I'm up

Okay I'm going to bed

I still am not quite making that 1:30 bedtime

But it's getting a little earlier

I love you very much sweetheart

Goodnight

 the republicans

are in court right now

to try to reduce early voting in harris county

not the state

just the big democratic county

i cannot believe they are so so obvious

i mean

i can

but

fundamentally it still shocks me

I slept through my alarm

I'm up now

I'm going to sleep earlier

Not a lot earlier

I was going to go to bed at 1:30 but then I got busy doing something and so now it's later than that but I am going to sleep

So I should be ready

In the morning

Goodnight sweetheart

I love you very much 💋

The birds

They're running some kind of operation

I'm not sure what kind

And tree doesn't know

I've been awake for about an hour

I just been doing stuff on my phone

Sunlight is pretty

That is my observation so far for the day

I might be having another one of those cold flash things

and actually I might have had one the other day too not quite as bad as the other one but it's like 79° according to my phone

The AC is on but it's not running much cuz it said it about 74 75 something like that

I have a fan on and normally it rotates which I'm much prefer I don't really like it to be blowing on me the whole time but the rotator thing is broken so it's blowing straight at me

But I mean it's been like that all day and I am uncomfortably cold

I mean like I'm thinking oh I'm so cold I need to put on a sweater but it just can't be that cold

Anyway I got to say

I'd rather have cold slashes than hot flashes

Because I mean Jesus

There's only so hot you can get

Without passing out or something

But I got to say this is weird

I love you sweetheart

Good night

i love you very much sweetheart, goodnight

 visited with the tree some

in my imagination

the tree is dizzy

because it has been re-wired to take in more CO2

and breathe out more oxygen

and it's not used to it yet

the flowers {tree says}

are gearing up to release "pollens"

which will be

foods

and maybe medicines

kinda like the manna in the desert situation

but

tree isn't too sure about the details

will they need to be collected

or will they simply be breathed in

not sure

i asked about the inter-dimensional or wtf nature

of all this stuff

tree didn't really understand me, couldn't say

 well

i certainly eased into today

is that spelled right?  eased? looks wrong

i set my alarm for 11am, said nah

reset it for 12pm

woke up at 1:30pm, sort of

and now

am finally at computer with coffee

it's beautiful outside

i mean, it's still 91

but it's only 91 and not super humid

there's this thing that happens here

there's this thing you feel in the air

it isn't like a chill

it's like there's an absence of an element of the heat

and you know fall is coming

that's been happening lately

and today

there still isn't a chill in the air (that's winter)

but there is a what you'd call nice breeze

fall is here!

Goodnight sweetheart I love you very much 💋

card of the day: the hierophant :09/26/20

She went outside.

Overnight there had been an evolution.  The trees.  How to explain the trees with words, hmmm.  I suppose, the most immediate and quotidian way to describe what was going on would be to say the trees appeared to have multitudes of holographic mylar roughly flower shaped kites stuck in them.

She imagined the rainbow parade of gen alpha children dancing through the streets at dawn releasing their flower balloons.  For a moment her mind filled in glitter everywhere...and it...didn't track.  

They were flowers, actual flowers...sort of.  They were perhaps multi-dimensional, or inter-dimensional...not all there, here, it was complicated.  They shimmered and caught the light in ways that "real" plants would...just, not.

Neither were they ghostly or apparitional.  No ghost of Gaia past.  No jam yesterday and jam tomorrow, but never jam today romanticism.  Perhaps it was some sort of neo-gothic.  Perhaps fear was the right direction to lean into.

How ya doing tree?

Well I'm sort of awake

I slept really deeply hard

But not well

I woke up three or four times a leg cramps that had to walk off

And I dreamed something like a spy story

That somehow incorporated a single pigment story

And my being laid off from work

And these agents that would come and attach themselves to you I mean not like physically but

You'd be walking home from somewhere

And they would just kind of come up to you

Can I just have a few words with you

But sometimes

They'd be driving along the street and they would somehow pull your clothing into the door of the car so you couldn't get away

There were a lot of dark underpasses

But the spy was trying to attach himself to me

I think it was someone I knew personally

Side kind of a strange situation

And then there's some kind of

Time anomaly

I was back in some kind of past news event

Something I had knowledge of

But not firsthand knowledge of

And there was another woman there

And we both knew that we were like witnesses

We were talking to each other

We both saw whatever it was that people from our current time didn't realize about the event

But I don't think we interpreted it the same

Anyway it was very involved

And I'm exhausted

Like I don't know if you've ever had a dream where you were running around and doing things and working

and then when you woke up in the morning it was like you had really done all those things and you were exhausted

I don't know if you had that experience

But that's what it was like

I am super duper congested this morning

And I don't know if the thing is happening today

I got the impression that it wasn't

But I can't run down the stairs immediately and check it so if it is I'm probably going to miss it

Good morning sweetheart

I love you

Goodnight sweetheart

I love you very much 💋

card of the day: the star :09/25/20

 I'm pretty sure I never mentioned it to you yet, but I had the two disc soundtrack album to American Graffiti when I was a kid, and I was pretty serious about it.  That book of love song was one that I especially liked.  Also teen angel. Very emo.  

Now, just now, it makes me think of inscribed in the book of life.  And that just opens up a vector of metaphor and current events and stuff.  And maybe I've just had a crisis of conscience about the writing thing.  I wasn't enjoying it.  And, I felt like it was a lot of work to tell my story--  and the thing is, I don't want to tell my story.  I don't think I can tell this story about America, now, yet, and to be perfectly honest maybe I can't ever tell it.  I just needed a non-verbal way of communicating.  I just lost the desire to say things.  It wasn't that I wrote something and didn't like it.  I liked it fine.  I just hated it.  I don't expect that to make sense.  Also, I'm trying to work through some stuff, life stuff.  But I understand you still want to read my writing.  Maybe you need to read my writing, maybe it's important to you.  And I was writing to you for all those years--  it was when I started "writing" that I started hating it.

I feel like this is a very fundamental we differ.  You are a performer and I am not.  I do perform, but I have a very different relationship to it.  Maybe I don't know what I'm talking about.  Maybe we have exactly the same relationship to it, maybe it just seems different to me.  Maybe it seems different based upon brain chemistry.  Maybe we have different brain chemistry.  Or maybe not.

For me, in my experience, from the inside as it were, I just shifted from something I was not enjoying to something I was enjoying in terms of medium, but I didn't notice any large shift.  However, I'm sensing that that is not how it seemed from the outside.

I'm sorry to have distressed you, or disappointed you, or whatever is the right word for the lack of connection or passion or drive or stick-to-it-ive-ness, or however to quantify the negative lack of my writing.  It just made me happier not to write, so I stopped.  It wasn't supposed to have negatively impacted you.

Maybe I'm depressed.  I'm not sure that I am, but it is certainly possible--  you could definitely make a case for it with the available data.  From the inside it feels like there are a lot of unknown variables and I'm more ok with that than I've ever been before, but as a consequence of that I feel like I am in a different relationship with time and space than I have ever been before.  Normally I spend a lot of energy trying to decide how things play out.  I'm kind of hardwired to run probabilities to prepare myself to deal with whatever, ya know.  If I was doing that I would have blown out the circuits.  So I have just sort of taken the next step of radical uncertainty.

I'm just floating here.  I'm thinking about what I want my life to be like.  I'm discarding any limitations in my thinking about how to get there.  I'm looking for inspiration.  I feel like the universe has proven that it is willing to provide the answers and I'm looking for the right ways to ask the questions.  

