--too many to post now. The one thing I will say is that we taught the participants the meaning of the word "hauss," and likewise what it means to embody "haussomeness." Some examples include:

-A girl who came into the program with both a fear of cooking and of insects, helping to make dinner for everyone on the second full day, as well as ridding her own space of the forest creatures that had managed to find themselves in there.

-A muscular, able, strong, 6'4'' lad raising his hand to ask for help.

-A stand-in-front leader, who was able to take a step back and lead from the side.

-A shy, quiet girl, who spoke up when things needed to get done immediately.

-Another girl, afraid to descend from a 30' tower, zipping into the rainy darkness, blindfolded.

There are stories about all of them, how they successfully met and triumphed repeatedly on their Road of Trials. I speak for the rest of my fellow counselors when I say, "We are all very proud of you."