365 days.

[also posted at The Exponent]

365 days ago, I started a project where I did a drawing every day.

It is startling to look back and see how much just that little project has changed me over the course of this handful of days. I am a much more experienced artist now than I was 365 days ago.

Also this year I think I have put more miles on my legs than any other year of my life since high school.

These are just two little accomplishments that help me to gauge what I have done this year. I guess, being able to put a number to it helps me see the progress easier.

Even when there isn't an easy number one can use to assess progress, it is happening anyways. I've learned and grown in many ways this year, in areas where numerical statistics don't really apply.

What I am really trying to say here is that Time happens. Days pass.
What things sort of things did you do these past 365 days? What do you have planned for the next 365?

if given the time.....

DH and offspring have gone on a road-trip to visit family. I, however, have several little obligations scattered through the week plus an art deadline fast-approaching so I opted to stay here at home. Alone. For almost the whole week.

This is my chance, my opportunity to see just how productive I can be when I have the house to myself for a duration of more than just a few hours. (Especially as I have no car and will be mostly home-bound except for what I can do on my bike. )

for starters:
~Art deadline: I have some serious work to do to get a comic submission finalized by the end of this week. Plus I gotta tighten up our Monsters and Mormons comic (that was just accepted!) AND I have inSitu illustrations to get to work on and 20spec illustrations to prep for. Etc. Plenty to keep my hands busy with.

~This week I start training for my first full length marathon.

~I am curious how much of a dent I can make in the stack of books by my bedside: That stack that has grown dusty waiting for me to free up enough time to open a book and read just for leisure. Yep.

~Yah, okay, I may also see how much of a dent I can make in my Netflix queue. But I really need to watch out... I could easily get myself totally caught up in Dr Who or something and emerge on the other side, the whole week gone, and none of that other stuff to show for it. (Yes I have done that before.)

So that's my plan.
(Meanwhile, safe journeys to my loved ones <3)

#AmDrawing!!!

truth and story telling

the rest of the story...
the untold story...
their side of the story...
history is a story written by the winners...

I was raised in the LDS tradition, one that leaned heavily on the rhetoric of absolute truth (and the ability to know truth "with out a shadow of a doubt").

Now, I am mostly satisfied to accept ambiguity.
I accept that everyone frames events in their own way, telling the story from their angle, their own truth, how the world appears to them. We tell our stories to others and we tell our stories to ourselves.
And when the stories don't align...
well...

yah.

Joseph Smith may have been a womanizing fraud. Or he may have been a sincere but misguided charismatic leader. Or he have been a true mystic communicating with beings beyond the veil.

(It's a bit of a stretch but I find odd intersects between the cults of personality surrounding Joseph Smith and Julian Assange. Truth be told, I empathize more with Bradly Manning types. But I digress...)

What I really wanted to say is:

"Sometimes I crave truth but am not sure there's any such thing. I will settle for sincere honesty."

I actually DID say that, earlier today, on twitter and a friend responded:

"will insincere, but non-malicious, bordering on the truth, white lies, do in a pinch? :)"

That sure got me thinking. Because initially I wanted to insist upon the harshness of honesty, but, perhaps non-malicious bordering-on-the-truth white lies are the mortar of society. Thoughts?

Two random things:
1) Neil Gaiman's words about our masks/false faces/story telling.

2) Mike Kimera's words about writing lies to tell the truth (mildly nsfw).

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btw, here's the page in my sketchbook where I outlined some of these thoughts ->


Yes, I know, this is all very random and obscure.
Thanks for bearing with me.
<3

pushing past comfortable

Yesterday, a friend and I ran 13.1 miles.
(Which involved getting up at 3:30 am to drive to a drop point on the other side of town in order to be bused to the way-out-there start-lines, where we stood huddled in the cold and dark, clustered around heat lamps with all the other participants until it was finally time to start the race. /Whew!)

My plan/goal was just to finish. I was thinking of keeping a nice slow pace ("la-la-dee-dah") and breezing into the finish having accomplished merely running father than I previously have.

My friend, however, was in this to push hard and make a time goal.

So we found ourselves running at a nice stiff pace that I usually reserve for much shorter distances. I kept thinking we'd eventually slow down, but the miles flew past and we kept that pace like clockwork. The last two miles, pushing to the end of our limits I was SURE we'd slow down, but still we kept that pace. (It was NOT comfortable at this point.) And then finally the homestretch and a sprint to the finish, and zohMyGAWD that hurt SO MUCH!!... But we did it.

It made me realize how much I hold back, satisfied to stay in comfortable safe areas, when actually I have the capability to push farther/harder/faster. This, not just in running. In personal relationships and my professional life as well.

It's a fairly straightforward thing to pick up the running pace a bit. Not so simple to explain what that means in personal and professional aspects of my life, but it's something I am thinking about.

There is this: I would NOT have kept up that pace if I had not had my friend next to me, motivating me, encouraging me. (Thank you Katy.)

Meanwhile... My knees and my quads are ANGRY at me for keeping that less-comfortable pace. Ice packs and ibuprofen are helping.

[Here, here and here are the posts chronicling the building of my active life.]

another mashup: Safe Sex+Assange etc

Other people said things better than me and so I'm going to collect some of it here to pretend that I am worthy.

(prompted by the recent arrest of Wiki-leaks founder Julian Assange, arrested NOT for releasing secret international cables, but for having sex where a condom was agreed to be used but then wasn't.)

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BoingBoing succinctly recapped excellent articles by Kate Harding and Feministe with 'Whatever the Julian Assange arrest is about, it's NOT about how much women suck'.

RadicalBytes tweeted: "Lets not mistake government's cynical opportunistic misuse of sexual assault allegations for a conspiracy by the alleged victims themelves".

Carlin Ross wrote an interesting piece about this link between Sexuality and Classified Documents, and the use of scandal as a form of sexual repression.

Lessie Brown used the events as a jumping off point to discuss historic legal definitions of Rape and how they apply today. (All those blurry lines surrounding consent and human error vs human assholes.)

A friend showed me this article, an exceptional break down of the flaws in the rape apology rhetoric surrounding the Assange Case.

Finally, these have NOTHING to do with Julian Assange, but I absolutely MUST wrap it all up with->

~a Most Amazing Comic called Sex Talk (a very valuable look at communication and consent)
and
~this hilarious Sexual Consent Form spoof (thanks Lessie!)

(btw, as per actually address the subject of leaked secret cables: Here is an interesting article about the problems with DHS still trying to treat them as classified information, even though they are now effectively in the public domain.)

keeping friends

I've had this reoccurring thought, a question, about how many people I keep in touch with as time passes.

The reality is I tend to move on from people.

It's frequently that as my circumstances change, so does who I hang out with. IE, empolyment, housing, school, etc.

And also...
There can be a certain appeal in moving on from those who know your flaws to those for whom you are a new and shiny mystery.

And I have a difficult time creating deep and lasting friendships.

So that reoccurring thought tickling the back of my mind, it's telling me to work harder at being a better friend.
That's all.