I'm in a different mind state.  If there are games we've played, then I probably will need to play them differently.  It doesn't mean I don't love you.  In fact, I like super love you, like to the moon and back.

 goodnight sweetheart

i love you very much

My dishwasher

decided

it wanted to be a fountain

dayside is kicking my ass

Okay I think I'm going to go to bed

I was planning to go to bed two hours ago so probably time now

I love you very much sweetheart

All day I've been tired and thinking about taking a nap

Then after it got to be about 9:30 10:00 when I was thinking about going to bed

You know to maintain that sleep at night be awake during the day thing

I was wide awake wide awake

And I was doing various things on the computer

And then I was watching videos about paint

And I started watching one on Tuscany

And I fell asleep instantly I don't know I don't think I saw anything of it

And I woke up sitting in the chair up right 11 minutes and 12 seconds in

And it says San Gimignano

Which I didn't realize was in Tuscany so that didn't at all motivate my desire to watch that particular video

In fact it's completely about the painter

I'm trying to decide if I even like her paintings I'm not sure whether I do

What I had mostly seen her paint was flowers

And they're fine I'm not saying they're not good

They just didn't move me

And I'm not sure I like her

There's something very irritating about her

But then there's also something kind of compelling about her

So I'm trying to convince myself I guess maybe that I like her

And I thought Tuscany I watched her pick her paint ballot for that it seemed like she took like 150 paints and her little travel palette

And I thought oh I'll see how that came out cuz it's new she just posted it today

But all I saw was San Gimignano

Do you think it's a sign

I don't remember any of my dreams

I think the bad weather has pretty much passed

But I don't know I'm having some kind of allergy reaction cuz my eyes is super bad

Also I feel kind of strange

Slightly hungover or something

I don't think I've adjusted to the daytime yet

I'm having some coffee

I'm trying to decide if I want to take a bath or shower

I want to eat some toast or something

I don't know it's a lot of choices

I don't feel bad

I don't feel depressed

well I probably feel a little bit bad in a little bit depressed but not too bad

I guess what I'm trying to say is

I feel like somebody who has been living a vampire life who suddenly trying to live a day life and I'm giving myself some pushback

I did not feel like this yesterday

But then yesterday was a be up most of the night and just sleep for a few hours and then be awake during the day

And that's a different sort of thing

He would think that would make me feel less good

But I actually have a lot more practice functioning on reduced number of hours sleeping

Then I do on the whole change

Which is freaky

I realize it's freaky

I'm hungry

Just having a hard time wrapping myself around food

Anyway I'm going to go do that stuff but I just wanted to check in and let you know

Good morning sweetheart I love you

 i'm pretty tired

i'm going to sleep

i love you very much

goodnight sweetheart

I just remembered this part of my dream

I think it must have been from last night

But I suppose it could have been from the night before

At any rate I don't remember when it was

I just remembered that it was

I was in a bathroom

In a house I think

And you walked to the door

And you were kind of standing in the door frame looking at me

And then we both kind of had this realization that there were no other people around

I'm not sure about the configuration of this bathroom

And maybe it wasn't in a house

Oh I know is that behind me there was a wall

And you walked in

And you kind of pushed me against the wall

not like with your hands pushed me into the wall or anything but you just kind of walked into me and pushed me into the wall with your body

And then you kissed me

I can't explain this

And maybe you're going to think that I'm just f****** with you

But you look so good

I mean you don't look like you're trying to look good

But somehow it's really working for me

And it has a slightly sitter sound that instrument

That also really works for me

So how is it

But you still just continue to get hotter

I think it's unfair

I feel I need to protest

My timing is off today

watching now

I love you

Dreamed about a movie theater

But it was far away

So to get there you had to drive down this long highway

I can't remember how long

And there was a bunch of stuff I don't remember

But at the movie theater there was like this tradition

there was some really old movie that was like a short movie

And you pay your money and you do this whole like wind up routine where you have to do it a particular way cuz it's a tradition and plus that's the way it works without messing anything up and then you get to see this movie

So there's this whole physical procedural tradition and then you watch the movie

I hadn't done it in a really long time

So I was very excited

but then there was the sky who I knew that was there was from someplace else

and I don't know if I knew he was going to be there or if it was a surprise to me that he was there I'm not clear

But he had never done this whole thing

And he wasn't too sure he wanted to after I was telling him about it

And I'm like you know it's only $2

And he's like well I only have the $17 that I brought for the film

And I'm like man I will pay your $2 so you could do this whole thing

and then I was showing him how to do the wind up thing and

I don't remember what the film was about it was some historical thing I think

I wish I could remember more

I didn't want to do it before I came downstairs just in case there was something going on

So I'm super tired

I would have slept longer

But maybe this will get me back on a slightly more regular schedule which is probably a good thing

it's raining again

 i'm going to go to sleep

i was going to a little while ago

but

i got busy watching something

or a series of somethings

there's some stuff

i'd really like to know

how did you pick that place

do you like it

what do you like about it

it started raining harder

for a while

and now

it's completely quiet

but it may still be raining lightly

anyway

kitty could go out now

but he wouldn't want to

he doesn't like mud

or wetness

when i take a shower

or god forbid a bath

he just looks at me with concern

and disgust

he cannot believe

that's a thing, ya know

lucky for him i only do that once or twice a week anymore, huh

i'm very sleepy

last night

(or rather when i was asleep today)

i dreamed

i bought a new car

it was quite exciting

but

there was something wonky about the paperwork

like maybe i sent in the forms

not filled out completely

so

that's new

but

worrying

i hope you are doing well

i love you very much sweetheart

My cat is very upset

It's been raining all day

He wants to go out

But he doesn't want to go out in the rain

So he keeps coming and telling me I want to go out I want to go out

And I'm like yeah but you hear it raining right

And he thinks I can open my door

Into some kind of alternate reality where it's not raining he thinks I have that power

It's not flooding or anything

But who knows

I think we're in for several days of this

i've got to sleep

 idk exactly what you've got planned

but

i may or may not make it

if i don't

i'll be with you in spirit

i love you very much sweetheart

watching

it's raining here

pretty convincingly

love the art

good morning

i'm going

to sleep

for a while

i love you

very much

sweetheart

good stuff

 i'm gonna go to bed for a while

i thought

i'd tell you some stuff

life stuff

that i'm really enjoying

the painting, for sure

abstract landscapes are maybe what i'd like to paint

i'm working up to it

orange juice

i was eating oranges

but then i wasn't eating them

and then they had juice in the imperfect

and it's perfect

i just go take a swig

(it's not an enormous bottle)

whenever i want something

and i find i haven't then needed

chips or pretzels, or chocolate even--  weird huh

the h.e.b. started last fall with the fancy fancy dish soap scents

i had been using the orange scent one forever

and i was not pleased

until

i got the fall leaves

which was amazing--  best smell, ever

and then of course they didn't have it anymore

i don't like this trend

the grove (tree free toilet paper people) are always trying

to rope me into mrs. meyer's seasonal scents

but

now i've got rosemary and i love rosemary

it's like spa for me

non-fat greek yogurt

the h.e.b. has an excellent store version of this

and

i eat it with fruit or bee pollen or honey

or

grandy's granola

which is really good

another thing i'm enjoying

and

i love your wall

it's beautiful

that's not any of the things you might know i'm liking

just the little life things

i love you sweetheart

  

 yesterday

i took down the braid i've had

for i don't remember exactly

and

i almost had dreads

it took me a very longtime to separate

and then

it was a giagantic frizz

and then

without brushing it

i re-braided it

that's what i mean by

kinda rough

 i'm gonna go to bed now i think

i love you very much

i got more paints, you may have noticed

i decided i needed perylene green

i wanted the shade, but had to find what it was called

and then

it seemed like da vinci had one

da vinci is a less expensive brand

but i didn't remember if i'd ever had them before

and i'm wanting to try different brands

so that seemed to dove tail nicely

i got some sample sizes of two other colors

remember i said i was missing i'm pretty sure i said mars violet

but that's the same as violet iron oxide (which they said was transparent)

and they have a rose madder quinacridone which i had to get a sample too

because i was wanting that

and the rhodenite is very similar

but it has a weird granulation

i like thisnew one much better

so

i really like them all

though i admit the daniel smith are better quality

texture and mixing wise

all the brands have a different texture

and different qualities

the paints that i love

that i see staying in my palette long term

Sennelier Rose Dore Madder Lake

Daniel Smith Quinacridone Fushsia

Daniel Smith Sodalite Genuine

Daniel Smith Jadeite Genuine

Holbein Manganese Blue Nova

Holbein Umber

Da Vinci Perylene Green

Da Vinci Violet Iron Oxide

Da Vinci Rose Madder Quinacridone

the others

i'm not sure yet

i usually use earth tone yellows

i'm pretty sure about the mayan blue

i really love it but i'm not sure it's necessary

the piemonite is beautiful, but i'm not sure how useful it actually is

we'll see,i guess

i don't like the transparent red oxide

it's a good color

i just don't like it

i actively dislike the m. graham paints

the blue one is incredibly beautiful

i can't quite put my finger on why i don't like it

i guess they are all beautiful they seem flat somehow

they have a very opaque matteness they don't glow in the right way

the quinacridone gold is good

but it's too darkand brownish in it's mass tone

it weighs the color down

i'd like something that glows like that

just brighter

i hate the amethyst, hate

da vinci has a color i should have ordered a sample of

but i missed it

didn't understand it's greatness

until after i had ordered

so

i see it in my future

i hope you are having fun

and that you don't mind my general lack of talky-ness

i love you very much sweetheart

I dreamed about you

It was a bunch of little like micro situations

The biggest one

You had written this book

I think it was a biography

Of some woman that I don't think I had ever heard of and maybe that was the point

or maybe she was someone that everybody had heard of but didn't know about somehow I'm not sure that it's all very sketchy at this point but it was so clear in the dream

