Slept in past the morning chill until almost eight am and stepped out of the tent feeling great. Breakfast and a walk before a smoke. I am enjoying smoking a pipe again, though that does just put tobacco back on the list of the things I could be better off without.
However, fifty dollars for a fourteen ounce can is a cheap price to smoke. Also, it takes a bit of care to smoke a burl wood pipe correctly. We’ll skip seasoning the bowl, just packing and preparing each smoke is a process. On a small scale, it’s just like building a little campfire planning for a slow burn, then tending it as it burns. Packed well it can last forty five minutes or more.
I used a new gps app on my phone to track my lap around the block, it’s a half mile – five laps would be two and half! At least on that app. I tried different in the afternoon, on a different route though, yet it didn’t seem to align. Oh well, more reason to try the second app in the morning. I hope it won’t send me looking for a third.
I felt good sitting down to smoke and rest for a while. While I smoked I considered a list of other things I could be doing. Another lap? nah. Catfish point trail? nah. Clean up the site? nah. Second bowl of cereal? nah. Keep enjoying the smoke? yeah that sounded good. It was a nice morning and I no plans until sometime before one. At some point I walked over to the restrooms and on my way back met another neighbor.
I had actually seen Joe on my morning lap and even had a brief exchange with him yesterday also. I seem to think I had mentioned it, yet it’s eleven thirty seven, so I won’t go look now. We had a long discussion, standing on the sidewalk, then I needed to sit and invited him to my site. We continued for another hour. By eleven thirty I set an alarm on my phone, so that I wouldn’t miss Beth at the gym (and Laticia.) I got to the gym at twelve fifty.
The topic that engrossed us? Joe, after offering and opening a religious discussion, which I both accepted and enjoyed, gave me his testimony and explained to me some of his learning so far – he has read extensively and committed many scriptures to memory. At one point he affirmed his belief in predestination. I smiled and we talked. I hope to talk with him more after sharing a few points for him to think about today.
I am so glad I saw the gym yesterday. I am so glad Beth was so nice and invited me back at a scheduled time today. I am so glad I made it a priority to go. My legs hurt so good. Oh, parts made me scream. I lowered the weigh for many exercises and pushed higher than I thought for others. Yesterday squats with a bar enticed me, yet today the seated leg press looked bit safer for my first day back in a gym since the four weeks on the seated stair stepper at the YMCA in Jackson taught me how to ignore pain last summer.
Oh, the thigh machine. it’s eleven forty eight, I don’t have time for details. Went to a (the?) local vape store to see if they had any of the hemp pre-rolls, as Hoff’s has been out of the kind I have grown accustomed to, yet they did not. An interesting conversation none the less on the difference between Michigan’s and Texas’s laws.
A call from the park office to notify me of an Amazon deliver pulled me out of there and back to the site. All Amazon packages have arrive and one more coming from HRO. Soon, this weekend I hope, the car wiring project will be done, and done nicely.
A Friday night. I wanted to shoot a game of pool. The next town over had a decent place. Drove over and played two games and had a Doctor Pepper.
Good night. Some stories are for the book. Reality is better here.
Time to rest.
PS. A few other important things did happen today, as always I could not write them all. Yet, one thing, and it is a less good story needs to be told somehow. A conversation with a park neighbor, as that person went past my lot. They stopped to engage me, we’ve chatted before, I went out to the road to meet them. They told me an unpleasant story in which they did not feel well and want me to help them feel better about their position. The story I was told involved this person and another park neighbor. By the persons own first hand account, I knew that they had made the other person feel even more less well than they felt themselves and in a situation the person told me they knew other ways it could have been handled. Is the inclusion of other stories relevant to telling my own?
I need to THINK and pray, then rest and repeat, before I figure out how to tell that story. And then how that story relates, I think to my neighbors Mathew and Chris. Do I have a role to play here?
In a final parting meta thoughts (past midnight post scripts are rare- and only for necessary information.)
Yet, how choose to tell these next stories is important. There are many true ways to tell a story, yet there is only one Truth. Even the four gospels had different accounts of the same events. I have already crossed that road in my disclaimer, if you see errors in my stories, it could be the characters I’ve created and written about, or the errors could be in my own brain or biases, paranoias and other false perceptions as I’ve written about otherwise perfect people.
What happens to my own live action adventure day by day, if other people are actively involved and aware of their roles in my story? Should people know how important they are to us each day? Should we tell them? Should it be written about it? Should I tell each other that gets written about? For that matter, what happens to my own actions if I am involved and aware of the role I’m playing- or trying to play? Am I still “Acting as if..”?
Readers: open for commentary on the Facebook post… should each person be informed? Should my story be cut away by the others consent or lack thereof? Let me know what you think- Thanks!