Street Performer

This afternoon, my daughter and I walked down to the beach to see the Kite Festival. It was very cool; lots of different colored, shaped, and sized kites. There was an area where performers were showing choreographed kite moves done in sync with dramatic music. The four person kite team impressed me the most with their kites wildly darting through the sky, dancing on the ground, and twisting and untwisting around each other.

We then went on to the pier to see it from this vantage point. It was really beautiful.
We decided to head home when at the end of the pier was a scruffy man talking very loudly and a small crowd was gathered around him. At first I thought he was a proselytizing christian but the laughter from the crowd didn't fit that mold. I decided to get closer and check him out.

He said he was a street performer, definitly not a magician. He was going to show us a few things and for the grand finale, he was going to hammer a nail into his head. This intrigued me. He asked me and this other guy if we would each hold a juggling ball for him. Then he asked us to hold them up in the air. Then he asked for volunteers to help with his performance. That's right, we were to only two with our hands in the air. He brought us up and asked us to help tie him up in this long chain. He had the spiel going the whole time which included him saying that I was really good at this so this couldn't been the first time tying someone up. Wink wink, nudge nudge.

He escaped the chains in 29 seconds which was somewhat impressive but since he had instructed us on the exact way to secure the chains, it was less than a miracle.
He took forever getting to the nail in the head trick. I almost decided to go but, you know, I "volunteered" and all.

My job for this part was to hold a pair of pliers and towel in case anything should go wrong. If he collapsed on the ground I was asked to pull out the nail and try to stop the bleeding. If I thought this was remotely possible, I would have left then. "Lucky John" was just playing it up. I also held the board up for him to nail through to prove tht the nail was real.

Anyway, he kept talking to attract a bigger crowd for the finale; "Kids don't try this anywhere" and such. When he finally got to it, he put the nail into his nostril and proceeded to hammer it straight back, not up,into his head. This was a 2 1/2 inch nail so even though I was thinking he was going to pound it into his skull, I have to admit, it looked pretty remarkable. He let people take pictures then took the pliers from me and proceeded to "pry" the nail from his head; no blood, no snot. He then took donations. I didn't contribute; one, because I hadn't brought any money and two, I had contributed by being his "assistant."

Made for an interesting afternoon though. I never would have guessed that this would have happened today or really, any other day. Seemed out of place in Seal Beach. Venice Beach? Definitely.

Compersion

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Compersion is love manifested when a person takes joy in his or her loved one's happiness with another person. It is a form of empathy; that is, pleasure that a loved one is experiencing a good thing in his or her life. It need not be sexual. This distinguishes it from erotic excitement in watching another person or persons behaving sexually, known as voyeurism.

Feeling compersion for the first time is sometimes described as frightening and disorienting because it runs contrary to the jealousy most cultures believe one is likely to feel in such circumstances.

The term was coined by the Kerista Commune in San Francisco which practiced polyfidelity, and is one of the core values of polyamory.

The adjective frubbly is sometimes used within the poly community in the United Kingdom to describe the feeling of compersion.^[1]

^{So I saw this word, compersion, on a shirt that was being sold on-line. I looked it up on dictionary.com but there were no matches so I google searched it and got a lot of sites that talk about this.}

^{I like this definition. I've experienced compersion in the relationship with em and eduardo. It's really a nice place to be. Love seems less quantifiable and more infinite when you realize that there is room in your heart to romantically love two people. I can see how this could include more people than two and obviously there are many ways to love and certain people fill needs in your life. As far as a commited, loving and sexual relationship goes, two others looks like my limit. I'm really happy where I'm at now.}

^{As far as jealousy goes, I do experience it from time to time but not because I'm jealous of the fact that em and eduardo are deeply in love; I celebrate this. The jealousy comes from wishing we were all living together. From knowing that they get to spend almost every night or at least parts of each night snuggled up in bed together. This, though, makes the time I do get to spend with them really special. The sex is amazing but it's not always about this. It's often that warm feeling of sharing cozy space with the ones you love. It's shopping and making dinners together. It's the whole family gathering for a DVD and laughing or commenting on what we're watching. It about going and climbing trees together. It's about sharing our lives in intimate ways.}

I'm feeling pretty secure that we are working toward a future where we all live under the same roof. I know tht this will bring some unique challenges but I also know the level of love and commitment there is here and I believe we'll be ready for that challenge.