In the book it was like he was bound in some kind of weird creative way where you had to like tear off this stripped open up the the book

Wasn't a super long book

But it worked really well

It was all like super innovative and avant-garde

Also you had two children a boy and a girl and they were both younger

But there was something that I can't remember what some situation where you were very worried about them all the time

And we knew each other

In our relationship was kind of complicated

and like I said they were all these little bitty situational and conversational elements

But I don't have any sort of overarching what it was about

I was worried about you

You didn't seem happy

Oh I had almost forgotten this

I was at this I don't even want to call with a coffee shop it was like a coffee kiosk almost

it was like a restaurant but you walked up to it kind of like a mall situation only it wasn't in a mall I don't think I think it was outside

And I I don't know if I ate I think I must have eaten but I don't remember anything about what I ate

And then you were meeting me there

But you had someplace else you needed to go I think I don't know if you ate I don't think you did I think you were just meeting me there

And we got coffee

And the I think it was a it was a guy waiter but not waiter because it wasn't behind a counter

He was asking me if I wanted to get dessert

They had this thing he called Christmas pie

And I don't know what that was but in the dream I seem to have some vague idea what it might be although I don't think it was something I had had I think it was like something I was interested in having

And I was like well I think we're going somewhere I don't think I have time to sit here and have dessert right now but I will definitely keep it in mind

And so the first thing we did was we walked over to this table

And it was just some kind of cheap restaurant type table but it was sitting outside in the dark and I think it was connected to this kiosk thing

And we were both leaving tips

And so I saw actual bills like fooling money which I haven't seen for a while

It was kind of startling

But I'm making the stack of monies 10 and a 5 and like 4 ones

and you're doing your stack of money and we're kind of competing to see if you could do it faster

And we're leaving it for this waitress I don't know why I don't know what that was all about but it was important that we tip her

And then we wandered out from there

And we met up with your kids

And they were different

I mean obviously the boy was different because you don't have a boy but the girl was different too

And I got this since that they knew me already

I just can't remember

But there was something very worrying about the situation

I cannot remember

Was like some sort of danger

Some sort of very fundamental uncertainty

And I didn't have anything to do with me specifically it wasn't like I was causing some kind of danger or uncertainty

A danger and uncertainty was in the world but it was specifically something you were worried about

And so I was worried about you

but then I was very fundamentally uncertain about like my place in this whole situation

I didn't really have any power to fix whatever it was that you were worried about

And I don't really know what our situation was

On the one hand it seemed to be more like in the real world

But then on the other hand not really

And I can't remember like really any details that would be useful although it seemed like it went on for a long time and there was a lot of it

Anyway I just woke up and I tried to get this down as quickly as I could before it all disappeared

But now I really have to pee

I'm going to bed

I love you very much sweetheart 💋

I actually like my chart

Better than any of the charts that she mixed

I have an oops because I'm pretty sure I used the Quinacridone instead of the Izo with the manganese blue on the top row so I redid it that's a nice green though the oops is a nice green so good to know

And then the do-overs I actually felt like I've gotten too much of the quidacridone gold mixed in and so I made alternate mixtures

But I think it's kind of interesting because the quinacridone fuchsia mixed with the rose dore is essentially almost pyrrol red

So I may keep that yellow for mixing it mixes really nice oranges it mixes really nice greens

The quiddacridone gold mixed with the izo yellow makes essentially a ocher and the quidacridone gold mixed with the quinacridone fuchsia makes essentially a burn sienna color so I mean yeah I'm pretty happy with every single color on here

But I really enjoyed that class type thing

and I watched it all speed it up so it didn't take quite as long I think 3 hours was a little long for that but there were heartwarming family stories and such

I love you

those holbein colors

are better than I remember

I've been dreaming about color

I can't really remember the dreams

But some of them are anthropomorphized

That's right right

Anthropomorphized

It's anthropomorphic

I know that

But I feel like anthropomorphized might be wrong

I'm going to bed now

I love you very much sweetheart 💋

I love you

I'm glad you're ok

I'm sorry I wasn't visible

It never occurred to me that that would be an option

And while my face isn't in bad shape

My hair is looking pretty rough

And I had just rolled out of bed

not even to mention I don't have anything particularly attractive set up behind me it's pretty it's pretty rough

So if

Did wrong

well I wasn't even sure I was going to be able to make the technology work so

Just know that I love you

Well

Zoom seems to be working

😁

All right well I'm going to try

But I've never done anything with zoom before so I'm not sure if it's all going to work out

I'm going to sleep for a little while though

I'm not sure how I like those primary color paints I don't guess I ever really paint with primary colors

The red and the yellow are really beautiful but they just don't quite feel right

Plus the yellow is really weak it takes a ton of that and you just put like a drop of something else in it so I don't know they are really pretty though maybe I'll get it figured out

The blue is a pretty color

And it's good that it doesn't have all that granulation and stuff in it

Then it looks kind of flat so what I think it's mostly going to work for is glazing over the top with it

But it is a really beautiful color

And I had kind of assumed from things that I read that the ingram and the sennelier would be kind of the same texture but they aren't

Well I guess the blue is closer but the yellow is super duper runny

So I don't know I'll probably go through that yellow pretty quickly and I don't think I will repurchase it

And I don't know about that red Man it is so pretty but it just does not look like something I would use

And the quinacridone it seems better when it's watered down and that's kind of how I meant for it to be used was as a gold but you just got to be careful that it doesn't turn into that kind of brownie color not really brown more like ochre

I used the purple in the center of the flower I made a lot of little tiny dots which don't read as little tiny dots they read as much bigger dots

But I mean it it really looks good in that context so I don't know maybe I'm not as against the purple as I thought I was but only just used in little tiny tiny amounts

But like for example I painted the bluebonnet and I mean it's not like I got a picture of a bluebonnet in front of me I'm just painting it for memory and it it looks good painted with that whatever that blue is called but it just looks really flat so then I put the other blues in with it and then it just seemed like it had a lot going on it looked better in the picture than it actually looked in real life I think that it is my plan to paint flowers

That's what I felt like painting

and there is this palette that I saw and it's arranged really smart it's one of those tin ones but if I ever need to get a watercolor palette for somebody I think I'm going to either get that one or do one like that it's very cool

Anyway I hope you're doing good

And like I said I'm going to try

But I'm not sure about the technology

I love you very much sweetheart 💋

I'm gonna take a nap

Hopefully just for a couple hours

I guess you got where you were going

I am assuming you are safe

My primary colors paints came

I love you very much sweetheart 💋

Well I was having some trouble mixing colors for sure

but if you keep in mind that I haven't actually gotten my primary colors yet

then I think I can be forgiven for not being able to mix everything I'm trying for

I am a little miffed that it does not look as though the quinacridone gold and the quinacridone fuchsia are going to mix skin tone

it's been a long time since I've mixed skin tones because I haven't been painting people and I haven't really ever done it with watercolors

Both of my parents painted with watercolors

And so I did when I was a kid like a little kid

And then again when I moved in with my mom I guess for a while

And I did some watercolors that I put in her gallery and I sold at least one of them

I think I sold more than one

But I remember I had this one that I did

It was all bright colors and it had joy painted on it

I mean I don't really remember I think it was all abstract but it just said joy in the middle

But this lady came into the gallery on a day when I was there and she saw it and she was like my name is Joy and she loved it and she bought it

So that's cool I had forgotten about that

And what I find kind of strange

Is if you mention anything about doing art

To like a regular boring life type person

They ask you two questions

The first one is usually have you ever sold any

And the second one is what style of art do you do or how would you describe the style of your art or some variation on that like so is your art impressionistic or whatever term they've actually heard before of art

But whatever

I just wanted to paint

And by and large I am liking these choices

But I hate that amethyst

I mean it's pretty but not for me

It's too sparkly

And it just I don't know there's something about premixed purples that they just seem fake

Like I know those quinacridone colors

They're not like Earth tones

But somehow they just look right

And purples just don't

I mean if they're like magenta or something like that fuchsia looks great I love that color I love that color and I don't even mind it as a red but I love it

but when I was painting on that page and I put that purple I was like uhnnn

and then the purples that I mixed just looked so much better to me than that purple

and the funny thing is that there's no way it's in a natural color it's it is an earth color it's made from f****** rock

But whatever I don't like it

Also the transparent red oxide

Has a lot of granulation

Which works great if you're doing anything like trees or rocks or sides of buildings or things like that but works a lot less good if you're making something that's supposed to be you know skin or flower or something that doesn't have that kind of texture to it

So if I can find something that's maybe not quite that color but would work for mixing for things like that then I might end up with that

But by and large I'm really happy with all those colors and I'm also really happy with this brush I'm glad I did not also get a smaller brush because I don't need a smaller brush

The tip on this and the spring of it is good enough that you know there's no way I'm going to paint anything small enough that it won't work

I would like to have something that's a little less that puts down washes and big swaths of color better because this when you're doing a big swath it's it's not quite right for it

But they have another one in the same series that's more specifically a squirrel fake synthetic that's the word I'm looking for synthetic synthetic squirrel so I ordered one of those in the same size and I think that'll probably work for me I mean I'd like to have one of those sets with all the fancy brushes but I think I probably don't need it

And regardless of whether I need it or not I'm not getting it right now both because I don't need to be spending money on that

And also

Because you physically can't get them right now they're only carried in America by one place and they're out of stock on them and the Spanish website won't ship to America so even if it was vitally important that I have it it isn't possible to get it

But I think when I've got the primary colors

And I've got that umber

that skin tones are going to be a lot easier to mix

Because I think the umber is going to really help with that oh my God that's just too goddamn pink

So all in all I'm pretty pleased

And to be honest with you all that mixing is super duper fun for me That's actually a lot more fun than trying to paint detailed things

It's really all about the color

And the texture

And the painterliness of it

And maybe I finally will learn how to use watercolors

I mean when I was in college I had to learn how the oil paints worked and oil paints are really fun but really inconvenient

They dry really slow and you got to figure out where to put the stuff so that the cat doesn't knock it over and the paint and the turpentine and the mixing medium and all that kind of stuff it if it spills on anything it makes a huge mess

And I like to paint in that you know drippy kind of style well I guess I didn't do that as much when I painted with oils but whatever it still made a big mess

and none of that stuff is really good for you to breathe either

and then I started painting with acrylics and that is all different The paint works different The colors mix different

I mean with oil you can mix the color and put it on the canvas

And you can also put on a layer and then let it dry and put on another layer

And then you can glaze things

and really it probably doesn't look very good unless you do all of those things

Which means it takes a really long time because even if you put something on in the medium that speeds up the drying I mean it's going to take over a day

and if you want to work on more than one thing you got to have places to put all that stuff where your cat isn't going to knock it over and blah blah blah so it just doesn't really all that feasible if you're living in an apartment where you won't get your deposit back if things get messed up and you got carpet and all that

Now acrylic it dries really fast

It still screws stuff up if you get the paint on it because volleyball I mean

Soluble

It's soluble in water

But only if you catch it while it's still wet if you let it dry it's like plastic or polymer or something it like has to be scraped off

Which doesn't work if you get it on fabric

I mean you can paint a t-shirt with acrylic paint and it's you know an art piece you can wear

and wash and wear and it'll crack and stuff eventually but it takes a long time

But you know you can put down a drop cloth or area rug or something in the area where you're working to keep it from getting on the rug

And you can just stay in the area and wait until it dries to fend off the cat

but you still need an easel when it takes up a fair amount of space and you got to buy canvases and you know it has its drawbacks but I got to where I felt like I was you know reasonably good at it like I felt like I'd kind of got the hang of how the stuff worked

Couldn't really do a painting and then another painting on top of it and have it show through and stuff it pretty much is opaque and it covers everything

And you could kind of do glazes but they didn't work the same way

But I felt like I had kind of gotten the hang of it

and I had that one Daniel Smith acrylic paint that was a duochrome well I think I had more than one but I only really ever used one because it was perfect

And that became like a very important feature in the paintings so that you know when you turned them and moved them and looked at them in different light they looked different

And they have what they're calling a duochrome and watercolor but it isn't really

Because it isn't kind of based on what angle you're looking at it from it doesn't really shift if you paint it on something that's dark it looks one color and if you paint it on something that's light it looks another color well that's not really

I mean I guess it is technically do a chrome because it's two colors

But it's really an interference paint

And that's not nearly as exciting

But they have that same color and I came very close to ordering it as one of my original paints

but you know like all of them I did some research before I ordered and it was like I said interference not do a chrome so I mean why bother it's not that exciting

And I ended up ordering I guess the majority of the paints that I ordered were from Daniel Smith

and I'm not upset about that I like Daniel Smith a lot Daniel Smith makes a really good paint

But I kind of wanted to get a few from a bunch of different companies so I could kind of tell you know which one I liked better

And I did end up getting that one from sennelier

and I do really like that one and I really like the texture and I really like how it blends with things and it's a bigger tube it's 21 ml instead of 15 which is nice

Although some of the paints that I got were 5 ml

In that sample box they're very small

But I had really wanted to try something from schmincke

And qou wish I think that's how it spelled

I cannot spell it's so sad

I found out there's another brand called White knights but I don't think that one looks as good to me I saw a demo with it and it seemed like the pigment didn't flow and I don't know just didn't seem so good and there's old Holland and there's Van Gogh, da Vinci

and there's Rembrandt but for some reason I have a recollection of not liking Rembrandt

Although I'm sure they would have been oil paints that I used and they were probably student grade oil paints so that probably doesn't have anything at all to do with what their watercolors are like but I don't know I have some kind of recollection that I do not like Rembrandt

Not the painter he's fine I'm not trying to throw shade on him but the brand I don't care for and there's another one called mission gold I think there's another there's another part to it like mejillo

Or something like that which mission gold and mejillo sounds like it would be well it sounded to me like it would be from California to be honest but I mean I don't know it's from Korea South Korea which surprised me it didn't sound like a Korean company but sometimes Korean companies choose names that don't sound Korean at all and I guess they're not the only ones that do that I mean Häagen-Dazs is not European

this is a lot of talking without content that really is probably all that interesting to you

Sorry

Anyway I hope you're doing well I think I might take a nap

I don't want to sleep for a really long time I don't really like this psycho where I'm just floating later and later and later

I mean when I sleep I'm usually not sleeping longer than 8 hours but I'm staying up longer or I don't know something but it's just I don't like that it's floating later and later but and I realize that I've probably only been up for like wait eight to eight is 12 9 10 11 12 1 2 well so I've been up like 18 hours no wonder I'm tired okay

So I think I'm going to take a nap

I love you very much sweetheart 💋

 i guess i should go to sleep

i love you very much sweetheart

i hope everything is beautiful where you are

tonight i should be able to paint you something

i think i'm getting ten of the fifteen paints today

we'll see

or nine, i guess

i got one already

and a brush

and some books i'm supposed to be able to paint in

i'll get some watercolor paper later

these seemed more convenient to start

(also cheaper) also funner

they don't seem especially thick paper-y

but

i think they'll be ok

Well I've been up for almost 24 hours so I'm going to go sleep for a little while I think

It's 9/11

It feels different this year though

I mean 9/11 doesn't feel like a bigger crisis than what's happening right now

It just doesn't

I still remember all that stuff

The stuff I talk about just about every year

Except I think I may have said that the guy that I had a late lunch with at aunty pasto'sI think I may have said his name was Casey and it wasn't Casey it was Cassidy

So I want to correct that now

But I just don't feel the way I usually feel on 9/11

and I don't know whether that is a thing that makes perfect sense

Or whether it means I'm un-American or something

That just all seems like it was in a different world somehow

The way the world after 9/11 seems like a different world than the world before

Well that seems like a different world than the world now

I've taken to thinking and I didn't think this up but I have adopted it I've taken to thinking of everything before this as the before times

So I don't know

I hope that you are doing well

And I love you very much

and I am super excited about the paints that are coming and some of them are coming today and some of them are coming tomorrow and some of them are not coming for a long time

But I'm very excited

And early voting starts here on October 13th

And I'm going to vote on October 13th

It looks like as of now there are two places reasonably close to me

One is supposedly an annex of University of Houston that I have no previous knowledge of it's supposed to be on Hillcroft which is about 2 mi away I think and then there's another place that's in a Hampton inn that's on the other side of 610 for me and I think that's maybe two and a half or three miles