Parental Visit

I seem to be on a roll here. I've posted the last four days! Let's see how long I can keep it coming.

My Dad called me to ask if he and my Mom could stay the night at my place because they have a dentist appointment in the morning and they live an hour away, which can take much longer in rush hour traffic. My dilema is that I've been looking forward to dropping off my kids with their father and staying at em and eduardo's for the night. The kids stayed with me last weekend, so it's seem like ages since I've had a night free.

After much thought, I decided to offer my place to my parents and tell them that I wasn't planning on being there tonight. They accepted and didn't ask where it was I'd be. I was ready to answer them truthfully if asked. I also made arrangements to go out for a late breakfast with them after their appointment.

Seems like a pretty good compromise to me!

Out to the children

A week ago last Monday, I told my kids about my relationship with em and eduardo. I made this decision for many reasons. It's been hard to keep this a secret and I wanted to make sure they heard it from me and not in some less advantageous way. em and eduardo's kids are getting used to me being around for practically entire weekends when my kids are with their father. My kids don't get that practical, hands on experience. Eventually we'd like to live together. My kids need this time to get used to the idea of their mom being in love with a woman and a man; not your most usual arrangement.

My son was a bit upset. He's been going through quite a few changes as he approaches adulthood that have been hard, yet good, for him. He said something to the effect that the "three" thing was strange and he was tired of having new things coming at him so often. Neither of them was completely surprised about em but had no idea about eduardo. There is a long story, that I won't go into here, where a while back, I told the kids about my feelings for em but ended up telling them a week or two later that we decided to just be friends. (This was true for quite a while)

My daughter said she was fine with it. I believe her. She has been changing and growing in so many wonderful ways that may have happened anyway but really started about the time of my divorce.

Son has said since that after thinking things over, he's feeling better about it. I offered to give him my last therapy appointment with someone we all started seeing. At first he said yes. Then he said it didn't seem necessary. I was given the advice by this therapist not to push him but to let him know he can see her anytime he feels like it.

As for me, it feels nice not to have this big part of my life kept from them. The three of us are still very casual around all the kids. em, eduardo and the kids have been battling colds for the last week or so. We haven't really all been together, say for dinner or anything, since I told them. I feel pretty confident that this will all work out fine.

My kids are their usual charming selves. They stayed in town with me last weekend and we had a nice time. We enjoy each others company very much. They are bright, sensitive and interesting people. I'm really lucky to have them in my life. I think they're pretty fortunate to have me too, even with the odd parts of my life.

Habitation Decisions

As noted last post, I live in a really great place. The kids love living here by the beach. It's been a struggle to make the rent every month and I've had to resort to going into my savings more often than I had anticipated. When we moved here I told the kids that I was commited to living here for a year but that I wasn't sure if I would want to continue past this time because of the high rent. I was looking forward to getting past the year lease I signed and start paying month to month which is what the tenets in my tri-plex did with the old owner.

The place got sold and although this new owner must abide by the conditions of the lease that was in place, I'm fairly certain he will, in the very least, up my rent in November. The smaller place below me is coming up to be leased. I asked the woman who lives there why she's moving and she said Simon just told them they had to move. He wants to remodel and re-rent. She asked him if they'd done anything wrong and he said "no." She then said "Do you just want to rent it for more?" He siad yes. He's asking the same rent as I pay even though my unit has a pretty big extra den with a fireplace. I also have a large sundeck and storage/carport parking which the downstairs unit does not have. This doen't look so great for me.