So assuming that those are right I'm not sure which is the better place to go

But I'm going to vote early

I've been voting early for years

I didn't vote early in 2000

I'm not even sure they had early voting in 2000 here I sort of don't think they did

I'm not certain if I early voted in 2004

I sort of think that's when I started

But it's possible that I didn't start until after that

For sure I did in 2008 for sure

and the very first place that I ever early voted is a place that I could still early vote and I may just go there

It's a community service center that's like a gym I'm not sure that that's what you'd call it but it's a a place where people play like wheelchair basketball and stuff like that it's over in Montrose well it might technically be fourth ward

But it was pretty nice

Last last election I think I voted in an office building in the galleria area

And the time before that it was kind of on the cusp between spring ranch and the heights

That was kind of a far drive and I wasn't crazy about the place

also both that place and the one in the office building had very limited parking but the community service center has quite a bit of parking

So I don't know I may do that

I love you very much sweetheart 💋

i'm so very excited

 i bought a few more paints

and while i was not intending to

i am so very happy and excited about my choices

that i want to share them with you

so, to recap:

azo yellow

quinacridone gold

pyrrot red

quinacridone fushcia

anthroquinone blue

manganese blue nova

sodalite genuine

holbein umber

i mentioned the transparent red oxide before, well i went looking for a video about rose dore madder lake because i had seen it when i was looking at rose madders and it looked enigmatic, which i think it is.  sennelier is supposedly known for their reds and they had a french vermillion that i decided i didn't like as much as the schmincke vermillion light, which, as it turns out, is not really light fast so it had to be abandoned.  and i found a "sampler" pack of daniel smith paints with six of the primatek paints in--  piemonite (which i had previously spotted as being something i wanted), rodecrosite, mayan blue, amethyst, jadeite, and hemitite (which i don't really want, but maybe i could give it to my mother).

the jadeite is more of a veridian/forest green than the apatite (but i think it will be easier to paint with).

they are in small tubes, but they are also a deal for being a set, and then i can see how they work.  and the amethyst (maybe) lets me spit my violets with the fushsia being the warm and the amethyst being the cool (although it isn't really all that cool for a violet and it has sparkles which i'm not sure whether i like or not)--  it is really beautiful.  the mayan blue is super beautiful.  the rodecrosite is too.  i feel like i'm really blue heavy but the sodalite is a black substitute.

so, i was going to do six (which none of us ever believed) and i ended up with fifteen--  but five of them are on a trial and won't stay if they aren't great.  the palette i got holds eighteen colors, soi have space for three more.  it was the right price and configuration.  i didn't buy a much bigger palette than i needed just to have an excuse toget more colors.  i didn't want a tiny one.  i wanted one with mixing room.  

i'm pretty chuffed!

i cannot wait to paint.

i realize that most people probably do not take that long to pick out their paints

but

i think you know by now

that's how i am

picking the colors

was an incredibly important and enjoyable part of the process

that i did poorly last time and so didn't really enjoy it

i didn't get much sleep

i got up for that thing,just in case you were there

i came in late

heard your thing and then didn't hear the rest of it

i thought that getting three hours of sleep

would mean

that i would got to bed earlier

but

it's already after seven

so i guess not 

I'm gonna sleep a little

I love you very much sweetheart 💋

 so i found an adorable paint brand

handmade and all

but, two things

one, i already ordered the paint

two, you don't seem to be able to pick like one thing of paint

and also the format is a little problematical

i did not enjoy the small pan format when i got that kit before

when i was younger i used tubes

and i need a lot of room for mixing

because i mix everything

that's part of the funfor me

so

i ordered three from daniel smith

quinacridone gold

quinacridone fushsia

sodalite genuine (which i got instead of the payne gray blue that i was originally going to get because it was prettier and has the whole granulation thing going for it + it mixes pretty with other colors)

and three from m. graham

azo yellow (did not specify nickel)

pyrrol red

anthroquinone blue (i have a tendency to get indigo or prussian blue because i think of those as my colors, but they aren't very good inwatercolor)

in fact prussian blue, indian red, and naples yellow were practically my triumverate in oil painting, but the texture of the paint doesn't work well--  very heavy pigment, takes over everything

but

i had some sort of flashback

to the days of painting past (like the seventies)

and, although i thought i could get by with six paints

i wanted holbein umber and holbein manganese blue

i was like what blue did you used to paint with

because i decided i should probably split the primary for it too

i don't really like ultramarine blue (maybe it's just the ones i've had) it never works right

i don't like cobalt or cerulean either

and thalo (which maybe i like a little better) has the same take over problem

they don't make real manganese blue any more

the process is apparently toxic

the manganese "blue nova" from holbein is apparently made with thalo blue

but whatever, it looks right, and i'm okay with it not granulating

i don't remember the granulation stuff anyway

i probably was using acrylic

it's not completely transparent--  which i didn't notice when i ordered it

but whatever

also i never knew holbein was from japan--  guess i never read the label

umber by holbein is a transparent raw umber--  neutral brown

not to say that all raw umbers are neutral browns

 they are all over the map

but it's a soft, lightly pigmented brown that blends really well

i kinda want daniel smith's transparent red oxide

which i can make a case for

and

i kinda want schmincke vermillion red light

which i can make less of a case for

and

several things that are just super pretty and i'm used to having them

like i usually have a mars violet

and i usually have a rose madder

mars violet is another one of those heavy earth pigments

that don't play well with the whole transparency thing

and rose madder is probably close to quinacridone  fushsia

anyway

eight colors is more than enough, probably

it's coming from three different places

the daniel smith is scheduled to be here saturday

but the other places are saying like two weeks

so the paints i will have starting this weekend

they don't really make a primary set

the quinacridone gold and fushsia blend out to make a sort of flesh tone

so they are closer to opposites than a triad

and the blue is near black

so i'm not sure how easy it will be to blend them

but

whatever the other paints probably won't take that long

That reading looks like everything's fine

Five of feathers and ten of feathers could be taken in a bad way

But the cards that are explaining them are accomplishment and mother of feathers so those both directly contradict

I'm not sure what that means

Okay well the other tarot says I need to calm the f*** down and breathe

Everything's fine

You don't think I'm saying bad things to you

You're not trying to say bad things to me

Everything is fine

but I should perhaps not stay up all night drinking coffee and going down 12-hour rabbit holes about what the perfect shades of paint are

I love you very much

I think I should sleep for a little while

I hope everything is going good with your move

I don't know when you're planning to do the driving

So I don't know if it's happening or happened yet or whatever but

At whatever stage you're in I hope it's going well

Be safe

Take care of yourself

I love you

i haven't gone to bed yet

 i'm doing a reading

 well

i've been looking at paint

for more than twelve hours

and

the thing is

i'm wondering if you think

i'm telling you something that i don't think i'm saying

or

possibly i'm losing my mind

So I was just reading a thing

About how

Since Democrats are voting by mail

And Republicans are voting supposedly in person

That there may be a long period of time during which it looks like Trump is winning

And I personally have heard him say many many times even though I'm not going to his rallies and I'm not looking for this kind of information from him so I've heard it in the general media I guess or social media

I've heard him say many many times that the only way he can lose is if there's foul play basically

And he said that last time

And he was actually the one doing the foul play but you know he has that projection thing he does and then also he was priming for telling his base basically oh well we were robbed right

And I thought about it and when I did that reading I was asking you know who was going to win and what was going to happen was he going to try to stay in power by any means necessary or whatever

But it didn't specifically ask about the voting part you know like what's it going to be like at the voting booth and what's it going to be like in the you know counting I wasn't asking specifically for that situation and so I went ahead and did another reading on that

And it was consistent I mean it's basically like

basically it was like he's going to realize that his ass wrote a check that he couldn't cash

Feel like I'm getting that wrong

Well whatever He's going to realize that the jig is up and that he doesn't have all the power that he thought he had

And then and then it's the world with the queen of feathers on top and the empress on the bottom and that's all about that feminine energy and you know change and entering a new world and crap

And then there was growth and altruism and Like higher perspective higher ground so I mean even though it's another reading it was very clear and very consistent with the other reading and didn't even need as many cards to say it this time because it was a much simpler question I guess

Anyway I guess we'll find out soon enough

I'm sorry I didn't say anything earlier

But I was very confused

Anyway I'm just going to assume it wasn't bad

I'm going to bed now

I love you very much sweetheart 💋

Woke up with a leg cramp

And I guess I had to pee

I was dreaming about cats

I was being introduced to cats

I'm not sure where

I'm not sure why

But they seemed like nice cats

I have to sleep some more

I'm going to bed now

I love you very much sweetheart 💋

Okay so the two cards I had were breach and rivalry and breach is the one where the beavers are so busy working on what they're working on that they don't pay attention and notice that their whole damn is falling apart at the other end so it's about focus and paying attention to the bigger picture in the tradition of seven of cups which is about fantasy and daydream an inability to see what's really there because of the fantasy and daydream s so in this case it's things falling apart that you weren't looking at and paying attention to and

Then the rivalry card is five of wands and that's always got something like rivalry or fighting or it's a card that I've always had a lot of trouble with because it seems kind of vague and every description that you read of it is a little bit different and so I've never had a very clear understanding of kind of what it meant in a reading it just seemed kind of vague

And in this card it's interesting because it's almost like she responded to that so maybe I'm not the only person that has that issue so she's like you know it's these two Gila monsters that are fighting they're these feathers that are set up making it kind of look like it's a cage match or something but in fact even though Gila monsters are you know North American lizards who can bite with poison and they could kill each other blah blah blah in fact that's not what's going on at all it's part of a mating ritual where the the male Gila monsters fight with each other and the winner which nobody knows exactly how the winner is determined I guess it depends on case by case basis but the winner gets the girl

So the idea is there's some stuff going on and we don't really understand what it is because we're looking at it through the context of our own filters and what I thought was really interesting is she said she was writing it in the spring of 2018 and she wished our elections were more like Gila monster fights or Gila monster mating fights whatever so I thought it was interesting that I'm asking a question about the election and she references in her description the elections of 2018 however 2018 were elections that were very much you know was like the the the wave the blue wave but also it was all the women who went in and kind of had a sense of camaraderie and tried to get things done and so so both of these cards are you know kind of to do with perspective and change in that way my cat is menacing me

And then the cards that I drew were the daughter of roots and the mother of feathers and the daughter of roots apparently the Cherokee would for both trail markers and marking important spots they would take the trees and start to kind of weave the branches so they would grow in this very unusual loudest form and be easily identifiable and it's also talking about that this is a really good card for if you're interested in or if the aquarium is interested in you know tarot reading or esoteric mysteries or whatever this card is very much about very much about that and so I took that with breach to be that you know with this election we're going to get a real sense that what we need to do is focus on putting it to place things that will protect the checks and balances that we now understand viscerally that the things that have always been done that were a tradition and a precedent but apparently we're never codified as being something that had to be done and so Trump didn't do them and tried to undermine many other things that are that are codified but perhaps are not strongly enough codified since they've been able to get away with it somehow so I take this as there's going to bureau focus on trying to find a way to make that reinforced and supported and more unbreakable to kind of weave it in in a way that it can't be just ignored and fall apart

And then mother of feathers is very interesting it's very interesting Father of feathers is the the hawk that has the lizard that's bleeding from its eyes and the prairie is on fire and he's all got the wrong attitude about things about how he's all in control well in the mother of others they're talking about that and they're saying in the mother of feathers she's sitting on her throne which is like a stump or something and there are three male birds that are trying to court her but she is not concerned about that when she is ready to pick a mate she will pick a mate and if these three guys leave they will be more along she is not worried about it she has got her paintbrush flower which when it blooms makes the prairie look like it's on fire but it's like a happy and good you know new growth kind of fire not a destructive kind of fire

And I'm not 100% sure

But it seems like that kind of dichotomy of the mating ritual like these two Gila monster guys are fighting fighting fighting for the right to the woman rivalry

But this mother of feathers is just like yeah I'm not concerned with all that I'm doing my thing and I'm just ignoring you guys it seems like that is significant in a sort of a change of attitude about the way things are done as well maybe like we're not focusing on that you know there's two sides and one's going to win and they're going to get the girl but now it's like you know the girl

Which I mean in this I guess represents the country or the people or the state or the state of mind the zeitgeist whatever it represents the thing that there's this fighting to get well you know she's not all that interested in being gotten she's interested in getting s*** done so she's got her you know set in the prairie on fire going on and you know all you fighting people can just kind of f*** off

And that doesn't seem like a nicely wrapped up answer but it feels very satisfying it it feels very you know we're shifting we're shifting our whole focus to not be this b******* but instead to be you know life and new growth and that kind of stuff and then trying to fix all the s*** that was too flimsy to stand up to bad people

I mean we've had plenty of bad people

And we've had plenty of bad people in politics

And we've had periods of time you know starting as early as the second president

Alien and sedition acts

Blah blah lots of bad stuff

But the checks and balances have typically worked eventually not right away

and we swing in cycles we do you know I mean I was just unfortunate because at the time when I became aware of politics was the period of time when they were putting in all the stopgap measures to try to protect against people like Nixon right and then I've watched the whole of my life you know all the regulation and the framework to try to protect anything that could be protected just be chipped away on shipped away at until the point where you know there's f****** homeland security b******* and Guantanamo

And then I really really hoped that Obama would turn some of that back I really hope that he would say no no this is a bridge too far we have to turn back to the light

And he didn't do that

And so for all the people who say great president

I say he was a very intelligent and charismatic man and and he was in many ways a very good president especially when compared with Clinton and it must be said it pains me but it must be said Jimmy Carter was maybe the most honorable man that we ever had as a president but he wasn't necessarily the best president

And and part of the reason why he wasn't had to do with that same honor

Where he would do something that was right even though maybe it wasn't the in some very important ways

Honoring our commitments to the shah of Iran for example did not pan out to perhaps have been the right decision but it was for sure the honorable decision and so I mean I think if you look at Carter and then you look at Clinton who kind of preempted the Republicans by moving to the right and I can't help but feel like in some ways facilitated the fact that in a lot of ways the Democrats are now like Nixon Republicans and the Republicans are batshit crazy anti-intellectual fundamentalist Christian conspiracy theory cultist

So I mean when you look at Obama in that framework man he kicked ass

But what I really wanted from him

Was for him to turn back but I considered to be the super duper dangerous things that went on during the Bush administration which were continuation of a line that in my mind started with Reagan but perhaps started before that that was just where I came in to the movie you know

I wanted him to turn that back

And that didn't happen

And then with this presidency it just became some kind of chaotic hellscape where there are no laws and there are no rights and the president is king and he's got you know paramilitary beating people in cities that he has determined are you know like libland and you know up is down in black is white and

And to be honest with you now I don't even remember the point I was making

And I mean maybe these decks are just telling me the s*** I want to hear I don't know that is what I want to hear that is so what I want to hear that you know in the same way that when I was growing up there was no way there was ever going to be gay marriage people weren't even asking for gay marriage

And then things move along and there's a complete sea change and now of course you have gay marriage because The supreme Court recognized that it's just a fundamental right and I mean that came about through a number of different actions that were pretty smart one of which had to do with filing for a separate type of certification where you know the Christian said marriage is between a man and a woman and they're like okay well fine then why don't you let us have civil unions because we're not concerned with the religious aspect we're concerned with the legal aspect and then when it was presented to them that particular way the supreme Court was like well you can't have separate equal no of course they have to have marriage that's just natural but it was years between the point at which literally people would say things and I don't mean just like people I heard on the street I mean like people who were being quoted in the media people who were thought their opinions were important we're saying things like blah blah gay blah blah bestiality like being gay was a sexual aberration in the same way that bestiality was a sexual aberration when clearly they're not the same sort of thing at all

But that was the kind of mindset that was rampant in the country

And to go from that to will of course same-sex couples can get married because if we didn't let them that would be a violation of their rights that kind of sea change

Generalized is what I would really like to see happen and of course there's a way in which culturally the millennials and the zoomers have already instituted some of those things as being just normalized

I mean just a few years ago I was talking to you about non-binary only I don't even know if I was using that terminology and it was weird to you You didn't really know what I was talking about and now you've been living in a community maybe not the specific neighborhood you're in but the state for sure in which it is a very common practice to state or to ask people for their pronouns

So again that's a pretty large change culturally

Although there's still a lot of growing pains and issues with some of the cultural changes

I mean like for example when I was in college a safe space was a place where you could say whatever it was you needed to say and people would not attack you

Now a safe space is a place in which no one is supposed to say anything which might trigger anybody

which I maintain isn't actually possible because you don't know what might trigger somebody so you can avoid the things you think might be obvious triggers but you can't actually know all the things that might trigger somebody