So what to do? I'm going to call him today and see if he will give me an idea of what his plans are. I guess I'm jumping the gun to spend a bunch of time considering what I'm going to do until I at least know what he's thinking, but I get wrapped up in this stuff pretty easily. I start analyzing all my potential moves to the point of not being able to sleep. Stay here? Move to another place close by? Move inland and save $400-$500 a month? Do I even want to sign another year long lease anywhere? Ahh!! My Brain!! I keep telling myself, turn this over to spirit. Easier said than done.

UPDATE:
I talked to Simon. He says he's "happy with the way I pay my rent." He has no plans to raise my rent. Someday he'd like to turn the den into a third bedroom and bath so then there would be some negotiation. Nothing of this sort is going to happen soon.
He couldn't talk long but I guess I can stop worrying. I figure I'd like to be here for the next six months or so. I'll put this energy into my business. That is, right after I get back from surfing. Bye!

Surfing

I live a block and a half from the beach. I decided to re-take up surfing. By this I mean that I owned a surfboard in Jr. high & high school and would occasionally go out. I never was very good and one day I wiped out pretty bad and when I came up there was a shadow over my head. Someone had grabbed my board just before it would have hit me on top of my head. I got out of the water thinking that I had narrowly escaped death by drowning (which I have heard it very colorful way to go) and traded my surfboard for a boogie board. Nice and soft.

Anyway, I went surfing a couple years ago with eduardo and another friend with a borrowed board and had fun.

I bought what is called a soft top surfboard a couple of months ago and have been going out fairly often. It's been fun. Today was really beautiful. The sun was shinning, the water was clear and sparlkly. I'm really enjoying being out there and not taking myself too seriously; riding the smaller waves and not pushing myself too hard.

It's also nice to walk directly from my place, surf, walk back, shower and be ready for the rest of my day about an hour and a half later. Sweet deal, huh?

Words of Ayn Rand

Here's something to counteract those "I can't live without you" type of songs heard so often.

From the Little Big Book of Life

Author Ayn Rand to her fan, Joanne Rondeau May 22, 1948

Dear Ms. Rondeau:

You asked me the meaning of my sentence in THE FOUNTAINHEAD: “ To say ‘I love you’ one must know first how to say the “I.’

The meaning of that sentence is contained in the whole of THE FOUNTAINHEAD. And it is stated right in the speech on page 400 from which you took the sentence. The meaning of the “I” is an independent, self-sufficient entity that DOES NOT EXIST for the sake of any other person.

A person who only exits for the sake of his loved one is not an independent entity, but a spiritual parasite. The love of a parasite is worth nothing.

The usual (and very vicious) nonsense preached on the subject of love claims that love is self-sacrifice. A man’s SELF is his spirit. If one sacrifices his spirit, who or what is left to feel love? True love is profoundly SELFISH, in the noblest meaning of the word- it is an expression of one’s SELF, of one’s highest values. When a person is in love, he seeks his own happiness- and NOT his sacrifice to the loved one. And the loved one would be a monster if she wanted or expected sacrifice.

Any person who wants to live FOR others- for one sweetheart or for the whole of mankind- is a selfless nonentity. An independent “I” is a person who exists for his own sake. Such a person does not make any vicious pretense of self-sacrifice and does not demand it from the person he loves. Which is the only way to be in love and the only form of a self-respecting relationship between two people.

Gong

Guess what I bought recently? A gong! You know everyone needs a gong! Well at least if you own a Martial Arts school that teaches a Kung Fu style but goes by a Karate name.

I'd been trying to look for a way to get a bit of Chinese culture into the school without pissing off the Christians too much. We bow at certain times during class as a sign of respect but that's about it.

The kids and I were poking around town one day when we came across a store clearing out some imported merchandise. There, out front, was a beautiful gong. The stand is hand carved wood with Dragons on it. The gong itself produces a beautiful full sound. If hit hard it is very loud! The price was half off the sale price; about 60 bucks. I told the kids "I'm buying that gong!"

They were pretty excited and said "I bet no one else's Mom we know is buying a gong today!" We all laughed the rest of the day about this.

So now we have a gong at the school and we'll be putting it to use to bow into and out of each class. Don't know why, but it feels like this will bring some cool energy to the place.