And although I very much like the idea of not being triggered

I'm not sure that if you take that to its natural extension you don't create a situation where people aren't able to learn in a way because they aren't exposed to anything that might be difficult for them and a lot of the learning that we need to be doing involves some real difficult talks

A lot of the things that need to change in the world or in America I should say I'm not going to make generalizations to the world but a lot of the things that need to change in America involve us really needing to have more of a kind of truth and reconciliation situation than a politically correct non-triggering environment

But I'm not trying to make an anti-political correctness statement generally that's not what I'm doing what I'm saying is that there are a lot of societal problems that need to change that involve people changing their attitudes about things in a similar way to the way we went from gay people could never possibly get married to well of course gay people can get married

so I guess what I'm saying is perhaps all these wonderful changes that the deck is telling me are going to happen perhaps they aren't really going to happen perhaps it's just telling me what I want to hear I don't know but it's two different decks and they both tend to be kind of tough love type decks really they're both reinforcing the same message so I cannot help but think that something some of this is going to happen

And they did tell me it's all going to be okay

When I look at things I don't see okay I see scary post-apocalyptic hellscape

But apparently okay

Okay so I would say this more or less completely verifies that other reading we've got the chariot which represents will but in this deck not necessarily very directed will we've got the hierophant that in this deck represents a connection with sort of a universal spirituality in the book she talks about the hierophant being a specific priest in ancient Greece who kind of presided over the ceremonies of Demeter and it wasn't really about him it was about her or the cycles of essentially the things that were involved in sustaining life for the community food and whatnot 

But then the hierophant became a position that was essentially representative of the Pope energy but now in this deck this card is kind of moving past that into some sort of a universal spiritual consciousness represented by the characters in the book that are you know native summer native American and some are from major world religions but the idea is there's this will that needs a direction and then there's a universal spirituality and then the sun I know I've mentioned that the sun is a super duper positive card but in this deck it's represented by these birds which are the first birds that emerge in the spring and they become more and more yellow I wasn't clear exactly why but it has to do with the the warmth and the sun and whatever and then it has the sunflowers that always turn so they can follow the sun and get as much light as possible so I mean this combination is kind of like you know a turn from the chaos to the light

That's what I'm going with a turn from the chaos to the light

and then in the center column we've got you know joy again which is Ace of cups which showed up in the other reading as well and then we've got six of cups which in some decks can represent a kind of nostalgia for the past but in this deck specifically does not so go with me here You could really look at it like you know the the people who are great again they have this the people who aren't that as a dog whistle for slavery times right The people who are make America great again who are thinking of it in what I think the majority of people thought of it in Reagan times was this idea that there was a point in the past that never I don't believe but they're nostalgic for it this time when everything wasGood and true and just in the American way and everybody was prosperous and blah blah blah

I maintain that what they're remembering is something that never existed truly

It may have existed at different points for small groups of people within the community but it tends to get generalized into this magic time where it was just all beautiful and wonderful after you know we came back from world war II and the economy was booming and everybody could finally buy things after they had been deprived during the depression and they had been deprived during the war and now suddenly everything was roses

Well I mean

Reagan

And whatever

And you could tie that kind of you know yearning nostalgia for simpler times when things were all good that maybe didn't ever really exist that the 6th of cups cards represents in other decks

But this one kind of turns away from that and says no there's a very fundamental quality that is not just true among people but it's true among animals it's true among all creatures that there's a certain necessity for just play and happiness and not having any of that sort of looking for something that happened in the past but is very much about being in the now in a positive way

And then there's Joy which I think I mentioned is the same as the Ace of cups which was in the previous reading and also I think I talked about Joy in a previous reading that I did but with happiness and joy and fulfillment I mean I don't think it could get a whole lot clearer and the fulfillment in this deck is about Caribou making this long track across this kind of dangerous river and some of them will make it and some of them will not make it but it's part of their migration and this caribou is on the bank and he's dripping water into these cups and it's like fulfillment in the sense that he has accomplished this thing that he needed to accomplish to survive and you know there's the geese and of course nine of cups is the wish card which was also in the previous reading 

and then we have the seven of roots which is the seven of pentacles which is all about growth and cycles but it's also in this debt got a part to it where people are frightened of the cicadas when they come out they think they're locusts and they're going to destroy everything and eat all the crops and they think it's crisis and plague and bad things coming to get us but in point of fact none of that stuff happens the locusts come out and they go up in the trees and they do their thing and then you know there's they sing their songs and there are the dried out skins that they shed that are left all over the ground but they've had this long cycle that they've gone through and crawled their way up out of the dirt and done their thing and then that's all over and it's on to the next 17-year cycle so that takes into account a lot of you know that hysteria and growth and whatever so I think that's fairly reinforcing of the message of the other one also

and then mother of horns we've mentioned that before that she's all tied in with creativity being an important and essential part of life with her paintbrushes or flowers that look like paint brushes and her flutes and the turtles and everything it's just really pretty and good

And then daughter of feathers ties in with that Hopimythology again with there being multiple worlds like one ends and another one starts and remember the ants were protecting them well when they came out when it was safe to come out they didn't have any food and so this bird some kind of swallow brings them part of an ear of corn that they can plant and start their food supply up again so it's it's got to do with that rebuilding the world after the destruction of the world kind of energy so I mean that all seems very much to support and reinforce previous reading and there are just a few other cards that didn't fit in with that and I will be right back with those

Okay so the negative cards that we had were the hermit and the tower and the eight of swords and Herman isn't exactly a negative card it just didn't fit in anywhere with the other things The hermit is kind of about introspection and carrying your own light and the tower is about sudden transformative change

That might be for your best interest but is usually difficult and people usually see the tower as a very bad card eight of swords is interference it's basically feeling like you're trapped or that what you want to do is being interfered with in your unable to move so then I pulled these other cards

So with the hermit I got the star and the hanged man and the hanged man is about stopping and looking at things from a different perspective it's about I mean the the image is pretty clear You're hanging upside down and you can't go anywhere or do anything so it can be a peaceful meditative experience or it can be less pleasant but it's definitely a different perspective and the star is generally about hope and positive things for the future combination of these cards seems to me it's indicate that there is going to be a very hard look taken at where things have gone wrong and how we can ensure that this does not happen again where someone I mean it doesn't say in the cards where someone completely hijacks all of them or group of someone's completely hijacked all of the checks and balances that are designed to make sure that tyranny does not occur not just a few of them but like all of them so so that looks like it's going to happen and then the tower had the three of wands and the three of cups

Now the three of wands is sometimes seen as being virtue but it is for sure a very stable solid structure of wands which is all about energy and passion and drive and enthusiasm and creativity so you know in this deck with the kind of tripod structure it's it's almost like the four is that kind of creating the celebratory space but this is more like creating the structure to be able to work in creating the structure that will hold things together and the three of cups is usually about celebration and harmony and it's another one that can be seen as you know a wedding or an engagement or a birth but in this case it's just about kind of that kind of love of people friends but then also you've got the rainbow at the top and the characters seem like they're at least of different races and maybe multi-racial so and they've got the little heart tattoos they've all got little heart tattoos so it's like in the context of this reading it seems to be saying that there's going to be some kind of major forward movement in that direction as well

and then with the aid of swords the interference you know if I just had that card in relation to the election I would definitely think oh well you know they're going to try to pull fast one but with all these other cards I mean clearly there has been interference already and will continue to be interference but then with the five of swords which is that kind of like you might hurt yourself or you might hurt others with your pretty little rings and then the lovers which you know is about lovers but it's also about choice and connections and binding things together and so I was like I don't really get it I don't really see how these things connect so I pulled another card which was the 10 of pentacles and the 10 of pentacles is kind of I mean it can be another happily ever after type card but it can also be and is usually more like establishing an estate for your children preparing for future generations legacy right but in this deck they've got it's really cool it's like balancing act it's all about you know the one person with the other person balanced on top of them with the dog on top so it's like and it's like at night and it just rather than being more specifically about some kind of financial situation it seems more to be about the understanding that you know if you're going to build a pyramid you got to have a strong foundation and then you got to have a strong middle part and you've you know I mean in order for and then the dog is I mean he's really kind of sweet and the people don't be sense from them that they're struggling it's like they're just casually in this weird contorted position with the dog on top

And so I guess those things together say to me thatmaybe the interference is multifaceted like maybe there's interference going into the election but then after that maybe there's a sense of people not just casually moving forward with whatever they want to do but stopping and looking at the different ways in which their actions can be harmful to other people and how we're not separate from each other and how we have to have balance

And that the important thing is not to have these people over here who say this and those people over there who say that but the important thing is to have a sense of loyalty to the larger structure of the country

Okay so that's my divinatory reading and I don't see how it is possible at all that that is going to happen

in fact that seems so utopian and filled with hope that I'm going to do a whole nother reading with the other deck because I just don't buy this but that is that's my reading That's it what's so crazy about peace love and happiness

Okay so first the two of cups in the nine of cups we're in the initial reading they were in the initial grid matrix whatever but then in the extra cards there's Ace of cups and ten of cups and the empress who isn't a cup but I think you'll agree that she kind of fits in with this so I'm reading her with these cards so Ace of cups is you know the beginning of the feeling of love and joy and creativity and all that stuff and the ten of cups is you know I know I said that the nine is usually the highest and then the ten is usually moving on to the next thing and that's sort of true with cops but it's less true with cups than it is with the other ones The ten of cups is like the happily ever after card kind of so like nine of cups is the wish card and ten of cups is happily ever after which in this one is a bunch of people you know sitting around a campfire out in the in nature with the stars and then there are these kind of I don't know like intangible cups like the cups aren't concrete they're ghost cups so it's like they're telling ghost stories about all the different feelings and emotions and whatever right and the empress is about creativity and fertility and you know all that kind of stuff so I mean I read this very as a some sort of like you know how we've had this very divided very hateful situation going on and it's just escalated and escalated and escalated but it's been going on for a long time and now it's reached the point where I mean the two different sides don't listen to each other and they demonize each other in a way that is really unhealthy well this is just a lot of love in this and not just like you know friend love or I mean it's justit's just very positive cards to the point where I feel like there's going to be some sort of change and I can't imagine what could bring about this change I mean I can't see how I mean even if Biden is elected and even if the house flipped I mean the Senate flips to Democrat so all the houses are together with the executive branch and even if they all have like a big love fest about you know taking care of people and and loving the world and solving the problems that we have and black lives matter and millennials and zoomers feeling like there's just no point in the political process and not understanding the ideas of compromise and cooperation that go along with American politics or strong arming and whatever

To the point where they would send a letter to Biden saying basically if you don't do everything that we wanted Bernie to do then we won't support you and there are so many people that I hear just going on and on about how they're not going to vote because they're not going to vote for Biden because he's not any different

And I mean I get it but I don't get it because how how could they possibly think that allowing 45 to be re-elected could do anything good or could get even one of the things they want done to be passed so I mean the idea that there could be all these people who are saying if we don't get everything we want then we're not even going to do anything that might get some of the things we want done we're just not going to participate

And I am hearing that

So I don't see how even if the stars align we're moving from this very toxic and negative situation that we're in that isn't just caused by the Trump cult I mean they are making it very difficult but they are not it's not just them it's not just that one group and and when they get out of power everything's going to be all hunky-dory they're all these other issues you know

And I suppose that you could boil them down to a sense of disenfranchisement just kind of across the board I mean I think that even a lot of the people who voted for Trump last time did it because they felt disenfranchised by the political process and they felt like if they had someone who was from the outside that that was going to somehow be better for them than to have someone who had been a career politician

And I initially thought that at least that feeling was kind of a good sign both sides were looking for someone who was not a status quo they were looking for you know Trump or they were looking for Bernie but they were looking for somebody who was going to make fundamental changes

And that isn't how it played out

And certainly there were people in Trump's base who were and are racist you know crazy people but it's not just them it was a coalition of people who felt like maybe they finally had somebody who would do what they had been trying to get people to do for I mean years right

But I don't see how if the stars align that there's just going to magically be a total change where people are valued and loved and the American ideals are upheld and I mean the cards in this reading just represent an awful lot of good loving positive things and system corrections lots of system corrections in the direction of harmony and preservation and peacefulness and love and I find it hard to believe that all of that is going to happen with this transition

But that's what the cards say

Okay so I decided to do a reading on the election see what it said and I was asking it you know is there going to be peaceful transition of power is 45 going to get reelected or is biden going to get elected and if Biden gets elected is 45 going to leave or is he going to try to stay I was basically asking it all these questions I'm like just give me a kind of a view of what's going to happen

And it was interesting it all kind of lined up there are seven more cards that I pulled so that means I pulled what 16 cards 19 cards I can't count I should probably just pull like two or three more cards but we'll see so they all lined up fours and twos and nines and pentacle court cards then there's a stack of other cards that I'm going to have to reconcile on their own but I'm going to start with this stuff except to say that one of the random cards is the page of swords so I predict you have some sort of a planned communication related to the selection or else if things go badly there will be a communication from you like you know what I'm saying there's a project coming from you that's a communication one where the other and I haven't really read the card s*** so I don't know if it's coming out bad or good but it looks preliminarily like good

So the fours with the emperor and the four of pentacles and the four of wands it's all about power and the four of pentacles is kind of that hoarding grasping energy and then the four of wands is a celebratory energy and and that kind of magical creation of the new space so I think there may in fact be a little bit of trouble but I don't think that the forces of evil are going to prevail and it might even be that the hoarding and grasping close of the pentacles has to do with holding tight to the principles of the country I can't say yet

The twos there's two of pentacles and two of swords and two of cups and again that two of swords with the crossed energy is more like you know no I'm standing my ground you must go no further the two of cups is more about that you know connection between people and the two of pentacles is about change and it's got that kind of a magic so I think that looks like very positive

The nines and also nines are like a completione no not completion but nines are like the fulfillment where 10 sometimes 10 goes over into the it's too much we've got to start a new phase 9 is like the goodness the sweet spot the amazingness and choose are like not the beginning energy but the more kind of stabilizing energy it's the first stage at which there is a concrete action taken maybe is a way to explain it it's not just the thing and it's raw form it's the beginning of like an actionary step so choose and nines are very positive in this reading and then pentacles court cards there's that's all about hard work and dedication rationality it can be like I think I mentioned before it can be about the senses so it it or money it's all very to do with kind of earthiness and the real world as opposed to philosophical or energetic or whatever but King of pentacles is a very all three of these pentacle cards are very stabilizing energies and the the page of pentacles I mean he's making like a piece crane you know what I'm saying and the night of pentacles he's all about like hard work and effort and the king of pentacles is about I mean he's kind of like the the Lion King he's viewing his kingdom all he surveys and he's in I read about this card in the book and it's not that he's I mean I looked at it initially and I'm like that's kind of weird he's like a void but no he's in shadow and what he's looking at is you know like the future and it's bright and clear and focus whereas he is like inside you know kind of like that thing where you're in a oh I'm just getting this this is good like when you're inside a dark room and so what's outside is even brighter and clearer so it's like he's looking out onto the world that is no longer in shadow he's in shadow he's in a shadowy place but he's looking out into a more positive place I mean I don't think the card is intended to have that kind of shadowy meaning but I think for this particular reading I think it's pertinent

And again you know there's not a lot of swords there's not a lot of wands The swords that there are are the the only ones are the two and that card is you know about justice and balance and this particular card has got the like no you shall go no further kind of energy about it and then for wands we only have that four of wands which is about that kind of celebratory positive space being created and the nine of wands which is about this particular one I think is really kind of beautiful because nine of wands is kind of about standing your ground a lot of times it's a final final stand before your battle you know with the idea what kind of like in Henry the 5th you know rallying the troops and but not necessarily about their being other people it's more like an internal like you are preparing yourself for the final onslaught for the final battle right but in this one it's got this very kind of looks like a body you know the ones the eight ones on the side they kind of look like ribs and then there's this one in the middle that's kind of like the spine and there's a broken bone and it's all tied up with this red string which kind of looks like the out makes it kind of look like the outline of a body and there's this kind of vascular energy to it and so I read it as very much internal fortitude you know as opposed to anything to do with battles even it's just you know you're taking the thing that's broken in you and you're binding it up and then nine of pentacles is you know that you know you have everything you need or want monetarily and you know it's the queen in her garden with her falcon and you know it's I mean that's not exactly what's depicted in this card it's she's got the falcon but you don't see the garden but you see that kind of eye above her and I I read it as more like she's on top of it everything is under control and then the nine of cups is the wish card but in this it's got this very you know pink art love love happiness sensuality so it's like you know internal fortitude and top of your game and joy and happiness so I mean I read this as a very positive you know maybe we're saving America kind of thing but now I have to read the cards that were not working out into the grid and see what they have to add to it and I dictated all of this so if there's some wack stuff that doesn't make sense just keep in mind that I have too thick of an accent for this thing